BleakMidwinter

One of the things I learnt the last time around a few weeks ago was that when it's this very dry air, like in the Siberian Easterlies, the usual precipitation conversions alter. Normally if it says 4mm of precipitation, then if it falls as rain, you get your 4mm, but if it falls as normal, frontal, snow, you get about 4cm. Just a simple 1:10 conversion, approximately. But in this very very dry air stuff, it can alter to 1:30, so your 4mm of precipitation might deliver 12cm of snow. It isn't set in stone, not always 1:30; just that it can be a lot more than 1:10 - but apparently it's the very dry air in this convective Easterly that makes it accumulate very rapidly.

A streamer - I'm not an expert, but... When you get convective snow that's formed by very cold air passing over a comparatively-warmer body of water (ie Easterly from Siberia coming over the North Sea at this time of year) then you get the snow falling as the air then reaches land. The models can predict convective snow, but they really struggle with predicting how far inland that snow will keep falling. It might only fall on the coast, or it might get right the way across the country (Telford is a VERY long way from the North Sea!). Generally speaking, it gets dropped when it meets hills as the air rises, so anywhere on the far side of the hills won't see snow. When you get very lucky, the snow comes in on a wind that is the perfect angle to come streaming in along the undulations of the land's surface, often a river valley, and it then streams a helluva long way inland, compared to other areas/occasions. We had a "Cheshire Gap Streamer" on Dec 8th 2017, when a North-Westerly came in at the perfect angle and Telford was pretty much the first high ground it hit and he got absolutely buried in something like eight inches of snow in a few hours (then we got more from the SW in a totally separate event two days later - 28cm in all!!)(yes, I know, it's because I'm 49 so I work in both metric and imperial, sorry!) You also hear of "a Thames Streamer", or "a Wash Streamer" - it isn't always a river, cf the Cheshire Gap (a flat plain between hills), but basically it means snow coming on off the sea will get further inland along the path of the streamer. Does that make sense? And people who know more than me, for havens sake quote me if I've got things wrong, so I get an alert and can come back and edit this so it doesn't stay wrong to confuse others! I *think* I have it mostly right, though...

Drove today to Papplewick, Nottinghamshire and back - falling snow about half the time on the drive there, much of the day there and most of the time on the way back; back to Telford for heavy snow from 5ish onwards. Bitterly cold out there!

Well, they have said it will be bitterly cold...!

It's just a question of when it's likely to arrive, the heavy stuff... ie what time we cut the day short and head for home! A38, M6 toll, M54 so I would expect those would be fairly clear. It's not like we'll be on little side-roads over the high tops...

I haven\t been keeping up with the model thread - how bad is this evening likely to be? Just trying to work out how early we should cut our day short, to be safer driving back from Notts to Shrops...

This is possibly a bad day to be driving from Telford to Nottinghamshire and back again, yes? Buggrit! Light dusting of very white snow here - it appears that it's the very fin stuff again so where it lis, it's dense.

Oops! I lose track...! Must be snow-dizziness!

Well, for the last week, Winter has definitely been in the Midlands

MIA posted in the model thread that this was the second-coldest 7-day period of late Feb/Mar, second only to 1947, going all the way back to 1772. That's pretty amazing... @Midlands Ice Age - did I get that right? It was from memory, forgive me if I lost a century here or there!

Looks like no additional snowfall last night, nothing seems added to our couple of inches yesterday afternoon. Nothing like the totals many of you have, but it's enough to look beautiful and that does me... We've had a great week, though - day after day with falling snow, lying snow - and I reckon the weather system has been the most exciting I've experienced. Worrying, in the longer term, if this is going to start happening at this time of year, extending the cold like this with little warning. But beautiful, thrilling and gorgeous. I'm trying to make myself get up and go out in it, but it's so nice and cosy in here gazing out at it...

To be fair... the Amber Warning system is a reflection of potential disruption, hence why they're rare in the Highlands of Scotland even with two foot of snow, but more common in London with three centimetres - so the Ambers all week related directly to the fact that the vast majority of the population needed to get to work, etc. This is a Friday night, with much of the area already having snow-affected roads, schools closed, etc., and as people have said over and again in this thread this evening, a lot of this snow wasn't really expected to reach this far, or was expected to be further over west, etc. So, as with snow so often, it was difficult to forecast the track specifically, but also, a Friday night has far fewer people out and about urgently, so less of an impact. So less of a warning, or none. It isn't any anti-Midlands thing, imo. It's just how statistics are applied. Nothing new. Nothing biased.

I wilt sadly if it gets over about 20-22, and by 26-27 I'm really miserable. I'm clearly evolved for British summertime What I will admit to being quite happy to see coming along in the next few weeks is some spring days - by which I mean, I'm still wearing a jumper outside, but with sleeves pushed up, maybe bare-legged under my skirts, and being able to spend an hour or so out in my guerilla-garden, tackling a lot of neglect from my being poorly last year, and a winter of blown litter. I am really looking forward to being able to get the garden cleared up and cut back, and lightly raked, and getting my two little cloches down to warm the soil for sowing some early seed (which normally I'd have done a fortnight ago and be getting the early seed in this week or next!). Those sort of cool but bright spring days, I am happy to have come along, yes... I've loved this snow, but I am horribly aware of the terrible price we will all be paying for the rest of the year, people having to find money for well over a week of unexpected fuel bills at a time when the average temp is 10C, but also the potential damage in farming terms - delays in sowing crops, damage to just-sown, maybe early blossom on fruit trees - the hedgerows may be very bare next autumn from this, so wildlife may suffer... So much as I've loved this, and am happily enjoying the last days of it, but I'll be happy to see a primrose or daff by next weekend...

I do love the way my chap now draws the curtains to leave a six inch gap in exactly the correct place for me to be able to see the two lamp-posts along the street... <3 Bless him, he understands...

We're staying safely indoors - my chap took the afternoon off on my urging because I didn't want him driving back at 6ish... we live on a hill, and on a slope, if that makes sense! Had to leave the car up the top as it is, where it's level.

Seems to have stopped for the time being here in Telford TF3, but it has totally covered everything with a good inch or two, thick thick stuff.

Oh, there's plenty of moaning about the snow in this thread - "my backyard only has three inches, and up the road has four inches!" Welcome... yes, it's magical and I love it, even if it doesn't settle... even if it ends up not snowing, I love the excitement of maybe-maybe-maybe...!

Been snowing lightly in TF3 Telford for the last hour, light but getting heavier and hasn't stopped at all.

A few flakes blowing around in the light wind here in Telford now. -0.5 C, and DP of -2. The wind has dropped considerably in the last twenty minutes or so. It has felt far colder all morning than it felt a couple of days ago when it was really cold!

Still clear skies here but all forecasts have altered to give us varying amounts of overnight snow. My chap is working from home tomorrow, which is a relief - one fewer car on the roads... We're still in BOTH of the warning areas, and I really do wonder how unusual that is, weather systems from opposing directions trying to clash in the middle over our little flat!

I definitely live in a different Telford form the one you live in It literally hasn't stopped snowing the entire day here in TF3! Stopped now, admittedly, but a good few inches on the ground!

Can anyone explain to me how this happens, or how often it happens? I live in Telford (I promise, it IS model-related, not IMBYism!) and as you can see, we currently are in a Yellow Warning for snow this evening. Except we're actually in TWO Yellow Warning areas, from almost-opposite directions. One Yellow warning says we may get snow from the east/north-east. One Yellow Warning says we may get snow from the south-west. Surely that can't happen often, can it? Wouldn't the models normally have a firm idea of how to cope with opposing weather directions, especially given that they are different things, ie convective snow from the Easterly versus frontal snow from Storm Emma? It seems somehow very unlikely that they can't decide...

I think this must surely be unprecedented. We have a Yellow Warning for snow this evening from the east/north-east. We have a Yellow Warning for snow this evening from the south-west. It seems we may get snow this evening but nobody knows if we'll be getting convective snow from the Beasterly, or frontal snow from Storm Emma...! Does anyone know of this happening before for snow from two almost-opposite directions?

It snowed a couple of inches overnight, woke just after 7 to medium snow falling, very fine stuff mostly, and it's pretty much not stopped all day thus far, although it did get very very light for some bits around 10-11am. None of this was forecast, though - last night, when I checked, all the forecast sites were saying here would have snow from about 2pm onwards, but dry all morning. Real nowcasting - and we're also now squeezed between two ever-closer Ambers, and only 61 miles NW of the Somerset-Cardiff Red! Who knows...! We've got maybe 4-5 inches now, but it's covered all surfaces overnight and nothing has melted today, so everything that falls is staying.

Snowing heavily in Telford TF3 for the last half-hour since I woke up, a couple of inches overnight.