[North West England Regional Discussion Thread]

BT it was only other day when you goading the NEsters saying good it was looking for the NW and that it wouldn't be until mid January until they saw any proper snowfall.

Tables certainly seemed to have turned now lol.

[North West England Regional Discussion Thread]

Aye it's no way to live a winter, I'm only ~50% sure we'll see a change to colder weather in January

Like I said model thread I massively blame the last two winters for this.

If wasn't for them so good then I can guarantee I wouldn't be on here now stressing myself out over it all but ah well...

[Model Output Discussion - 5th December - 11th December]

CC I fully appreciate what you're saying here and I too would love to see a prolonged cold spell; however I think what many people fail to appreciate, is that although you say one third of winter is already written off, what we are experiencing at the moment and expecting in the next couple of weeks is really typical British winter weather so we shouldn't actually expect anything else despite what we coldies might wish for...

To be fair you can't really blame some of us for raising our expectations too high, the last two winters did that by themselves.

[North West England Regional Discussion Thread]

Yep, nothing of interest tomorrow for the majority of people

We can only hope things change at some point but I'd be lying if I said the possibility of going through the whole winter clutching at straws like this but nothing more hasn't crossed my mind.

[Winter 2011/12 - General Discussion]

It's only a week into the meteorological winter and I've already had low temps with sheets of black ice covering the streets, Snow for 3 days accumulating to depths of 6 inches, sunny periods of lovely crisp winter sunshine and now a MAJOR wind event and I'm slap bang in the middle of the MetO's RED warning. I'm already loving this winter. Hopefully more snow on saturday morning aswell. It's a pretty amazing series of differing weather events in the space of 8 days. Couldn't really ask for much more . . .

Where you live no you couldn't.

As for the rest of us well it's still nowhere near the sustained blocked pattern we'd ideally like to be in for proper deep cold across the whole of the UK but i think it's fair to say the weather has been at the very least 'eventful' which is something not many were expecting earlier in November with that stubborn euro high.

[North West England Regional Discussion Thread]

torrential rain in widnes now.very strong gusts as well!

So did I just over the bridge in little Runcorn.

Lets hope that precipitation amounts haven't burnt out "too" much come tomorrow.

[Northern England - Cold Spell Discussion Part 3]

According to the 18z NAE its going to be a very short lived event as well.

Last 2 BBC updates havent put a friday forecast up and from 25 years experience of watching those forecasts religiously during winter, when they do that after previously forecasting snow that almost certainly means a downgrade.

That's what I've been seeing over the past few runs as well.

Backtrack seems to be remaining optimistic however.

[Northern England - Cold Spell Discussion Part 3]

Good post DS

Hopefully the beginning 2012 eventually leads us to something even more 'interesting' than we're in now, fingers crossed eh?

[Northern England - Cold Spell Discussion Part 3]

I guess you're right there lol

You told me not to worry earlier is this still the case?

[Northern England - Cold Spell Discussion Part 3]

Confidence still high.

Just out of interest what makes you think so?

Not sure I share the same confidence looking at the updated snow forecast based on the latest 12z run or shouldn't I be looking too much into that?.

[Northern England - Cold Spell Discussion Part 3]

It's just been hail stoning around here again lol.

[Northern England - Cold Spell Discussion Part 2]

Im in Liverpool for the next few days as well. It's difficult to say what will happen here because the irish sea will only serve to drive temperatures up. The best hope is that the 850's will be cold enough to sink down along with heavy showers that can readily bring down the freezing layer. I would say expect some snow, but i doubt any of it will settle.

Any other opinions on this?

According to the latest 18z GFS model run there's at the least a 35% chance of snow falling on Friday and at the most a 67% chance ofit doing so in the early hours of Saturday morning for the Merseyside area.

That's just one run though and things could quite easily look quite a lot different come the morning never mind the runs following that but if the current general trend continues providing it isn't downgraded too much then you should get snow yes.

It's not really a definitive answer but that's all i can really give at this stage.

[Northern England - Cold Spell Discussion Part 2]

It'll change of course and has like a 0% chance of actually happening that way but if the 18z came off then things would certainly look very interesting for the overnight period from late Friday to Saturday morning for this area.

And even more so in Cumbria where Liam J and few others live.

[Northern England - Cold Spell Discussion Part 2]

I pretty much nailed November. Was VERY surprised at that!

For the south you did and that indeed is where it was the warmest but pretty much the whole of UK going all the way up to Scotland frequently experienced above average temperatures with the final CET for the month being 9.6 whilst you went for 7.7.

Still that isn't really a part of winter and nobody really saw that coming so I'll let you off on that one. :winky:

[Northern England - Cold Spell Discussion Part 2]

Yeah, did you read my winter forecast?

Yup, doesn't seem to be doing so bad up until now either well for the beginning of December anyway which is all that really counts. :winky:

[Northern England - Cold Spell Discussion Part 2]

Yeah it was utterly rubbish after December

Next year should be good. :winky:

Still standing by your forecast then?

If that's the case then post Christmas/new year and beyond is when the real fun games should begin, lets hope so anyway.

[Northern England - Cold Spell Discussion Part 2]

I know, but we've not had any proper snow since last January.

And that spell only lasted for a few hours, seemed to snow quite heavily for a bit that day in early January providing a very decent covering before things warmed up and it turned to rain washing and melting everything away just as quickly as it had fallen.

Obviously I'd take anything at the minute but back then considering the weather we'd just had the month before it was very disappointing.

[Scotland - Cold Spell Discussion]

It's kind of sleety rain and wet snow here with a thaw of lying snow. I want to get rid off this band and hold onto the remains of the snow cover. Still pretty decent with roofs, some trees, pavement, some roads and garderns and all covered in a decent layer of snow of 2-5cm and everything all white.

You really do not know how much I envy you right now and to think this time last year it wasn't even an issue.

[Northern England - Cold Spell Discussion Part 2]

You need to understand that the synoptics have to be perfectly timed for this part of the region, I mean pefectly timed.

The Irish sea SST are on the mild side, which isn't surprising. Then we had marginal uppers at -5.6C this would ordinarily

be enough if your ASL was at around 300m and even better higher, where temperatures are more conducive.

Unfortunately for our part of the region, nothing went remotely right, which is understandable when you consider all the

facts of the situation. We where simply to warm, was it the sea? It played a part yes, but there where other factors that

where simply not conducive for us to see any snow.

What we had where hail showers, some of these torrential at times throughout today, but the temperature did no vary at all

even in those torrential hail showers..if any thing this evening, as seen a slight increase in the temperature.

Current temperature is slowly dropping.

Temp +5.5C down from 6.1C 1 hour ago.

DP +3C +1C increase in past 2.5 hours

Wind chill -0.4C

Humidity 86%

Barometer 1002.2mb slowly rising

Visibility 11KM

Wind Direction: West

Wind Speed 29 K/PH gust 38 K/PH ocassionally

You are right of course. That was just a quip more than anything else(not a very thought out one I'll admit) to vent my frustration at how things were going.

On the other hand things still pretty much look game for the period leading into the weekend at the minute.

Fingers crossed it stays that way and doesn't downgrade.

[Model Output Discussion - 5th December - 11th December]

And no sign of above average constant mild SW'lies. I agree there is no sign of prolonged cold, absolutely agree but coming and going of cold shots...yes.

I'd be happy with that if it meant there was a possibility for a little more than just hail for this neck of the woods in the NW otherwise it's just another big fat meh for me,

[Model Output Discussion - 5th December - 11th December]

Seems we've gone in just a few weeks from euro/bartlet mundane boredom to zonal/Atlantic driven boredom.

So not much progress at all really towards proper cold conditions in spite of the odd toppler we're still in the process of.

[Northern England - Cold Spell Discussion Part 2]

Rinse and repeat of yesterday - more hail showers. I'm a bit disappointed they didn't turn more wintry overnight, though it's better than just having cold rain.

Yup, looks like our good old friend the irish sea has helped things water down a bit meaning no proper snowy precipitation.

But ah well there's always next time, whenever that may be.

[Northern England - Cold Spell Discussion Part 2]

Mainly rain here, hail and slush at best in the very heavy showers, even though the temp is very low @ 2.4c.

Yet BT is reporting sleet/snow with a temp over double mine.

True, the last few showers have been mainly rain here(as in Runcorn where I also happen to live), it was hailing earlier though.

[Northern England - Cold Spell Discussion Part 2]

You're north of the shower line. Hail snow and rain been pounding down here all morning and afternoon.

Something seems off with your weatherstation to me.

It's reading 7.7c for this yet other ones nearby seem to be reading lower even some nearer to the coast in Liverpool, strange.

[Northern England - Cold Spell Discussion]

So you haven't seen that huge shower heading for you then?

And within the current inactivity round our area the temperature seems to have risen a bit again too, hopefully that changes soon, if not tonight/early morning then tomorrow.