Ventnor Viking

Light sleet/wet snow in Shaftesbury at the moment

We never tend to do well out of these northerlies. Im looking forward to the scandi high which is growing in confidence for mid to late December, where we have lows undercutting it. That's our best bet. Im still enjoying the showers we have had today and the event on Monday morning will be good for us. We need to make the most of that one though before it thaws away into Tuesday!

Unfortunately as soon as they hit the Brecon's and the Valleys they lose energy and dissipate. The Irish sea build the showers up and then the showers lose the strength over the colder high ground. Need a bit of heat somewhere to pep them up

Here in Shaftesbury today we have had some snow showers which has given a dusting. I would forget Sundays snow event if you are south of north Wiltshire. Monday looks like a snow settling event for anyone 5 miles from the coast and with decent elevation

Great description of Dorset snow chances and very accurate! I grew up in Poole and was so frustrated with snow prospects, Shaftesbury is a good spot for it. Although the charts are looking good even for Poole in the coming weeks

It looks as though at 210 GFS heights are diminishing and the polar energy groups are merging back together to possible start up the polar vortex.....of course 210 is about 80hrs to far forward to consider speculating about in these set ups......

Light snow forecast for Shaftesbury tonight at 2am according to BBC weather......

Just to add, the models don't factor in the extremely low solar output we are experiencing (and will continue to do with the occasional little spike) along with an eastern phased QBO which in my opinion both of these will have a significant affect on our pattern into mid December onwards. The general trend for the foreseeable future is to see the Arctics stratospheric 30 hPa and 10 hPa temperatures to decline to below average over the coming days. (sorry cant attach any links at the moment - will post later!) which will strengthen the jet temporarily due the temperature deviation from the arctic to that of the mid(ish) latitudes i.e. the northern Atlantic.

Sleet also in Shaftesbury - Air is noticeably colder now to.

I know this is a bit off topic, but it's currently snowing in Shaftesbury North Dorset. I think this just proves that we look so far into FI chasing charts we don't look at all the little changes and things happening alot closer to the time

Over the past few weeks a lot of end of year winter tension has been building and a few silly comments made - just think if everyone put a pound in for all the naughty words said at the models and too each other we could have all gone to Lapland and built snowmen together with good cheer.....anyway that's not the case. The models are very turbulent at the moment, the ECM looks like the form horse to me. I think all models have been hinting at seeing colder conditions coming in and normally cold air is tough to budge and this is where we are likely to mild air and cold air battling with snow events taking place I for one love what each run can bring so lets all just chill (pun intended) wait for the fun to begin!

Hi Nick, I agree that we do need a trigger. However what is clear at the moment from the previous run is that both agree that a hit of unsettled weather is due but both don't agree on the HP situation as the HP on the 0z run is very different to that of the 12z. This indicates that there is a probable chance of some changes aloft as there as some quite big differences with regards to HP position from run to run.

The last 3 frames of the ECM this evening do have fairly cool to cold 850 hPa temps as seen below. There is a good chance of unsettled weather coming in towards the Christmas period. its definitely worth watching to see if the jet pushes further south and to see if the orientation moves to a more NW/SE then precipitation is more likely to start turning wintry.

Absolutely, no doubt there will be snow in places however the wind direction will be key as to where will be affected, furthermore easterly winds can in fact be very dry

Not the right set up unfortunately. There needs to be a deep cold pool moving from the east and a low pressure to unstable the atmosphere. very rare we get these types of set ups.

I agree, I think frost at night and if fog lingers during the day then it could minimise temps during the day but its surface cold which as I mentioned earlier isn't a reflection on the true atmospheric pattern as wind and orientation of the HP can dictate who sees the colder conditions.

I think many in here are looking for cold. Under the HP there are chilly days ahead and frosty nights but nothing sustainable long term. Additionally its surface cold so wouldn't take much to shift all in all seasonable weather and more importantly for many it remains dry! If its wintry weather all is after the HP is too weak to our SW and upstream patter doesn't allow for any ridge to build in a favourable position.

I appear to be the only one that doesn't see this as an upgrade?

Hi Paul Apologies no offence was intended I was merely being factual about how arctic ice could influence the atmosphere.... thanks

A mild GFS run today - I have to say the GFS has been in poor form lately with finding any consistency even to relatively short time frames. There are many things, as ive mentioned before, that the GFS cant forecast and isn't programmed to until fairly short notice like a SSW etc. Im more intrigued by the Met Offices model as the models available to us are really struggling which is very tiring, that said Ill still be watching like a donut!!!

So many interesting charts tonight - don't forget this time yesterday for many winter was all ready over! Interesting that GFS favours a Greenland block and ECM more of an easterly flow. I think yesterday I mentioned the model are struggling big time at the moment but one thing I will say im confident that some cold charts will appear relatively quickly and not so much in FI. With so many situations that the models aren't really programmed to factor in like SSW, Solar and SST that are changing frequently sooner rather than later we will see something v interesting!

I'd like to think that's a possibility but to be honest there is to much energy above to the north which forces the weakish HP to collapse away to the SE pretty quickly...

So the charts once again have no trends - we can comment on the charts being produced but no trends in FI to speak off which is positive that means the models have no clue for anything past 240h. to summarise the waiting game continues............

I'm not getting caught up in the individual model runs at the moment - this really is an usual situation we are going through with regards to the stratosphere, the sea temps and the solar activity. I don't think I've ever seen a strat warming start so early on, technically everything should be cooling right down now. http://www.netweather.tv/index.cgi?action=stratosphere;sess= The sea and ocean temps have changed and have been changing recently,especially the pacific and north pacific. Looking back through I cant match a year with anything similar. Solar activity continues to decline on a weekly basis (with the very occasional sun spot appearing but overall very week). The latest image being very quiet for sun spot numbers! My opinion is that the models cant get to grips with all these changes and the variances are very different to anything I've seen. My gut tells me that very soon we will see something very interesting appear out of the blue at shortish range and catch many of us out!

My reference to being "off" is nothing to do with wanting cold its more to do with the fact its been all over the place today with regards to positioning of the HPs. Once the 2 LPs over the next 4 days have passed through the models will then in my opinion show something more realisitic. The models trying to forecast deep LPs and blocking at the same will never be accurate to be honest. So I stand by my the models have been a bit off today and by off I mean they are struggling to get grips with both scenarios although tomorrows low is probably on track now