BarnetBlizzard

Another upgrade on the ECM.....

The GFS and its ensembles seem to be particularity aggressive with these lows attacking from the West. Is this often the case with the GFS? If so, maybe it will backtrack a little to the UKMO and ECM, and maybe allow heights to rise to our West, rather than just our south west.

Is it me or are the charts slowly improving and the general model output not actually that bad. Yes- there will be cold rain, and wind, and yes there is no snowy easterly. However, these lows, usually tracking just to the North of the UK, are bringing shots of colder air across the UK, particularly the Northern half and there is no reason quite a few of you won't see some snow showers every now and again. For me the 12z GFS is better- heights in Europe less pronounced eventually and the start of an Atlantic ridge appearing. there is by no means a guaranteed cold spell on the way- but Meto and bbc did suggest something on the way in around 15 days time- lets hope!

Been looking through the GEFS 6z ensembles and the majority show high pressure near us after the 180 hour mark. Just over half show a movement of that block of cold to the east, westwards. Around 4-5 show some form of easterly between 200-300 hours and around 2 of these show a beasterly. For example, run number 17 shows this at day 11- which equates to this in terms of upper air temps- No gurantee of an easterly, but no gurantee of a south westerly. It's all up in the air, and I for one, am looking forward to the next 5 days of model watching. There could be something brewing

Not just pressure that matters, strong winds, difference between upper air and SST's etc.. Ive seen easterlies where the pressure is far higher further north yet the frequency and intensity of those showers is far higher then those further south, with lower pressure.

By 225 hrs snow showers are piling against the East coast. The south-east in particular would be hit hard. Obviously a very small chance of happening, but shows heights developing to our North still isn't out of the question.

People mentioning the Sheffield snow shield etc.... My word, the York snow shield must be some kind of magic force field. I have lived here for nearly 3 years and experienced two snow showers. I'm not sure of its the mountainous region to the West or the not many meters above sea level but snow does not want to come here.... Ok enough complaining, you can see the easterly track of the band is beginning to slow down, and slowly heading south while the western side of the precipitation is intensifying. From the look of things those west of Leeds and east of Manchester seem like they will do best.

For those who are less able at reading the charts (such as myself) here is what the latest GFS chart shows. For me, the GFS 6z looks better in terms of the threat of the azores low (less of an interference) . Also, the way the high is positioned means a north easterly wind is brought in bringing colder uppers, this has been a bit of a trend overnight and this morning. The next few frames should show cold uppers coming in from the North/ North east.

At this moment in time its obvious Northern Scotland will have the best chances for extensive snow showers or periods of snow as they are closer to the source of the cold. However, it is looking more likely in recent runs the cold will extend to the majority of the UK and stay there (not a toppler). Once you have the cold, then you can look for the snow and in the case of the upcoming cold "spell", troughs and other features could pop up anywhere. In December 2010 the cold came from the North yet the biggest falls for Southern england came from activity moving up from the South and stalling, so no point worrying about where and how much snow yet!

Hi guys, My dissertation involves comparing the tidal range at coastal locations across eastern England and more specifically the Humber Estuary. Firstly, I picked this as a topic for my dissertation due to the lack of research and knowledge on the effects a changing tidal range, due to climate change, can have on our coasts. I have produced some graphs for the tidal range at Immingham after retrieving data from the British Oceanographic Data Centre (BODC). These graphs show the average tidal range at Immingham for each year going back as far as 1956. These graphs produced some results i did not expect. I expected a slight decline in tidal range at Immingham within the last 30-40 years after research however once the graphs were produced any decline was very hard to distinguish. This was mainly due to repetitive periods of large mean tidal range and low tidal ranges. These occurred every 20 years or so. Initially I was slightly confused however after more research I discovered these repetitive periods could be due to something known as the Nodal cycle, which is a cycle related to the Moons nodes and its relation with the sun and moon (far more complicated then that). Furthermore, the Nodal Cycle occurs in cycles of 18.6 years, pretty similar to the periods I recorded in Immingham. However, the range between the peak and trough of my graph (highest mean tidal range and lowest mean tidal range -20 years apart) is 20cm. I have found some sites which suggest the nodal cycle can only affect the tide by a range of 2 cm or so, far less than 20cm. This is where my question is: is a difference of 20cm between the peak mean tidal range and the low mean tidal range far too large and not possible? I have looked for possible errors involving units however I can not see any thus far. Sorry for quite a difficult question, and there may not be anyone available to answer however I may as well try! Thanks, BarnetBlizzard (excuse the name)

Okay great, that gives me an area to look in more detail. The topic was created just so I could communicate with other people interested in the same topics, and see where that took me. Thanks

I was thinking of looking at solar activity so I'll look up some papers now. Thanks

I am studying environmental geography, so quite a range of topics I could have gone in to. Thanks very much, I'll check that out and is definitely a good place to start. I am looking to make my question more focused, e.g whether the longevity and frequency of droughts in the UK has increased within the last 50 years, and whether this is set to continue.

I was thinking between the last 30 to 50 years, however another option is to go back further to the start of the general industrialisation period although I am not sure how readily available any data would be.

I have always been obsessed with weather, and in particular, extreme weather events. I have been visiting net weather daily for almost 9 years, and have been a member since 2008. There is nothing more exciting for me then to anticipate and experience unusual weather events such as extreme snowfall, heat waves and storms. It would therefore make sense if i were to write my dissertation on extreme weather. However I have yet to decide on the title, and this is where I need help from you guys. I would like to write something to do with the frequency of extreme weather events occurring within the UK, and whether this is due to climate change. However, the title has to be way more specific then that, and this is the bit I am struggling with. Bare in mind the title has to enable me to conduct a significant amount of research. Any comments, discussion or suggestions would be welcomed! Thanks a lot.

On a more positive note the latest Gfs shows increasingly cold uppers and winds veering ne will drive in snow showers across the region from Tuesday on wards, particularly towards the eastern side of the region Which i agree with, but you said the gfs shows snow for all the region which is misleading for many as this is not what it shows.

Agreed, I just wouldn't get your hopes up for tonight

Yes but the 7am shows even less snow.

Unfortunately not. Temps look okay in some western and northern areas. However uppers look pretty poor for any snow lower than 200m

However if you look more closely you can see it only suggests snow for the western half of the region.

This is so painful, 2 snow showers from this cold spell with nothing settling. Enjoy those further west, south and north.

This suggest the difference in height can make, just sleety rain here in york.

Thanks a lot for the reply. I guess i'll just have to wait till the winds move towards a more easterly direction, which maybe possible in the the next few weeks.

I've quite recently moved to York so I've had very limited experience of snow so far. From what I have experience this winter, it appears two factors have had quite considerable negative impact on the chances of me seeing snow. First facotor is the elevation. I have only looked up the elevation of York briefly, but it appears to be about 20-30m asl on average. This appears to have made marginal situations far more marginal than other areas, for example last week where areas like Leeds saw settling snow while York saw a slushy cm which quickly melted. Second factor is the Yorkshire moors, which is relevant to the recent cold spells where wind and preciptation have derived from the west and northwest. Preciptation appears to break up quite often over the moors before it hits York and surrounding areas. For those that have lived in similar areas longer, am I right to assume these factors have had a negative impact on the chances i see snow, and what are your experiences?

We drove from north london to Les arcs in france yesterday and the drive took 26 hours. not nice.