osmposm

No, probably not, though it does seem a bit daft. So where is this place Bristol, anyway?

Dear god, BB - can you not look it up yourself? There's Google, and even a quaint, old-fashioned thing called AN ATLAS....

Thanks, Nanu - and those kind souls who posted the up-to-date Met Office warnings for me earlier. You may well be right, but she's reluctant to cancel unless absolutely necessary. We're still not very much the wiser, predictably. The real questions are (1) will the North Circular and A40 have been properly gritted, and (2) even if they have been, might the heaviness of the fall overwhelm that for a while? Incidentally, since about 5pm I have generally been able to get to the horse's mouth on the Met Office site, which suggests that they have belatedly brought some more servers into action (if I understand these things right). I wish they'd anticipated the heavy demand (not difficult), and done so earlier.

I'm glad you can get on to the Met Office website: I can only get occasional entry, and little or no navigation within it; the rest of the time I either get my ISP (AOL)'s timeout page, or a met office notice & apology explaining that the site's unavailable because of high visitor demand. I've been trying all afternoon. I will restrain from ranting about this here, as I have already done so in the media forecasts section of the forum. But could anyone who has managed to get on tell me what the latest warning/forecast says - there was apparently an update just after 4pm? This is not just idle curiosity, by the way: my girlfriend desperately needs to know the latest position before she leaves work, as she may have to cancel a load of patient's appointments tomorrow morning (she's a clinical psychologist), not to mention her child minder, if there are likely to be substantial traffic delays in North or West London between 7.30 and 10am

Tempted to repeat my miserably insufficient +5.3 for January, but suspect it'll still be too low.....so will add a tad and go for +5.6oC Please god may it turn out to be much too high.....

I'm ten or eleven miles east of Heathrow, SF, pretty urban, and less than 15m ASL: here we had just over 1 inch (I used an ancient folding boxwood rule on three different hard surfaces), deliciously squeaky/crunchy underfoot. That would make 2.6 or 2.7cm, so Sarah's (?rounded-up) 3cm seems OK with me. After a minimum of -1.9C, the snow began falling at c 3.30 am @ about -0.7C. It continued light/occasionally moderate for at least two hours, settling pretty much everywhere, the temp steady. By 7.45 (just before dawn) it had stopped bar the odd very light flake, the temp was -0.3C, and the depth was as given above. Most melted during the morning, and by 3pm @ c +4C only tiny patches remained.

Sorry, Paul, I think I may have typed it wrong originally (though it's now edited) - anyway, it's http://www.weather-uk.com/hampstead/data.htm. Some useful data - already goes back to 1955, and more will, I think, be uploaded in due course. Ossie

quote name='Paul Carfoot' date='22 Jan 2007, 06:59 PM' post='894382'] It’s many years since a Polar Low made any impact here in the Midlands or anywhere in mainland UK for that matter, but I do remember one, which struck long ago during early spring in the 70s, I think it was early April 1973. It was an amazing snow event for so late in the season.

Serious incident of Comparisons with '47/'63 spotted at 21.54 hours in model output discussion, originating in Norwich.

The right abbreviation, but the wrong spelling, Shuggee - Oscillation!! (I normally try and stop myself being too pedantic, but this is a pinned "educative" thread.)Perhaps this isn't the right place, but there's a number that come up all the time in Environmental discussions: GW - Global Warming - the current temperature rise of the planet, whatever its cause. AGW - Anthropogenic Global Warming - that element of GW disputedly caused by mankind's activities. THC - Thermohaline Circulation - the global density-driven circulation of the world's oceans. MOC - Meridional Overturning Circulation - alternative name for above. Also known as ocean or global conveyor belt. GS - Gulf Stream - largely wind-driven fast, warm ocean surface current that flows from Gulf of Mexico northeastwards, then splits mid-Atlantic into a part that recirculates at the surface past S Europe & W Africa, and the..... NAD (easily mis-read as NAO!) - North Atlantic Drift - largely THC-driven northern extension of the Gulf Stream towards NW Europe. The density changes eventually cause this surface current to sink (NE of Iceland), where the cold water circulates back south as part of the..... NADW - North Atlantic Deep Water - a mass of cold water, originating mainly in the Labrador & Greenland Seas, that forms a complex, slow-moving, deep (2-4 KM) ocean current flowing south, part of the MOC that pulls the NAD northwards.

I must have missed whatever this refers to.....and a detailed search for all WB's posts has left me none the wiser. Oh god, I do hate it when I'm the only person who doesn't know what everyone's talking about.....have a heart, someone, and PM me with the sordid details.........

Fantastic, Stratos - we're very lucky to have you. I think you may have left off poor TimmyH and his 12-hours-late 7.0, though......and he was so desperate to be allowed in, too!

...and I'm delighted (and amazed) to see that my +6.2 lies bang in the middle of your upper and lower projections.

Bennytes. I think you should do a little bit of research on just how healthy - and sustained - the population of Greenland was during the Mediaeval "Warm" Period. As for removing guilty rich people's wealth in order to provide bottomless pots of money to help everyone....well, it's a delight to find an unreformed Marxist alive and well in the UK. Alas, the maths doesn't work: you get a once off distribution of nothing like the size you imagine - and certainly nothing like enough to solve this problem - and then it's gone. In subsequent years you're back where you started; and, of course, you've lost the energetic entrepeneurs who, on the whole, work hard and imaginatively to increase the size of the overall pot, even when their motivation is entirely selfish. It used to be called "killing the goose that lays the golden egg". Oh, and I think they tried it for a while in Russia and China and a few other places.....didn't work out too well.

Stratos, I'm completely confused by the months you are attributing these places to - as I commented yesterday that I was by some similarly odd figures on the "Beginning of the End...?" thread.....Oh, I think I see it: I guess you really meant the last SIX months, but have mysteriously stuck in another third place in addition to October's, and shifted July Aug & Sept back by a month. Um....weird. As you know, I do not disagree with most of your assertions and hypotheses - but I think you should double-check the stats you post to back them up! Ossie

WIB, I agree that it's exceptionally mild; but I suspect that the tree is Prunus xsubhirtella 'Autumnalis', which - as its name implies - flowers intermittently in mild spells from late autumn through to spring every year. If it's a different variety, though, then it's remarkable indeed.

So, is there a "match referee" in overall charge, or just a number of umpires and line judges? We really do need to make a decision on this late/changed entry business; and while looking for consensus is great in theory, I fear it'll lead to us still arguing the toss come Christmas. Perhaps we should start fresh from Jan 07, with fully understood and accepted rules....or maybe we had those already (and all ready) for this month? I never engaged in the setting up process - I just made a punt, and am happy to abide by the rules made by those who did. Ossie

You make a very good point, Roger, and I agree that this time only we might perhaps show compassion.....however, while I don't mind preparing a supplementary list of latecomers, I am NOT staying up till 4.30 in the morning again changing half the figures on the main one !?!

Damn, it doesn't seem to be in this thread, though I know I've seen it somewhere recently. Forgive me for being so dumb, but could someone tell me where the scoring system is described? It doesn't seem to be in the 'competitions' section either - could we maybe pin a copy of it here, Mods?

Well, I'm not in charge. Come to think of it, who is in charge? Perhaps we could allow entries up to 24 hours late - but with a severe scoring penalty attached? EDIT: Ah - snap, SF. Yes, -5 points a day sounds fair, though I've now forgotten how the positive scoring works: I must scroll back through the thread.

Um....Timmy....I fear you're around 12 hours and 12 minutes too late - only thirty days in November . ....and ditto BriT by even longer - unless the umpires are minded to allow a late entry or two? Probably better not, or those brave souls who made their final predictions a week and more ago may understandably feel a little miffed.

Not sure about "easily", Stratos, it's taken me HOURS....but here is a list in temperature order, lovingly drawn up by hand using pen & paper. My apologies for any errors or omissions, but some posts were so full of (fascinating, of course) blurb that it was occasionally difficult to see the wood for the trees. It's also late & I'm very tired. Any previous guess, sorry forecast is shown in brackets: 2.0 : THE EYE IN THE SKY 2.0 : memories of 63 2.8 : charlton north-downs 2.9 : snowmaiden 3.1 : Optimus Prime 3.4 : BristolBlizzard 3.6 : Serendipidity 3.7 : Lorraine Bennett 3.9 : Ian Brown 4.0 : fishdude 4.0 : Paul Carfoot 4.1 : Rollo 4.1 : mark bayley 4.3 : skiwi 4.3 : Intrepid 4.4 : STEADY EASTERLY 4.4 : conor123 4.5 : Steve Murr 4.5 : SNOW-MAN 2006 4.6 : Geordie Snow 4.7 : Robbie 4.7 : Iceberg (4.4) 4.8 : neforum2 4.8 : Wilson 4.8 : Glacier Point (4.5) 4.9 : Atlantic Flamethrower 4.9 : snowhope 4.9 : Mr Sleet 5.0 : shuggee 5.0 : WindWatcher 5.1 : James M 5.2 : Nick F 5.2 : Supercell 5.2 : mattneal 5.3 : DAVIDSNOW 5.3 : tugmistress 5.3 : kold weather (4.4) 5.4 : ukmoose 5.4 : Tamara G 5.4 : windswept 5.4 : Bottesford 5.5 : Cymru 5.5 : s4lancia 5.6 : Don 5.6 : summer blizzard 5.6 : JACKONE 5.6 : Stratos Ferric 5.7 : Persian Paladin 5.7 : Paul Sherman 5.7 : Joneseye 5.8 : Steve B 5.8 : The Penguin 5.9 : Snowyowl9 5.9 : Anti-Mild 5.9 : Mr Data 6.0 : Evo 6.0 : The PIT 6.0 : reef 6.0 : senior ridge 6.0 : Norrance 6.1 : Stargazer 6.1 : nigelonline 6.1 : Somerset Squall 6.2 : cheeky monkey 6.2 : Gray-Wolf 6.2 : Gavin P 6.2 : osmposm 6.3 : BLAST FROM THE PAST 6.3 : guitarnutter 6.3 : ChrisL 6.4 : stormchaser1 6.4 : Tom Partis 6.5 : Chilly Milly 6.6 : JohnAcc 6.7 : Scorcher 6.7 : snowray 6.8 : West is Best 7.0 : weatherwise 7.1 : Stephen Prudence 7.1 : Paul 7.3 : derby4life 8.3 : Roger J Smith 9.9 : tinybill Let the contest - and the winter - begin!

I'm glad I'm not the person trying to keep track of everybody's predictions if they keep changing !! Mind you, I was cowardly (or sensible) enough to wait until late last night before throwing my hat in the ring. But I hereby promise that even if a huge surge of west-travelling Siberian air miraculously appears on the 18z the day after tomorrow, I shall stick to my 6.2.

A depressingly mild +6.2 for me, too......though I passionately hope I turn out to be at least a couple of degrees too high. Ossie

Cheer up, Damien. Looking carefully at your map (where does it come from, by the way?), it would seem to be suggesting a probability of 40-45% or 45-50% for the UK to have above normal temps this winter. But the logical corollary of that is that a probability of 55-60% or 50-55% is suggested for normal or below normal temps, isn't it? Or am I being really stupid?