Scorcher

Completely disagree with this. 20C could easily have been reached in late December/early January last year if we'd tapped into the exceptional warmth that Central and Eastern Europe experienced. Places in Germany that had never recorded 20C in winter before exceeded it and Warsaw smashed its all-time January record by 5.1C- recording 18.9C. Some meteorologists thought it was the most remarkable warm spell ever at any time of year. I remarked at the time that if the warmth had been further north and we'd had those sorts of uppers over the UK, places like North Wales, parts of Scotland and even eastern England would have been close to or exceeded 20C.

December 2001 really stands out for me. Lots of crystal clear blue skies and temps in low single figures. I was young but I distinctly remember thinking this must be what continental winters are like.

Doesn't look likely going by the ECM ensembles above. Most stay above the long term mean. In any case it wouldn't be like winter this early in the month. It's the last third of the month when single figure maxes become possible.

You'll have to hope he predicts the mildest on record if you want a cold one!

The fact you've posted probably means it will be an absolute scorcher now. Last time you predicted the historic September hot spell would be 'blink and you'll miss it' away from the south. We ended up having 10 days of it up here. That's also a Met Office automated forecast which are notoriously too low with temps. Expect those to rise as the weekend gets closer.

Saturday looking hugely disappointing here if those charts are correct. I hope they're way off the mark as 20C seems very low in such a setup, even in October.

I'm taking it the GFS is having another wobble? It's been all over the place for the weekend while the ECM has barely shifted at all.

They're not shaking about a warm up- it's definitely going to get a lot warmer as we move towards the weekend.

Rostherne reached 20.4C on Sunday 24th and is the official site for the area. Also 19.7C on the 26th and 19.0C on Friday. Personally I don't think that's really autumnal. There were a lot of days cooler than that in July this year. Light-wise it's very autumnal now of course with the days rapidly shortening. Trees are slowly changing yes but I noticed some were changing colour at the end of August this year.

Depends how you define autumnal- at Rostherne almost every day in September was above average- even in the 2nd half. Very few nights in single figures.

It's inevitable a cool down will come at some point next week. It will be interesting to see if the warmth can be extended though into Tuesday and perhaps slightly beyond. The GFS has hinted at this possibility in its latest run.

I did say that I expected 17.0C a few days back when others were convinced it was going to drop into the 16s. Just shows you shouldn't trust the raw data from the GFS, which is often too low. It surprises me how many very knowledgeable people in here trust the GFS in situations like that. The same thing happened in June when some were convinced it was going to go below 17.0C a few days before the end of the month. A really remarkable month- particularly in the south when you look at the number of days that reached 20C+ across the month. Heathrow only had 5 days across the month that failed to reach 20C and a lowest maximum temperature of 18.6C. And the heatwave in the first 10 days was something that will live long in the memory for most of us across the country.

I know that but that's not the point I was making- I was simply making the point that a low sun angle of under 35 degrees can still support temps above 30C. I'm not expecting temps to get that high here, even if we get an ECM type setup. The LA sun angle is 32 degrees at midday on December 30th. 90F was recorded there on that date in 1980.

The solar angle isn't much of a barrier as many believe- yes it will restrict temps compared to a month ago, but get a hot enough air mass and the temps will still soar. For example somewhere like Los Angeles has a December all-time record of 33C despite a similar midday sun angle (around 30 degrees above the horizon) to the UK in October and shorter days. I get the geography is very different and continental, but the low sun was no barrier to temps going that high.

Looks like a potential direct southerly. Ideally we need a decent breeze at this time of year to prevent fog lingering.

Good call- the setup from the ECM for next Saturday is one of the most impressive I've ever seen for warmth in October though. 17C isotherm over Scotland a week into October- astonishing if that came off. 25C quite widely perhaps?

By my calculations, yesterday was warmer than 14.5C. I've calculated 16.55C at Rothamsted, 15.3C at Pershore and just under 15C at Stonyhurst. It will be interesting to see what the figure actually is. Unless you're actually using the data from the CET stations, the figures aren't going to be that precise with the estimates.

I don't think I misunderstood- I may be splitting hairs here, but there is only one day of the month left after Friday. Following 'days' made me think you meant multiple days after Friday.

Where? The Met Office have a min of 10C for Pershore, 9C for Rothamsted and 9C for Stonyhurst. Actually an above average night for this stage of the month.

Is it really going to drop 0.4C over 3 days though? I'd say it's very borderline whether it will drop into the 16s. I'd say if it does, it could still be a rounded 17C. Another warm night across the CET zone last night with none of the stations dropping below 13C. Tomorrow night doesn't look all that cold to me and it will be cloudier further north. Saturday is the final day of the month so the 'following days' doesn't apply here.

Yes and what it makes it more remarkable is that July wasn't that cool at all.

Not sure how June doesn't come into the 'classic' category given it was the warmest in our lifetimes...it was also particularly notable in your part of the country. 245 hours of sun here along with it being record-breakingly warm- I don't know what more it has to do to be a classic. Even the all time great months had cooler spells at some point. 1976 is a case in point- pretty unremarkable until the last 10 days of the month. Is that not a classic either?

A really nice day overall here- sunny and breezy for the most of the day although the sun was hazier later in the afternoon. Max of 19.3C.

I really don't think this is going to be concluded until 2 or 3 days out- still all to play for IMO.

Far too early to be talking about victories- nothing is certain at all for next week yet. There is enough scatter in the ensembles for the models to completely flip back to the high pressure scenario.