LetItSnow!

An exceptional run of warmer than average Februaries since 2014 with 2015 and 2018 the only exceptions. Must be one of the fastest warming months in recent times. A lot of Februaries in the past ten years would be a mild March 50 years ago.

1903 is one of those "classic" unseasonable years along with the likes of 1974, 1998 and 2011. Exceptional winter mildness followed by a very cold April, and infamously bad summer which included one of the longest continuous spells of rain ever known, then the only fine weather of the year came in September, but it didn't last long as then came the wettest month ever known in reliable records, October 1903 with an EWP average of 218mm. The last one isn't unseasonable so much as it is extreme. 1903 was a very extreme year. In contrast, 1904 was a lot more benign. So much so the only month Trevor Harley wrote about was November! 1903 looks like a pre-AGW version of many recent years tbh: mild winter, cold spells in the spring, an unsettled summer, warm spells in September, turbo charged Atlantic in October then generally mild with transient cold blips across November and December. The synoptics for February 1903 are impressive though and wouldn't look out of place today with that massive slab of high pressure over Europe. The C.E.T. for 1903: 4.2 7.1 7.1 6.4 11.1 13.0 15.3 14.3 13.1 10.5 6.4 3.3 - 9.3 What I think the same synoptics would produce now: 4.7 7.6 7.6 6.9 11.6 14.5 15.8 14.8 14.6 11.0 6.9 4.8 - 10.1

These pictures sum up just how mild it has been. Blossom coming well into bloom staggeringly early and tons of daffodils are sprouting up. What’s more disturbing is that when I looked closely at some of the trees, some are actually starting to bud. I know we had that cold phase in January, but as I have said before, I think the persistently warm autumn and December have meant that 10 days of frosts or so haven’t been enough for it to go into proper winter mode so it’s raring to go, the extreme mildness since January 21st adding to that. Would be interesting to compare growth to this point in years like 1989, 1990 and 1998 etc. I may be wrong but I cannot recall such an early advance of wildlife. Trees budding in February feels spooky.

matty40s I fear it's going to be brutal summer down to our south with persistent drought and warmth building as early as January.

To further compoud my message from the other day, flowers (not just daffodils) are now rapidly blooming in the park and blossom continues to advance. Ridiculously mild almost non-stop since the 21st.

Metwatch With a very wet December, I assume it wouldn’t take much to put this winter into the upper echelons of wet winters?

It’s seemed ridiculously mild down here this February so far. I don’t rely on app forecasts too much but we’ve only had about one day of average temperatures and most of the time it’s been in the low/mid teens. Blossom is flowering in the park rapidly and the bush outside my front door is starting to leaf… in early February! I’ve said this before but the extremely late winter and potentially early spring setting up I think means that apart from a cold spell in mid-January, there hasn’t been much of a real winter to speak of. Wildlife getting confused.

Just looked at the MO report for January 2024 and it seems we are having interesting run of extremely sunny January's. IIRC, January 2022 was the sunniest ever, January 2023 the second sunniest and now January 2024 the sixth sunniest.

matty40s Looks like another wet winter for California then after last year's brutal torrent. Complete opposite of what was going on ten years ago.

Blossom has officially started to bloom in the park behind my house after a very mild couple weeks. Indeed apart from mid-January, most of the winter has been very mild with a very late autumn on top of that, so I imagine wildlife is itching to go. I have a feeling this could be one of those years with a stunted growing season with early warmth and then a cold shock later in the season, like 1998 or something like that.

Apart from a spell of dry weather that lasted from about November 2021 to August 2022, the past five years has been anomalously wet. 2023 was one of the wettest years on record and IIRC someone pointed out that July-December 2023 was even more anomalous. We’re not going into a drought any time soon, and as someone said, to be declared so would be more a shocking indictment on our infrastructure. We’d need to have an extremely dry year and probably stay dry into 2025 for that to happen IMO. Also, as much as I love an analogue to look at I don’t really find them particularly predictive. Someone made a thread trying to make an analogue on the years that match most globally and it still hasn’t been all that accurate. I would be surprised if 2024 was *as* wet as 2023 though. It probably will be dryer just on statistics alone.

Unlikely to be exactly correct but on the 0z it throws a ridiculously mild chart for February 2nd. Projected maximum temperatures widely in the mid teens with a couple 16Cs dotted around. You can usually add to that. Looks like we could potentially start February 2024 similarly to how we did exactly twenty years ago. On February 3rd, 2004 temperatures rose as high as 17C. You wouldn't be surprised if the projected pattern could do the same. Only caveat as that while a very mild start to February is on the cards, slight adjustments could mean slightly less (but still exceptionally above average) mild temperatures.

A lot of your examples are quite unsettled summers. Perhaps a wet, dull summer coming up but with regular hot spells. Rather standard fair for the post 2015 British summer. Even the hot examples were rather unsettled at times, June and July 2003 being unsettled as well as June and early July of 1990. I imagine the prospects of another unsettled summer are rather depressing for most members but I wouldn't mind.

With this crazy mild outlook extending for at least the next week, if we do see unusually mild weather persist into February then I wouldn't be surprised to a very early spring. Apart from some frosts from approximately the 7th to the 20th it has been a continuation of autumn. Trees were yet to turn by mid-October in parts. Nature must be very confused. If that happens and we get the usual cold snap(s) in spring that will certainly play havoc with gardeners. I can see this being one of those years.

Will hold back until month's end but I am anticipating a larger than normal chance of a warm February this year but there are some rogue members toying with something a little colder around the 4th so it's not a done deal.

As perverse as it may sound, I almost wish the cold spell in mid-January hadn't taken place. December was ridiculously mild, the final ten days of January will be and there are tentative signs of a ridiculously mild (even warm) opening to February. Without that cold spell we could have been staring down the barrel of an extremely warm winter. Not that we won't be giving a good shot. Rough calculations show that if January comes around the mid 5s then we only need February to have a C.E.T. in the low 6s to score a top-ten warm winter. Upper 6s, low 7s would take us into about the top five and equalling the old record of February 1779 (7.9) would equal 2015/2016. With some output at the moment, I really would not be shocked to fail to see anything appreciably cold in February. There are supposed favoured telecommunications which in theory may make colder weather more likely in the second half but I'm struggling to buy it now. My hopes were raised but this alarming set up at the moment has got me a bit jaded. Gut feelings tell me we're probably more likely to see a record-warm February than even an average February - but I am not a genie and could very well be wrong.

Concerning build of heights so strongly so early in the season. An early start to summer for our folks to the south of us. Hopefully not another summer from hell setting up across Europe. If there’s any consolation at least winter may still be alive and well for our Scandinavian friends. They’ve been very lucky to miss the mild muck that’s plagued us most the time.

Thought that when looking at the charts for October 1879 which was a cold month but the charts look mild, even warm at times. I think if you had a lot of winter, spring and autumn synoptics from that era today, AGW aside, the surface conditions would be quite a lot different.

Looks like the set up we had in February 1998 but with a little added oomph. Impressive considering this is almost two weeks earlier in the year before that spell. I wonder if we have to wonder about a very spring-like opening to February. Sun strength is a little weaker but depending on cloud amounts this could be a warm spell. A bit concerning to see heat begin to develop to our south already, hopefully not a sign of another harsh year across Europe. All around the day ten mark so exact details will shift but it's an interesting chart, but for the wrong reasons!

Ignoring more detailed variables like SST anomalies playing a part in the month’s temperature I would say yes. It was virtually an average month at the surface even though it isn’t typical for the synoptics (and IMO would have been cooler with the same synoptics even a couple of years ago/in the next few years if SSTs reduce) that were present, purely at the surface, at least for the CET then yes it was average.

I think it should be agreed upon that a 1901-2000 and the latest 30 year mean should be used concurrently. If we only use the previous 10, 20 or 30 years it will lead to months being classified as cooler than average that really weren’t, like August 2021 or April 2023 off the top of my head. However, it is also important to know where a year stands amongst its current era. But I personally will continue to judge months based off 1901-2000 etc.

Entirely possible if high pressure becomes more dominant to allow for frost and fog or even an easterly incursion by around the 27th-29th period but there's so much uncertainty. We'll be in the mid-5s if we don't see that and the south-westerly flow remains in place.

Not something I’d be concerned about in late January and early February to be honest. If it were a month down the line, perhaps. It could be worse.

I know about moderation and all but there is a healthy patch of uppers below minus ten so that is hardly mild. I’ve seen far worse cold pools in synoptic charts in recent years and even in the 19th century sometimes! If it was around the -5C mark I’d get it but that looks alright. Anyway, ten days away so worrying about exacts like that is fruitless. The uppers were corrected to be colder for the last spell of easterlies anyway, right up to 1-2 days in advance.

It was actually 20.0C, 0.3C warmer than July 1988 - but July 1988 had a lower highest temperature of just 23C. July 1988 was also wetter and windier. July 1980 had more shockingly cool days but had some warmer weather at the end, wheras July 1988 tended to be generally be around 18-21C and had less extreme maxima (though the lowest max was 16.4C on the 3rd so still shockingly poor). There's so sunshine data so I can't speak as to what was worse. I think the difference between them was July 1980 was a blocked, raw, cloudy type of cool, whereas July 1988 was a Atlantic driven, wet, cloudy type of poor. Not a lot in it but there is a slight difference. Compare that to July 2023 which only had a low max of 18.7C on the 4th, an average high of 22.8C and most days tending to be between 20-24C. It was also drier in London than both July 1980 and July 1988. It had a similar monthly high to July 1980 with 29.7C on the 7th. Further north, a different story as I've heard but for London and the south-east it wasn't anywhere near the poor Julys of the 1980s.