warmintim

Snow a the Uni in Bath - just bumped into my HoD as I was gawping at it. He thought I was waiting for a delivery... How do you explain 'just so excited to see snow!'

I think the point is if Joe forecasts it - it won't happen...

Excellent - thats my home village! Have a good game - but go easy on them! My youngest memories of snow come from the early '80s snow in Shrewton, including huge drifts that cut the village off by blocking the A360. They were cut off in Jan this year too, but not for anything like as long...

Just a dialect thing 'cos I don't understand?!

Subject to change as we get closer to the event... No comments from anyone about Metcheck's 'snow bomb'? I'll be checking the radar a lot tonight!

Hi Andy, Looking like a good day tomorrow. I am expecting Warminster to enter the amber-zone shortly. I've already decided to take the day off (don't want to travel to Bath for work...)

Spot on - it has been a pretty cold period. Its a shame its been so dry - those very cold frosts just don't look as impressive when there is no ice everywhere to make it look pretty...

This is almost the definition of cherry picking! Where did she say the 20cm was for? And did you say 'maybe up to 20 cm'?

The forecast changed as we got closer to the time - as it always will. The mistake people are making is to take the forecast at 48 hours or 24 hours out as the final position. It isn't. Two years ago my area was smack under a red warning from the met-office for heavy snow - up to 12 inches. In the event it missed us by 30-40 miles. Thats just the way it is. I know people are dissappointed, but the criticism isn't fair here.

This is a general moan here. I really don't think it is fair to say the MET got it that wrong. In the lead up to this there was a huge emphasis on uncertainty. I don't recall any forecasts from the met or the BBC saying that it was definitely going to give widespread snow of 10 cm. They just didn't say this. The big problem is we all cherry pick the best bits for ourselves both in terms of locations and amounts. So a forecast of snow for some parts of the south west, with up 1-5 cm typical and up to 10 cm in parts becomes 10 cm for all. Snow in this country is incredibly hard to forecast. We all know this. Lots of us HAVE HAD SNOW. Many of us have between 1 and 5 cm. Where is the huge mistake in all this?

Okay I may be wrong but the latest rainfall radar over wiltshire is really interesting. If you zoom in on the Rain Today radar http://www.raintoday.co.uk/ and focus on the Westbury area it looks very much as though the high ground is causing the formation of light precipitation. Obviously this is what is expected of orographic enhancement but its really cool to see! So over the high ground above Westbury (and Warminster) there is some ppt (and reported as snow in Erlestoke by someone tweeting Ian F). Cool.

To clarify - my take is he is saying that there will also be some snow further east, not that it will only snow further east. Its all about interpretation of the tweet, which to be honest is leading people astray...

So that doesn't say rain all the way! Anywhere!

Come on guys - I don't see this quote from Ian F (twitter?). Why do we not look at the data ourselves and have some faith? The event hasn't started yet, it certainly hasn't been called off yet either!

To be honest I think this is way better for Frome (and me in Warminster...) than before. For us its an upgrade. BUT don't expect massive snow totals out of this. The move back east by the NAE, matching the evolution on the radar is great for us, not so much for others further west in the region.

Maybe they should have listened to the Met Office warnings? In all seriousnous I hope all involved recover quickly, but I do wonder about why the Met bothers putting out warnings in this country as most people seem to ignore them...

Sorry - don't understand what you mean? Does that mean only Somerset and not Wilts, Gloucs, Avon etc or do you just mean that Devon and Cornwall won't get snow?

I think it was referring to disruptive elsewhere (eg Heathrow) not round here. As I said in a previous post we should beware reading too much into tweets that are answers to questions...

Come on folks - chin up! Its not even here yet - yes it might not give a foot of snow everywhere, there might not be polar bears roaming the wilshire countryside, but we are less than 24 hours away from seeing possibly the heaviest (for the region) snow of the year! Ian F doesn't know where it will snow any more than we do - he is just looking at the same data that we are and using his experience and knowlege. Plus you should be careful of reading too much into a tweeted resonse to a tweeted question. Like last weekend we won't know till it's here. I am hopeful of seeing some nice snow, both in Warminster and at work in Bath (plenty of height at the Uni!) I seriously wonder if too much information is going on here - in the old days it would have been checking the BBC 3 times a day and thats it! Keep calm and carry on...

Yourscepticism is a good starting point! I'm with you on this - I won't believe until I wake up on friday and see it snowing... Good NAE forecast though, and I suspect 1-5 cm widely and higher ground to get a bit more.

Time to chill out and not worry about the specific details! I've had enough experience watching models in the run up to events like this to know not to take anything at face value. So one quote says Bristol eastwards? So what - look at the charts and make your minds up. What has been fascinating of late is how often the BBC forecasts have mentioned the doubts, and the differences between GFS, ECM, MET etc. I heard one specifically metion GFGS versus ECM yesterday - I don't recall this sort of discussion before. I believe that this, in part, is due to the engagement with forecasters (Twitter and so on, and with web-sites such as this and TWO) - they are aware that some of the watching public want something more advanced than an ITV forecast... (sorry ITV). In this case, don't fret, wait for updates (NAE, MET) and see what happens. At the end of the day its just weather!

Which was basically my point about the NAE - this looks better - at the current time! Things will change, I'm sure. Just hoping they change in the right way so that we in the SW can share some of what the east and SE have bee having since the weekend...

And now the Meto has posted warnings too http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/weather/uk/sw/sw_forecast_warnings.html Fingers crossed!

Not quite sure I agree with this - I accept that the 06 GFS is reputedly a bit on the 'dodgy' side at times, but as for the NAE - its only because it stops at 48 hours that we don't see the extent of any event. The 12z will be more informative, but for me it does look promising if nothing else. At least we are looking at charts 2 days out and not scaning the GFS op 240h for any signs of cold! We should all know that snow events are ALWAYS marginal in our parts, and details are rarely nailed right up to just before it happens. I would say that for Warminster, saturdays event was looking extremely poor for much of the lead in period, and it was only when we reached 24-12 hours out that it looked better, and in the event we had 6 hours of (albeit light) snow.

I think this is looking a potentially interesting event for some of us (I'm in West Wilthsire, so East of the region). We did ok on saturday, with a good 6 hours of snow falling, albeit light. Managed to get out for a walk around 8 pm in what had settled (about 2 cm, well in the 1-3 cm expected!) so wasn't too upset when it had gone by morning. I went out for a short run sunday morning in the woods and there was still lying snow in places, as well as very much still frozen ground. The NAE was very good in the run up, with the last prediction (i.e. 6 hours out) almost bang on. I shall certainly be following this one closely. As with last week I suspect height will help (as ever). Up at the Uni in Bath on monday morning there were some biggish patches of snow, and we still have piles where it had been dumped by people clearing roads. I always believed that when snow lingered like this it is 'waiting for more snow'. I guess you can rationalise that by the lack of melting being due to the persistence of cold air, and that will always give the potential for more snow as warmer air tries to come in. Roll on the 12z forecasts!