wellington boot

Im loving this calm before the storm. Plenty of people around, but everyone all posted out on the runs we already have. Now just waiting for the next data nervously. The calm before the storm

Temp here has been plunging, now down from -3.9C to -4.3C.

Where are you getting the birmingham airport temps from? Ive been googling for a while but havent found where you might find this. Ok ive found it on netweather now. when i googled it it gave me an old page with birmingham at -2 or something, i forgot to refresh...

Temp here in oxford down to -4C

Matt Bellamy has an incredible voice. And Keane went to my school you know . I like Keane -some of their stuff is really good, but i haven't listened to their second album that much, and their first, while i started off liking it, i got totally bored of at some point. I have no inclination to listen to it really now - it's just a bit weedy, lacking in complexity. Anyway, back on topic, temp here is back down to -3.5C

Somewhat warmer eh? Down here in oxford the temp is at -3.5C now and it feels bitter. On the subject of the 18z, it's clearly a massive downgrade. And a downgrade for everyone. I see why northerners feel it could at least give them a dumping earlier on, but let's face it, even on thursday/friday, it's far more marginal. -5 850 line is a good 200 miles further north and east at the same point as on the 12z, really a vast downgrade. Partly to blame for this is the absence of the low passing through in a position to recirculate the -5 air down south a bit again. As for saturday, whatever some people want to believe, if you go by the gfs, it would be a miracle to see proper settling snow if you wern't fairly far north and on the pennines. You guys up north have got to give it up and send thursday back south to me, if you want anything good for yourselves. That way we all win. I'm fairly calm seeing the 18z, because everything can change, and the 18z isn't exactly the most reliable run of the gfs, but even the ukmo is worse than it was for me a run or two ago, so by tomorrow morning we really need some significant upgrades if the potential is to be fulfilled.

Just as a record, boring though it is compared to news from the north east, but temps here are down between -2 and -3 degrees. Though a low of -3.5 was reached at 12.25. I hadnt noticed your sig before. Muse are my favourite band (probably, well more often than any other band).

Indeed, i think a moment's silence to bow our heads is in order

Yeah thats quite unlucky. And ive found a different weather station online for oxford, which is closer to me anyway, and has -1.6C as minimum , 5 minutes ago, and mean over last 60 seconds of -1.6. This feels much more likely to me

I dont understand the online weather station for oxford that im checking. How can the temp have gone up from around 0.5C to 1.3C, particularly since it feels colder than before right now. maybe their thermometer is on the side of a heated building.

In newcastle and durham and thereabouts, you could get some snow from this intensifying shower, whish is extending slowly towards you. But youre quite unlucky to miss the the snow hitting middlesborough (edit:or perhaps scarborough more), marginally to the south of you. There's quite a bit stacking up down there, only 20/30 miles to the south max.

Thanks for the clearing up. I guess i just never looked closely enough/though hard enough about it before to work out what was going on.

Yes thats a really nice link. Cheers matey

Yeah Harrogate and other places around there, like sheffield and nottingham, are, byt the metoffices reckoning, in line for two periods of heavy snow and a few of light snow on and around saturday. here in oxford, were down for heavy snow on thursday, but then theres a mixture of light rain, sleet and light snow.

temp here in oxford rather laboriously dropping. Still 0.7 degrees though. I dont have my own thermometer here though, so im going by an online oxford weather station. When i looked at a similar thing for leicester, it said only -0.9 degrees

PP, your more bitter and pessimistic than ever, lighten up. There are quite a few showers off the north east coast showing on radar, and while the snowy ones which are hitting land look to be fractionally south of you, there is plenty more out there, and anyway the rain snow indicators on the radar are pretty poor. They do it in big blocks. you can see the straight lines all over the place where sleet turns to rain or snow or whatever. And the models are struggling at the moment; theres a reasonable chance that well see quite a cold setup develop for the Uk over the next few weeks. And as for even larger teapot etc., the fact is that weve had 10-15 years of poor winters, but its not necessarily global warming, and actually the last few years, despite what you might say, have shown that maybe winters are beginning to go the other way. Last winter there was certainly lots of northern blocking. The synoptics just didnt quite work out for us. And this winter, despite being a disappointment, could end witha bang yet. Basically, right synoptics = proper event

I hasten to add we're not looking at that block of cloud just of the south west with reagards to thursday. Thats tracking into france tonight and tomorrow i think. Its the general movement of a band of cloud comign up behind and into position which is relevant.

You can see the cloud massing http://www.netweather.tv/pages/charts/noaa...061629-mcir.jpg

Oh dear im ashamed . What a lapse. I thought they corresponded somehow, the colours and the DAM readings. Because if you actually use the colour coding, the number match up surprisingly accurately. http://www.wetterzentrale.de/pics/Rtavn061.png http://www.wetterzentrale.de/pics/Rtavn063.png The '528' lines on both charts are almost in identical positions! Anyway, thanks, thats an embarassing hole patched up.

With all impartiality, i would suggest that the JMA looks decidedly dodgy right now. From the word go, it looks like it's taking all the atlantic low pressure too far north, all the way through in fact. Like it's underdoing the high pressure to the north and east. On the other hand, it actually did ok with the setup we are seeing now/soon to see, or better than certain other big names, such as the ecm, by suggesting that the high would stand firm and deflect the lows south, something which the other models really didnt get at all. So maybe it has a better handle on the high pressure. I doubt it though.

Much appreciated anti mild. It's settled then, the low is going to track south because anti mild is taking one for the team... With regards tonight's models, I would back what many have already said, in taking charts beyond 72-96 hours with a pinch of salt. There is so much disagreement before 96, let alone afterwards, that it really isn't even helpful to go by reputation (ie back the ecm). Because you'd expect all the models to be roughly right out to 96 in a normal setup, but they're so different that some, including the big ones, will be proven wrong, so anythign they forecast afterwards is rendered irrelevant.

This is not to say those charts are reliable or anything, but i really cannot believe how identical they are. It's really incredible. I thought they were th same chart for a moment.

Don't do this to me Steve. Don't get my hopes up like this. To be honest, from what i have been seeing over the last couple of days, I have also been feeling that oxford should really be in a very good position, but we are, to use my phrase again, right in the highest risk/highest gain spot. I feel the front should be further south, but small adjustments could take us from a snow to rain damp squib to a memorable major snow event.

Sorry yes i meant to write underwhelmed!! Though actually i probably just wrote can rather than cant by mistake. It should have been 'I can't say im overwhelmed"

Nick F did you move to tunbridge wells recently - i never noticed you lived there before. During holidays i live 10 mins away. Back to the weather, Ive just taken a look at the AO forecast for the first time in a while, and i can say im overwhelmed. Its a fairly good indicator of whether we have any chance of prolonged blocking and wintry condiditons here in the longer term, and right now its looking like theres quite a bit of disagreement, but most of the ensemble members are actually going to take it positive. Four or five, including two outliers which have it plunging negative, show it staying negative with the beginning of negative plunge at the extent of the forecast. The rest of the 11 ensembles members though have it rising steadily towards a positive state by mid month, including one horrible, but unlikely outlier, which rockets positive. Here it is: http://www.cpc.noaa.gov/products/precip/CW...ex/ao.sprd2.gif