Nick L

No worries. The ECMWF can overegg winds by 5mph or so, but even taking that into account it's still potentially damaging on Sunday. The UKV gusts will be very interesting viewing tomorrow.

I'll try and put something together before I clock off at 7!

I'm sure they'd be whining even more if their train ploughed into a fallen tree at 100mph!

ECMWF just rolling in has edged the winds back up across England and Wales for Sunday. Well into the 70s and hints of exceeding 80mph over inland parts of Wales, perhaps into parts of the Midlands too. This HAS to be an amber warning.

Optimistic but possible, although on past experience with their warnings I'd label that explanation generous. We'll see, but I suspect a widespread amber warning will be issued tomorrow when it could very easily have been done today. Models have been very consistent (unusually so) for the strength of the gusts we're seeing so I'd be surprised if there's a significant backtrack now (famous last words). And when I said moderated slightly, it was probably just inter-run variability. The 18z ECMWF last night nudged the max gusts down slightly but brought them back up over night. I'm still confident we'll be seeing 70+ gusts inland.

That makes this decision even more puzzling. Winds in London are likely to be very similar to the gusts in Kent and Sussex.

I said the opposite, it very much is unusual But again, I'm not seeing a significant difference with the length of time of the strong winds either. I just don't understand why that area has been singled out. I would be curious to hear their reasoning!

But it isn't an outlier, either with itself or other models. UKV (i.e. the Met Office model) gusts won't be available to see until tomorrow but the mean wind speeds are very similar to the ECMWF.

Just to clarify...My dispute with the warning isn't necessarily with the strength of the winds (although I do disagree with it), it's more that they've singled out an area which I don't think is more prone than anywhere else during this event. 70mph+ gusts for London and Birmingham is not a usual occurrence!

Thanks knocker, didn't have time to copy across the latest run. The 06z has moderated things slightly but still has gusts of up to and a little above 70mph well inland.

What I'm showing you is the ECMWF model.

But that's not what the model output is showing at all. This was last night's EC but things are still pretty much the same. If the models were showing what you're describing then I'd completely agree. What's baffling me is how the Met Office are ignoring consistent model output except for a small area in the southeast!

Nope, the rail network is covered by the company I work for. We're going for higher winds than the Met. I've been on conference calls for most of the day to various parts of the network!

Agreed. I find it incredible that the Met Office haven't felt the need to update the rest of the wind warning for Sunday. This is a significant weather event.

But the yellow warning hasn't been updated since yesterday!

That Met Office amber warning makes absolutely no sense. Why only that area? The EC has widespread gusts of 70mph or so for pretty much the whole of Britain, this is NOT just a coastal event and I'm really concerned by the way they're downplaying this. The UKV mean winds are very similar too. It's just puzzling why they've singled out a small area, it's so inconsistent with the model output.

Well at least the upcoming storm will provide some kind of weather interest! Going to be a noisy night shift for me.

Boulder is absolutely beautiful. I know someone living there doing a post-doc. Some day...

Imagine if we were on BST, it would still be dark until 8.30

I would love to live in Denver. They get proper winter weather, the summers aren't oppressive and you've got the mountains next door. Plus it's a saner part of the states. I got to experience a couple of these cold fronts in Oklahoma, they are incredible, you can actually feel the temperature drop 10-15c in a matter of minutes. Bizarre.

Trust me to pick June to go storm chasing this year!

We did at least get a reasonable snow event down here (on this day last year weirdly enough). Even the worst winters of the mid-2000s mustered a snow event at some point. Not this wretched excuse of a season.

As I've got a road trip around northwestern Scotland at the end of Feb, I'm hoping to see at least SOME snow! But I wouldn't mind some ridiculous warmth like we had last year.

Yep, it's not the lack of snow that makes this winter so awful, it's just that it's so non-descript. People recall 2013/14 because of just how stormy it was. But other than constant slate grey skies and diurnal ranges of 2-3c, I am struggling to think of one feature to remember this winter by. It really has been a nothing season. Bring on the first high-teens temperatures of March.