Cold Winter

Great to see all your snow photos this morning (and many more on Twitter) but all we could manage here was a bit of ice and a few well scattered flakes on the odd car roof... not even enough to call it a dusting! Temp now up to 4.0c. Looking ahead, Thursday morning looks like the next time period for possible snow. As others have mentioned, it becomes marginal as higher T850s and >528 dam filters south. Models also quite inconsistent on both when, where and how much precipitation there’ll be. I’d say western half of North Yorks, West and South Yorks best place to be as things stand (no surprises there!!).

0.4c here in Malton with sleet! Time for bed I think...

I know, I think this may turn out to be one of the most frustrating ‘cold spells‘ for our (very specific) area if you’re talking about snow potential. How often do we see snow modelled for the moors, wolds and W Yorks but a blob of rain over Malton?!? Seems to happen more and more often. Might look better later next week but that’s a long way off. Until then we just have to make do with all the pretty pictures from elsewhere!

Yep, -1c here now and frost never lifted. Surprised it’s stayed so low!

You never know, you might get lucky! We’re currently at 0.0c here now when it was forecast to be about 3c by the hi res models. Hoping this might be to our advantage later while realistically knowing that the upper air temps and dew points are probably more important

I’m in Malton too and the frost has never really lifted all day. You’re right though, we never seem to get that lucky here unless we get a really cold east/northeasterly. Back down to 0.3c now so hoping tonight might bring a surprise!

Temp now 0.8c here at 1pm. Forecast was for 3c by now.

Matt Hugo has posted a tweet regarding chances tonight. He’s using the GEM but of note it shows a fair amount of precipitation which is mostly snow. Still think T850s and dews etc will be too marginal for me, but keeps me interested! Content below is his tweet (@MattHugo81):

Hi everyone, not posted in this thread for a little while. Looking good for you guys in South Yorkshire later in the week. Sadly I think my part of North Yorkshire is probably a bit too low and near the coast for now but hopefully that may change in the next few days! NY Moors and Wolds should do well tonight I think. On the plus side, current temp here is still -0.7c while the computer generated apps think it should be 1c.

I’ll take this! Reasonable T850s make for nice looking snow cover charts. (Admittedly at T294...)

Agree. The charts look nice after what we’ve been used to for years but for actually delivering to the majority then they aren’t brilliant. As others have said, a smaller low positioned further east would be ideal rather than this canon ball that goes down the eastern half of the country. Prior to all that however, some lucky eastern areas could get a few snow flurries Christmas Eve and overnight into Christmas Day!

Are we seeing them too soon though, that’s my concern now!

I was looking back at old threads earlier on from previous cold spells and there is often talk of dodgy uppers out at Day 7-10 with improvements by T0. Equally there are sometimes warm sectors that are only modelled nearer the time too, and believe me I’ve been the victim of these more than once!!

The mean at T180 does appear to be a little further east than the op and control. Not much in it but it could help/be a sign that things might move east a little. Also the mean 850s for this stage are approx -4c, so 50% of ensemble members are going to be lower than that.

I’ll happily take this for Christmas Eve!!

You’re right, of course the hills should do well. I’ve noticed the 850s are steadily trending downwards however, and we’re still a long way out... 12z Friday & 6z today for my area below. The mean 850 temp has dropped from around -3 to -5c in the last 48 hours. Could it continue? Maybe. 12z Friday: 6z today

Fab chart... (if anyone comments on the uppers at this range I’ll politely ignore them! )

I would always favour ECM/UKMO over GFS but that doesn’t mean the former are always right. The consistency from the GFS recently has been of note.

Yes I noticed that, nice to see the op isn’t at the colder end

GEFS at T192 looks to be about a 50/50 split between lovely ridging to Greenland with subsequent northerly and a horrid flatter westerly pattern... but I don’t think op will be a major outlier.

The “too far west” comments are far too premature. It’s well out in FI so could end up going too far east, or not even happening at all! Focus on the overall pattern we’re seeing instead would be my suggestion

This is just pure filth from the 12z GFS. Glorious!

Just look at this... definitely won’t happen like this, or probably even close, but beautiful to see! I’ll have whatever the 18z is drinking

Gorgeous run out in FI... but it should come with an 18+ rating

Control run also picking up signal for increased heights over eastern Canada by T174 compared with 0z.