Bricriu

If you are looking at the bigger picture it's a great start to the today. If you are looking at the medium term outlook, and hoping for cold to come back quickly, it's not a great start to the day. The few dry days we had could soon be cancelled out by slow moving systems that decay close by

No I am not. Some of the more knowledgeable posters were indicating a period of less cold weather until around Mid December. We don't do well in terms of snow from an Easterly, but cold and dry with gin skies is the second best thing to snow. So bring on the Easterly soon,Dennis!

After reading some posts I thought for sure it is game over for a couple of weeks , then along comes the ECM tease. It's encouraging that these kind of runs keep appearing even if they don't have solid support across the models.

I hope this ECM run isn't a huge outlier and that it is backed by the GFS pub run later. If it is a lot of people will be scratching their heads wondering how the models came to show this.

That would be my fear. A case of close but no cigar. I hope I am wrong. Let's just say the coldest upper air did some how make it all the way across to England, what would the uppers be after modification from travelling over the warmer sea? Did -20 upper air clip the south east of England in Janaury 1987?

Just a thought on this, given background drivers are always in a state of flux, it would seem that on very rare occasions the background signals can be overridden. Look at the winter of 1962/63, I presume the MJO and AAM weren't conducive to blocking through that extremely long lasting spell,but the intense blocking must have overriden them. Perhaps if we had an omega block this time with the cold well entrenched the same thing might have happened this time. I take your point though that they generally have a huge bearing on what type of weather we are likely to have .

Our - Meteorological service- Met Eireann in its long range forecast is saying it will be mild and unsettled for the rest of December. The only crumb of comfort for me is the EC46 didn't go for this cold spell and it can often flip in fi. I just hope we are not going to be stuck under slow moving systems for weeks on end due to heights to the North East. We had enough rain over the last six weeks. I could live with that if the high then migrated north or north eastwards a few days later. I know I am straw clutching

Less cold for a few days seems inevitable now, but whether it becomes a lot milder, and for how long it lasts, is far from certain. There is not much sign of raging zonality for weeks on end as of yet

The teleconnections give us a chance of blocking but like you say they don't guarantee it. This blocking was always on borrowed time due to those background factors not being in our favour. I really hope, as I am sure most here do, it's only a temporary return of the Atlantic. A cold spell for Christmas week would be brilliant.

It's starting reminds me of February 2012 or was it 2013?. The cold breakdown kept being pushed back.

Slider gate? Could Roger J Smith be right about this winter having this kind of pattern?

It might not suit you if it turns out like that, but dry and cold will do me after six weeks of wet weather.

Come on let's gets that -12 air to the north down over us!

Indeed it does after six weeks of wet weather . I will be more than happy with come crisp days and frosty nights. Snow would be a bonus.

Hopefully just in time for Christmas week the high migrates north westwards! I don't like the look of the pv there but at least the bulk of it is away from Greenland.

Roger J Smith did speak about this too. He thinks the theme for much of this winter could be battleground scenarios. If that is the case let the boundary be to the south of Ireland and Cornwall!

Why is that. Do you think its less accurate than the other GFS runs?

So is it milder the following week?

Considering what's happening now in spite of the atmospheric drivers,It would be ironic if the background signals, like the MJO , when they are in a favourable phase for blocking fail to deliver. The weakening in heights over Greenland is never a good sign. We just have to hope any Atlantic influence is not a full on return to zonal for weeks on end, but of course it could be.

Is there any danger a ssw could end up shaking up the tropospheric pattern for the worse. Has this ever happened before while the troposphere had a blocking pattern?

The GFS were right when they led the way with this cold spell. So therefore they must be right about the Easterly;) When they are showing a breakdown or relaxation of cold we can discount it as the usual GFS rubbish. This is why I was dismissing it as crud until I saw the Easterly:) But seriously after six weeks of rain, cold and dry will do nicely , if we can't have snow. A heavy rime frost like last year would be a bonus as it took on the appearance of snow after a few days.

Fantastic ECM!!. That could lead to a sustained cold spell! If only it was at t24.

If we are to get a breakdown/ return to Westerlies ,I wouldn't mind if it's between the 11th the 20th, then let the lag of effect of the mjo show its influence and deliver a snowy nirvana just in time for Christmas.

To be honest from an imby perspective I would be one of those happier people. I would much rather cold and dry than cold and wet. Although I appreciate others who could be on the right side of the cold boundary in a marginal setup will see it alot differently!

It could well be cold rain for many places though,especially, Cork, where he is from. In FI on the ECM it looks like the heights are moving away from Greenland too. I would be much happier if it wasn't all so marginal. Still its better to have the chance of something decent than be looking at weeks of zonality,which was the favoured outlook for December a few weeks back