AderynCoch

Does Craig Evans have your login details?

No sign of any snow here either. Harumph.

I think you're getting mixed up with January 1766 (4.4mm E&W). 1776 actually managed 51.6mm. And TM has definitely made a typo by mentioning January 1796, which was exceptionally mild (7.3C).

26 consecutive days from 7th January to 1st February had sub-zero CET values. This near month-long period had a CET of about -3C. A notable freeze for sure. The last five days of January were particularly cold - each one came in below -6C.

I've started putting my shorts and flip-flops on instead.

Don't remember this at all in Liverpool (and Crosby recorded a 97mph gust). I got Goldeneye for the N64 that Christmas - what a game!

22° halo taken today in Cairns (with adequate solar protection of course):

Indeed I am, though I'm also on a working holiday visa so I can stay over here for up to a year. I just hope it stays clear on the morning of the 14th - the first few mornings have been a mixed bag with regard to cloud amounts.

Noticed this last night rising over the Coral Sea from Cairns. The presence of Aldebaran made a nice triangle. I tried to take photos but I'm not very good at night shots and they came out crappy. As an aside, it's nice to get an opportunity to see the southern sky. Orion looks weird with Rigel on top. Canopus looks brighter than I was expecting, but I haven't been able to see the Magellanic Clouds yet through the street lights (I thought they'd be bright enough to see anyway).

Probably won't be back until November, so I'll give my guess now: 5.9C

I always had Brum down as one of the snowier locations in the southern half of the country. Maybe my mind is playing tricks but I seem to recall countless times when they've had snow and Liverpool has had nothing. The inland location and relatively high altitude (for a city) certainly work in Birmingham's favour when it comes to marginal situations, which annoyingly tend to lead to my location just missing out: given that snow isn't all that common for most of the country, it's these marginal setups which are most common for snowfall. Very cold synoptics destroy marginality and remove Birmingham's advantage for snowfall, but of course this scenario isn't as common. Just consulted "The Weather Of Britain" by Robin Stirling, which states that Birmingham had 75 days of snow-cover in the winter of 1962/3 compared with 45 at Kew and 36 at Manchester - it's also higher than Buxton managed (74 days). Since 1917/8. Birmingham has had two snowless winters (1924/5 and 1933/4) - the book was published in 1997, but I don't think there has been a completely snow-free winter there since. I'm not sure if Birmingham has a particulary impressive record regarding snow depths, but it would seem that it is a pretty good place for frosts and lying snow days. You can compare it on a larger scale with Europe: Moscow is usually snowbound for months in winter, but it doesn't actually get many heavy falls.

Disgraceful. I can scarcely believe this is real.

I don't deny that the climate is changing, but I always get annoyed whenever certain weather events are used as evidence for it. I remember in 2000 people were blaming the record-wet autumn on climate change, but we haven't had an autumn anything like it since. We had a very dry spring last year and a very wet summer this year - what about the four seasons in-between?

Now that's the worst type of winter weather for me.

December 1988 CET mean: 7.5C February 1998 CET mean: 7.3C http://www.metoffice...t_mean_sort.txt Dec 88 had a higher average minimum and lower average maximum than Feb 98, but overall it was milder. Ditto for Dec 74. Yes.

Decembers 1974 & 1988 were both milder than February 1998. The absolute temperature record for December (17.7C) isn't quite as high as February but overall it is a milder month. The sun isn't as weak in February as in December but it's still weak nonetheless. Origin of airmass is a far more important factor.

If it's cold enough, rime will stick around even in February. The sun is still weak then and airmasses are colder than in December under identical synoptics. There's a reason February is colder than December on average and similar to January.

It's definitely possible in February.

It started very mild but cooled down pretty quickly and ended on an exceptionally cold note. Overall it was a cold November.

An actual "summer" will do just fine.

I agree. Perfect walking weather as well in sharp contrast to the previous couple of weeks.

That's the one: http://www.wundergro...l?entrynum=2059 Incidentally, the Maritime provinces of Canada look like a good place to spend the winter.

Normally you'd be right, but that's exactly what happened this year (27C in Minneapolis). Not only that, but some parts of Canada recorded temperatures in March which beat the April all-time record high - St. John reached 27C on 21st March, destroying the previous March record (17.5C) and easily beating the April record (22.8C). Anyway, to try to get back on topic I agree that the strength of the sun in late winter is vastly overexaggerated. If the air is cold enough, the snow will stick. February on average is considerably more wintry than December.

Totally fed up of this weather pattern now. It's impossible to go out at all without running the major risk of getting soaked. And today was one of the better days in recent weeks!

Penzance got a lot of snow in January 1987.