abruzzi spur

Morning all Steady light rain here in Reigate at 105m asl. Everything saturated. Not looking very promising for snow. Too dark to see up to the top of the Downs at 230m but if I had to bet on it I would be putting my money on green not white. Radio 4 weather forecast has just said 'rain, sleet and hill snow'. Note the subtle change to 'hill snow'. Does our elevation count as a hill? I think we may end up in the sleet zone. Which is not that thilling..... Good luck though AS

Hi all Found this from Lorenzo (thanks) on model thread, an interesting watch/listen. Quote: "Linking in this post from the Atlantic Storms thread as it is entirely model related. Good find Mapantz. Met Office Cheif forecaster seeing more consensus in the models and moving this into an Ice and snow event, I think they are being pretty definitive now. http://forum.netweat...ost__p__2185079

Hi all My reading of the recent MO alerts is that there are 2 elements for our region for early Friday: 1. Wind - this is for southernmost counties of our area, ie most of Kent, all of East and West Sussex, most of Hampshire and the southern half of Surrey. Again the uncertainty of track, and hence northern extent, is noted and it also mentions heavy rain (not snow). Coastal areas most at risk; and 2. Snow - this is for roughly Oxfordshire north-north eastwards and westwards, not much due east of there though. Sleet at lower levels is referred to. Still lots more water (either in the form of rain or melted snow!) to flow under a lot more bridges before we know how this will pan out. AS

Morning all, have just heroically dealt with last night's damage and picked up the blown over plant pot and chair. Oddly these 2 items were in a pretty sheltered spot in the garden so I wonder if there was some funnelling of the wind. Either that or it was a fox with wind rage, or a garden designer who had an issue with the layout.... Hope Nick F doesn't mind but I have copied and pasted his recent contribution to the model thread, which is very interesting for us down here in the North Downs(thanks Nick) AS Posted A minute ago "Well, Exeter havimg a torrid time knowing where to put late Thurs/early Fri's low and as John says, MetO warnings rather vague. If the low tracks across Sern most counties a la GFS, then a real risk of some heavy snowfall across Wales The Midlands and perhaps the Chilterns, Salisbury Plain and N Downs on Friday. Any further north the snow risk across northern England and north Wales with some severe gales across southern counties of England. P45s for the senior forecasters at Exeter the way they are handling this so far! A cold northwesterly over the w/e will see snow showers for favoured locations of the north and west including the Cheshire Gap, inalnd areas staying dry perhaps, though small features in the flow could bring sleet and snow inland."

This might be a bit of a ramble... As an unabashed snow and cold fan this winter has been a good one. Hell, I have had to wear crampons in Surrey just to get down the hill. And this was not up on the Downs but on the pavements in town (not that you could really see them at the time). Two weekends back I took one of the children to a sports event really out in the sticks and there were still the remnants of piles of snow stacked up in the car park from 4 weeks previously. Grubby and sad, but still there (the snow I mean). What has really impacted on me this year is that last Feb when we had the heavy snow my youngest was becoming increasingly ill and despite taking him out and going sledging and building snowmen, he hated the snow. Turned out he had a brain tumour, diagnosed just after his 6th birthday. All very terrifying but he came through it and all is now well. In this year's snow he has been out on the sled, playing in the snow, doing snowball fights, laughing and throwing himself about. Before the winter started I was not looking forward to the snow, I guess because I had associated it with his illness. Seeing how he enjoyed it though I am fully restored as a fanatic, but with a very real sense of proportion. If it snows, good. If not, so what. The other thing is that I am quite keen now for it to warm up. Not sure whether this is to do with the above or because I am getting old! AS

This is a melancholy post but, as Keats knew, melancholy can be a fine feeling. Got me thinking though, if our lives were predicted by the models what would they say and how would people read them and would they bear any resemblance to the reality? If you lived a life of regular thoughts and habits with nothing too controversial would the models show your life as one of gentle sw zonality with nothing too windy or extreme? If you were esentially a quiet individual would your output be calm southerlies? If you were prone to phases of wild outrageousness followed by periods of introspection would your output be fierce nor'easterlies followed by flat calm from a Bartlett? If you are permanently wild then it's endless polar maritime north westerlies for you. If you are cold, steely and rare then your charts show easterlies; if you are also on occasions excitable then you get the odd channel low thrown in. The problem with this analysis is that we all know for certain (probably for the only time) where the FI models will take us in the end...... AS

Here in Reigate it is as though we have been sealed inside a glass snow shaker. Not sure if that is the correct name - a glass flat bottomed dome with a street scene or similar, that is shaken gently to produce a fleeting snowfall. Whoever is shaking us this morning has been doing it gently since about 8am, pulses of fat flakes which if they got their act together could perhaps just about be described as swirling. As I type this it has stopped and started twice. Will the shaker become bored or is this a long lazy game being played? AS

Light-ish snow in Reigate, travelling near-horizontally on the wind and starting to settle. AS

As I posted earlier the Met Office Invent radar showed a shower over Reigate on the 5pm feed AS

Very light snow over the last 40 mins or so here in Reigate - precip from a very localised shower showed up nicely on the Met Office Invent radar at 5pm. At present rate of falling it will take about a week to hide the patches of yellow snow caused by the new puppy! AS

It'll take a long time to get to Wales if it is moving east...... This morning in Reigate we have had a mix of drizzle and sleet, with currently very light snow. Edit: now stopped. AS

Crampons and mountaineering boots are primed and ready for deployment! AS

Yep, it's normally all freeze/thaw, layers and windslab. At the moment there appears to be all sorts of unusual stuff going on, here's an example: http://saislochaber.blogspot.com/2009/12/facets.html You'll also get some photos to die for on the SAIS and associated sites Still expecting to have to wear my crampons on the streets of Reigate over the next week or so, which seems to un-nerve the neighbours thanks again AS

Mr M, I have read your posts for a few years now and despite being an occasional and highly non-technical (I am being kind to myself) poster, I always look to your input, along with that of a few others (they will know who they are), for guidance and ideas. Not as gospel becuase even these days the pros in the media are still described as "forecasters" not prophets. Anyone who criticises the knowledgable amatuers on here without any sort of technical back up has, I think, entirely missed the point of a forum such as this. For the avoidance of doubt I don't use the word amatuer in a judgmental way but in the proper sense - not one's day job, but a passion fuelled by learning, and all the better for that. BTW have you read the Scottish Avalanche Information Service blogs in the past few weeks - really interesting and highlighting the extremely unusual snow and ice conditions in our high mountains. AS

8 hours of intermittent snow today seems to have just about stopped here in Reigate. Today's falls have provided some icing on the metaphorical snow cake, and from a staggeringly literal IMBY point of view have covered up the puppy detritus IMBY that we have missed and may even now be lurking IMBY waiting to ooze out during the thaw (some time in April at present rates) Still very windy though. But enough about the dog. On that bombshell... AS

Snow on and off during the afternoon here in Reigate, spells of not much and then bursts of more life. Currently snowing moderately, and distinctly horizontally. However, even in the dark and looking pretty much due north, we can currently see the shape of the top of the Downs from the front door, so it is clearly not as heavy now as it was earlier when you couldn't see the Downs at all. From the model discussion pages there seems a decent chance for the battlefront scenario and the cold to win out for a while yet, which seems to be being hinted at as well by the media forecasts. Living on a hill (in a house on a hill in truth) provides some entertainment in the current conditions and, if I was so minded, betting opportunites. Will that car make it up? Where will it stop? Chances of a push? AS

And the people 2 doors down left their house this morning on foot carrying snowboards. I suppose it's one way to get to Morrisons.... Drizzly snow has now grown to medium sized flakes. AS

Snow here is like a thick drizzle but blowing around in an increasing north easterly. Still around 15cm of lying snow here, perhaps slightly more. Pavements not iced yet - there is still some give in the snow to allow for some grip. My crampons are on standby though - wore them before Christmas on the verglas-like streets of Reigate, having last used them in the Scottish Highlands a few years back. I have to say I had not expected to use them in anger again, let alone in Surrey. AS

We had not far short of 24 hrs snowfall here in Reigate, started last night at about 8:45 pm and eventually petered out at around 6:30 pm today. 18.5 cm of fluffy snow and all now freezing hard. Local salt/grit bin was, of couse, empty, so was reduced to throwing dishwaher salt on the steps up to our place. Must be getting old, but at least I tried to melt only a small bit of snow and even then only with a very heavy heart. New puppy went more bonkers than usual at the snow, it being well above his head height. Will have to bring him back inside eventually I suppose. The children also very excited. All I need to do now, so as to give them the authentic 70s snow eperience, is to arrange for some power cuts, fuel shortages, strikes, ice on the inside of their bedroom windows and snapping frozen washing left hanging on the line in the garden. Anyone else remember that? I wore shorts to school for ages as a result of my long trousers shearing off in early 1979, and stil carry the scars. AS

snowing quite heavily here in Reigate now AS

I've just posted a general reply which I hope entirely supports this point of view! Thanks for getting there earlier and in a more compact fashion than I have managed. AS

At the risk of this being another of my "what the 'eck is going on" posts, and taking account of the likelihood that this thread may at this time of year be fuelled by a little more of the old firewater than usual, I can only ask, what the 'eck is going on? Apart from all the regular experienced posters on here tonight we have also had a professional forecaster essentially suggesting (in my humble interpretation) that lots of contributors need, putting it as neutrally as possible, to calm down. Combined with that we have our mods having to issue warnings of suspensions until the new year for those more inflammatory posters. As someone who is trying to learn from this thread I can only endorse both these points of view. So far, as the 18z rolls out, I have read numerous posts saying entirely contradictory things (the low is moving north, south, east, west and all points in between, the south will miss out, the north will be pasted, the midlands will miss out or be pasted et cetera and so on etc). May I make a suggestion to the mods - how about blocking any posts at all until the model has finished its run, so that the posted views of members might then be considered, analytical, informative and based on the full model run rather than a running commentary as the computers churn out their predictions? If Rembrandt was being analysed on every brush stroke as he put together a picture, or Stevie Wonder every time he put a note in front (or behind or on top) of another, they might have become just a little fed up - "black strokes look a bit lighter on this draft, maybe the guards' hats will be more prominent?" and "I don't like the way that guitar riff is buidling on this version, might mean that it's just paranoia rather than superstition, which we had previouly assumed was nailed") Anyway, happy Christmas (BTW it looks like the star of Bethlehem is further south on this run which might mean the wise men miss us altogether and end up somewhere near the Maldives) AS

Yep, thanks. I've been watching for a few years and occasionally posting something that I thought might lighten the mood (attempted humour as substitute for knowledge!) Sometimes a step back leads in the end to at least 2 the other way. Appreciate your reply. AS

Reading this topic is an extraordinary experience, particularly at times like this. I have only a limited ability to read the models so look to this topic for guidance, and tonight I appear to have been told the following: 1. big freeze still on 2. big freeze might be on 3. big freeze not as big as first thought but still quite big 4. big freeze now "downgraded" to "even larger teapot big freeze", ie not much of a freeze at all 5. cold snap 6. cold snap-ette 7. cold up north but not down south 8. cold down south but not up north 9. ECWMF is the most reliable model 10. ECMWF model is not to be trusted tonight 11. ECMWF is not be trusted in this set up, whether tonight or not 12. GFS is not to be trusted in blocking set ups 13. GFS has been consistent and therefore is to be trusted (nothwithstanding 12) 14. It will get cold shortly 15. ECMWF data is missing tonight according to our new friend from Holland 16. Our new friend from Holland is clearly on the money (although we are all asking each other whether we know if he/she is right or not) Is it any wonder we are probably all a little frazzled..... When I was at secondary school second year in 1978 I used to sell weather forecasts to my class mates for 5p. I based them on a presusre chart in the daily paper and by looking out of the window of the science lab towards the West. Surprisingly I had a few sales. Most often I was roughly right but living then near the Severn estuary it was pretty reliable to say it was about to rain. My approach would have been useless in this current scenario so please let's have some measured and considered views (that I can nick and sell on at 2009 prices). Thanks. AS

A few flurries during the day here in Reigate but since about 5pm things have got a lot more interesting. We now have 3cm of lying snow at 110m asl and it is currently snowing lightly but with a crescent moon visible through the flakes. Snow intensity has ebbed and flowed for the past few hours alternating between heavy and steady to light and teasing. Always blown around on a proper breeze though. As the Evensong bells from the church rang out it was possible to feel transported to another age - snow on snow, smoke from chimneys (ours included), children of all ages in the street and the back and forth noise that laughter makes when it is brought on by natural phenomena. Doesn't mean to say that there weren't (aren't) some grumpy people indoors, but they would have been there in Victorian times too. AS