MisfitDog3

I am not at all convinced by the severity or length of this (currently) forecast cold spell. There is still a lot of spread and some fairly major movement on some models over reasonably short period of time! I would be happier with a closer consensus in the short/medium scope as well. Not at all picky am I?! Arf! With only the detail to be sorted out?! Yowzah..is that tempting fate or what? Plenty more to come from the models I think. Take your seatbelt off at your peril!

If it was any other Winter in recent years I would be casually disregarding some of these model cold forecast runs as little more than frontier gibberish. The problem is that this is not a 'normal' even larger teapot we have been used to so the more extreme cold scenarios become believable...if only to the next violent swing. I suppose the main problem is that we are slap bang in no mans land between the two blocks at present. Minor variations in Atlantic/Eastern Europe air mass locations have fairly dramatic effects on the forecast runs...

Good lord, what a total shambles. Raging schizophrenia seems to have broken out amongst the models (followed swiftly by the model followers if this malarky continues much longer!). I can honestly say I have absolutely no idea of what we will see next week and was sucked in by the shift to cold outlooks yesterday when I should know better. Usually you get a reasonable indicator by now.....I call this situation the 'flicked hall carpet' scenario because the 'ensembles' curves are inverting with such huge changes day to day instead of the gradual progress of normal times. The pattern since December would suggest the Atlantic is unlikely to go into full force at this point (backed up with the upper atmospheric data) however perhaps we are going to get a reflection of Novembers raging winds and rain. Whatever, it is certainly gripping stuff.

"but if I based a forecast on each model run then my forecast would change several times a day." That's what concerns me a little. The changes between runs are fairly large whereas usually they tend to be reasonably subtle. Just does not provide me with any confidence in the output at the moment.

I'd be much more confident about an approaching sustained cold spell if there weren't still such active forecast changes occurring on some models within a quite short time periods. Just too much instability to get excited about anything at the moment.

Interesting positioning of the dominant 'High' by some of the models. Doesn't look right to me in any of them! Instinct again. I suspect the Atlantic is going to have much more of a say, middle of next week and beyond, than is shown at present. Either that or we are going to be faced by one mother of an Easterly which is going to appear out of the model gloom with very little warning. I prefer the Atlantic scenario at present!

A mixed bag again this morning. Some quite large alternating outputs over relatively short time periods from several models which does not give me confidence that anything is sorted out post weekend. I always like to skim a couple of pages of this forum when I first log on to see how often the word 'Gem' appears! Usually indicates some straw grasping from one group or another!

Oh dear! I think I am getting a headache. What on earth is going on with the medium term output? It must be an input issue? Either that or something has gone spectacularly wrong in the last few days. I just don't go for the ultra cold output but quite a few of the other scenarios look half baked as well.... Might as well break out the seaweed and fir cones for all the good the models are doing at present.

I'm not so sure why everyone thinks a cold medium to long term outlook is nailed on as such?! Some of the south east and southerly winds projected on a few of the models are coming from a long way south and even given they are heading over a cold continent there is a lot of warmth in the SE Med at the moment! I also suspect the Atlantic isn't going to go back in its box without a struggle. The models are struggling. Just because they currently favour a cold future doesn't mean this state of affairs has changed chaps!!

Temps dropping off steadily here in Farnham! That front seems to be moving considerably faster that forecast. It will be snow anywhere off the coast!!

I think we can assume if someone was trying to fiddle the figures (if that is the suggestion) then they'd be a tad more subtle than that! I've never worked out what the actual perceived point behind all this alleged Climate Change Conspiracy is supposed to be? Have all the governments and many scientists got a job lot of electric cars they can't move?!! Arf! All very odd.

Given the ever closing Isobars over the southern and western areas of the UK forecast for the next few days I have a question about windchill. If the air temp is 2 degrees with a 30mph breeze, presumably the windchill factor does not actually effect the melt-rate of the snow and ice above zero? What I mean is snow presumably reacts to the real ambient temp rather than any 'windchill' factor?

Is there any evidence that eclipses have an effect on local climates other than in the very short term via reduced sunlight for a couple of minutes? Looking at this afternoons charts I suspect that Low is going to be getting towards the west of London before stopping.....

It's all a bit of a mess really. I'm not really convinced by any of the medium to long term forecasts at present. Some odd 'jumps' from one state of affairs to another on the 'GFS' without any real natural progression evident, that Scandi High, on tow other models, just looks too big and misplaced and what is supposed to be happening on the western side of it just seems devoid of any real detail. This all needs to shake down over the next 48 hours...

"Southern England - stop moaning !!!!" who's moaning? Just looks like reporting to me? By the way, we've had days on end of hardship stories about 'oop North on TV so lets keep a perspective on this... The models? Cold, cold, cold by the look of it!

No. The main stuff is not going to emerge until later this evening. Watch and see what lunacy breaks out past midnight and through tomorrow!

the band working its way through Wiltshire is dying on its a**e at the moment. Will be interesting to see where the 'white hell' materialises from!

It's 2.7 degrees in Farnham! A bit of a worry. Luckily nothing much is going to drop round here for a whilst yet! Low reckoned to be forming over SE England presently. Don't worry if not much on radar at the moment.

I must admit, even as the hard bitten 43 year old cynic that I am, I have just gone through the overnight model runs with my mouth hanging open!

"Did anyone listen to what John Holmes said earlier?" And we all need to remember that FI is still FI even if the forecast way out 10 days plus is for cold! (Nice model runs though! :-) )

Never quite sure whether Farnham falls into the SE camp or Central/Southern. -7.1C last night. Snow, as for many in the south, has been at a premium this Winter so far. What would be great is for a nice Thames streamer to get going if the easterly gets established. That has often been a generous provider of decent snow to the corridor through west Surrey and out towards Alton in the past! I don't see much coming out of the cold front tonight, given past experience of anything travelling over that much land from the North. An odd graupel here or there.

Joe does seem to have the most peculiar style of writing I have ever come across! A lot of it just doesn't make any kind of sense. Anyway, the models this morning seem to suggest the shower activity down the eastern coast is going to continue fairly unabated for the time being! Whether the 'motherlode' of snow promised towards the end of the week ever makes it much further inland than the Kent/Sussex borders remains to be seen, as I don't quite buy the forecast easterly just yet.

Currently in Guildford. Rain still! Heavy, very cold rain but definitely rain!

Short bout of snow here then rain....boo!

This is an extraordinary chart, sorry if it's been pointed out before. What is going on here?! http://91.121.94.83/modeles/gfs/run/gfs-0-156.png?6 That is a bit bonkers isn't it?!! Nervous breakdown I think.....