weather eater

I’m not sure the models over do the PV so much as underestimate blocking, as I say things remain on knife edge, stray just a little and all shall fall to ruin, or rather I mean we remain on the milder side of any cold and thus any snow will be localised and the cold not entrenched across the whole UK.

No reasonably responsible weather agency or site is going to get sucked into making any kind of clear-cut forecast that an extended period of cold and snow is an odds on favourite to hit the UK starting next week, things do remain balanced on a knife edge at the moment. However there remain some encouraging signs this morning, slowly slowly the models appear to be trending that way, better in my book as we want to see the projections evolve into something decent and not appear in the mid range fully formed with the only evolution possible back towards something milder, which is the usual way of things 99 times out of 100.

I tried Ian brown where is he, because actually I pay attention to what he says, at least when I think he’s not on a wind up, because he offers an alternative view, and on a forum full of cold weather nuts its sometimes useful OON, forecasting? But he just does do sarcasm really well, I'm deeply envious And Frosty has got better and better over the years, maybe needs to rein himself in sometimes, as his enthusiasm for cold knows no bounds, but nothing wrong with that.

Stuff like that’s been tried before and it doesn’t really work, what I would say is no need for confusion, post 3 days or so is always open to increasing amounts of conjecturing, it’s not really a case of believing one person or another, its weather, it catches all of us out on a regular basis, listen to the arguments, put any bias for weather types out of your head and concentrate on those who you think know what they are talking about, irrespective of what their weather preference appears to be. I recommend Gibby for a good unbiased view Ian Fergusson (fergieweather) with his finger on the pulse of the METO view S. Murr if you want to know how synoptic patterns may develop Nick Sussex, for much the same John Holmes, ex METO no bull Bluearmy another good reader of models Shedhead and Draztik you know they never get sucked in by cold in FI Nick F and Phil_nw more good readers TEITS, loves the cold but a realist Tamara excellent with the models chionomaniac in touch with his inner Strat, at least he knows what’s going down in that area. Lorenzo another whose posts I pay attention to

Indeed but we don't want BOOM chats appearing just yet, they almost always go POP, better to have slowly slowly catch a monkey. Some fascinating outputs at the moment, it looks a bit of a case of rinse and repeat at 192hrs but that's a long way off and will be subject to much revision.

Actually last night’s forecast did mention the possibility of some winteriness today and we have seen some wet snow, sleet and hail but it’s not laid even on the hills, just added to the soggy wet mess. Big lightning flash just now as well and a bit of a hail/sleet laying on the ground in the last few mins.

Seems to me that what’s being modelled in terms of potential snowfall is not that far of what happened in March. Here we had a relatively small fall of snow, but places like the hills around Buxton had massive drifts, head towards Stockport it was just rain. I was actually out in it helping people whose cars had got stuck, there was some pretty impressive drifts and we almost got stuck ourselves on the road between Castleton and Chapel, a four by four was stuck in a huge drift and we had to take the driver and turn around back the way we had come leaving his car behind, however, once off the hills there was very little snow in places like chapel-en-le-frith and Glossop. So yes if you have some elevation you could see some serious winteriness but I suspect it will be a mainly a slushy mess at low levels.

Yes things shaping up nicely this morning but the METO won’t get overly carried away with model projections out at 120-144hrs simply because these are still subject to much revision, that view will of course change over the next couple of days if we see more support across the further model suites.

I don’t think its relevant that it’s been mild and wet this winter, most of us on NW would be chasing cold and snow today even if the country had been ice bound for the last month and a half. Look at what happened in 2010, even after that frigid December people were still pulling their hair out when the rest of the winter wasn’t as bad. Personally I’m a cold weather fan have been since I was a teenager up to my neck in drifts in the winter of 78/79 and maybe because I was born in 62 but I’m also fascinated by all types of weather phenomena and occasionally I’m amazed by this forum, we could have a hurricane about to arrive and most NW members would still be ignoring it in the endless search for snow that almost never arrives, sometimes it’s a bit weird. What I find especially odd is, that if we don’t get a cold spell this winter NW members will put this winter down as boring and that’s one thing it has not been.

Mostly in vain downpour it has to be said, meanwhile we continue to have one of the most extreme winters outside of cold and snow that I can remember, I’ve said it before but during the winter we may as well rename this thread the hunt for cold thread. Most of us and I include myself in that are indeed looking for something of a cold snowy variety, however, sometimes when confronted with what’s really happening weather wise it seems a little one dimensional.

Trouble is Joe how many times has that been said this winter, there’s is good support from the Ems for blocking, only to mean nothing, as far as I can see the Ems just lead us up the garden path more times than the Ops.

I have to say I’m not filled with confidence this morning, yes here in high peak we have a chance to see some falling snow, some cold uppers in a NW flow but without a sustained cold block it’s going to be a rather soggy affair, any snow quickly going from white to a brown slush, like a slush puppy in a cess pit, not my idea of fun. On a slightly more positive note, as ever it’s an evolving situation and I’d rather see the charts we have now for the mid range because I know they will evolve, maybe for the better, as I’ve said many times, Stella charts at 144hrs are a fools hope, they almost always come to nowt.

I know, it’s not a pretty picture, but we must find some humour where we can, it’s been as you say a fascinating winter, some of the most extreme synoptics we have seen for a long time, but missing the vital ingredients for most on this thread, not everyone though is just interested by cold and snow.

Just have done with it Ian and run for president, under the moniker, Mr Popular, a vote for me is a vote for snow This is a party election leaflet on behalf of the Blizzard party.

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Let’s put it this way, over the last 7/8 years I’ve seen the models forecast zonal, wind, rain, dross, hundreds of times and be right, this winter a case in point, I’ve also seen dozens of occasions during that time where the models have forecasted cold and snow, the majority of which have failed to happen. The cold hard fact of living in the UK is that most of our weather comes off the Atlantic, so when the models run with the idea of zonal, wind, rain, dross, it’s perfectly believable, cold and snow projections on the other hand should always be viewed with hope rather than expectation, personally I want to see the whites of the eyes before putting faith in cold synoptics, 96hrs or less.

We need to be careful about putting too much emphasis and hope on strat warming’s as well. 1. We are talking about relying on future strat warming’s being correct. 2. Stat warming’s are not a guarantee of cold for the UK, although obviously they give us a better chance. I'm optimistic that we may see a better pattern emerge of the next few days, but I would still say its odds on that we won’t, that’s called tempering hope with realism Mcweather In regards egg on the face, all of us who have over the years championed the cause of cold winning out over mild when mulling over synoptic projections on these pages, have had enough egg on our faces, enough egg indeed to have made the world’s largest omelette and I don’t just mean relative know little’s like me, even the smart people see their predictions turn to dust on a regular basis. A case in point, Glacier Points its coming quote last year it too fell on the deaf ears of the weather gods.

Frosty I have spent the last few weeks reading your posts and thinking for lords sakes turn down the optimism just a little bit and now just when I think there are real signs that a pattern shift may happen and I stress may happen, you go all pessimistic on us, cheer up you old beggar. In my book scandy blocks like this need a lot of shifting, the models keep wanting to shift it post 144hrs but that’s just not happening as we get into the higher res. There is plenty more evolution to come and while I’m not forecasting it nevertheless I would not be surprised to see some good outputs in the next few days. The golden rule as far as I can see is that all output beyond 120hrs is highly suspect and the ensembles are unreliable and really that’s why we keep coming back run after run, it’s like pass the parcel, sooner or later someone’s going to get the chocolate bar and we hope it will be us.

Impressive 240hr chart from the ECM, not that I believe it will happen but some more like it over the coming days will be welcomed, Heights to the north and the PV takes a hike.

I think you misunderstand your power Ian, anything you say that hints at a cold outlook is seized upon like a starving squirrel looking for its nuts and everything you say that hints it may not be cold is viewed much the same way. You may not be the man from uncle but you are viewed as the man from the METO you have a sort of deity status. I think Steve might well be right about the ECM, trouble is does anyone trust output post 144hr, I learnt not to about 7 years ago, whatever it says tonight post 144hr it will change that projection.

I rather suspect that it will be a case of as you were, whilst we have seen some reasonable output this morning the MO don’t tend to jump their opinions about based on every run.

The models almost always seem to underestimate these sorts of blocks so it’s no wonder that we are seeing various ideas being mooted post 120hrs or so. However the problem for us is that we could just stay on the wrong side of the block, low pressure sitting on top of us and thus mostly rain (I would say odds on at this moment), the GFS and the UKMO have plenty of promise this morning, but 144hr projections will change, still better stuff this morning for those of us looking for cold.

And that sums up the ensembles for me, one clustering may be right, but it might not the largest or even one of them and sometimes it’s none of them. Trouble with the ensembles is you need to be a skilled and dispassionate reader of them to make the best call and even then you are as like as not to be wrong. s4lancia re your last post, that's as good an assessment as I’ve seen this evening.

No I know you didn't I didn’t mean to sound like I was pinpointing you, but I think plenty do or at least they pin their hopes on it, despite being a coldie I try to view things dispassionately I don’t try to read into model projections what I want to see as I can’t see the point, Cold and snow even in winter are the exception not the rule in the UK, so viewing model outputs by a what I hope will happen method seems to me to be pretty futile, rather like spending your whole life rejecting what’s right in front of you trying to look for the absolute perfect soul mate and finding yourself still single and a pensioner 65 years down the line. And right now what’s in front of us is a return to full on zonal, given that the Scandia high is now not going to be of any use to us, that maybe the best thing to force a pattern change, or it may be that the models will return to the mid Atlantic ridge there were showing a couple of days ago, I wouldn’t rule it out completely, although it seems very unlikely to my eyes.