trickydicky

Can believe that. Already -4 here.

Blake Fell on the western edge of the fells is a great vantage point. Many a time I’ve stood at the top of there and looked down on the completely green coastal strip from Egremont up to Silloth. Turn round and you’ve got snow plastered fells behind you over to Helvellyn. On a clear day, like today I’d imagine, you can see a surprisingly long way north into Scotland and can probably see a good portion of the southern uplands.

I remember many many cold spells as a youth growing up in West Cumbria that passed by without even the merest hint that it might snow! From where I grew up you could see the clouds going down the Irish Sea and some inland over the fells. And if you drove to Carlisle you’d see the Pennines and southern uplands plastered. I do remember quite a few snowy breakdowns though, even if they turned to rain after just an hour or two. Wouldn’t surprise me if we got a week or so like that again. But to be honest after the crud we’ve been through over the last few years, the relentless unending grey, I’d bite your hands off for a week of cold sunshine and frozen ponds.

Interesting to note how wrong the forecast is on the BBC app today. Presumably because it’s an inversion. It’s say cloudy with a max of 7 and min of 4 here but it hasn’t got above 3 in the fog after an icy start. Above the fog is cloudless sunshine.

I genuinely think it would be a massive benefit to this forum if people had to put their age under their name rather than their height above sea level. It would help give context to some of the posts.

I don’t remember many specifics about 2013 beyond that where I lived at the time in central Lancashire it snowed every day for a long period, without ever necessarily amounting to anything or even settling at all. I went skiing in the February at Cairngorm and none of the higher lifts were open because they had been buried. The pictures below are from 26th January. I think it was quite a major snow storm in some parts of the North West, particularly around the Wigan area. But it didn’t really come off where I lived. It was quite an odd event in that it snowed and then turned to rain for a long time. The rain didn’t melt the snow though and it all ended up freezing again. It looks nice in the photos but was all very crispy.

Fascinating. Ani ideas what caused it? Was this around the time of all the eruptions in Iceland? Frozen rivers in September must be a one off?!

Some stuff off my camera roll 3A592A03-D126-4D59-9CA0-439A5BA944D2.MOV 6BAA1DEC-6F9B-4D36-9A90-1771026F1DC3.MOV

It was well forecast but the red warning was in the wrong place. It was the North Pennines that got battered. It was a very interesting period of weather. It was dry and frosty preceding it and started with an overnight snowfall here on a Tuesday (27th) I think of 10cm or so. That thawed in the afternoon below 100m but then it snowed again that night and carried on right through the day after (28th). Soft powdery snow falling straight down in relatively big flakes. The day after was similar (1st March) and we ended up with 20-25cm of snow and some minor drifting in the wind which was starting to pick up. It was a very picturesque scene. My main memory of the event though is being woken up in the early hours of 2nd March by what sounded similar to a train going past or an aeroplane taking off. I looked outside and the 20ft high or so larch trees over the road were nearly bent right over by the force of the wind, and several bins were making for their escape. It is the strongest and noisiest wind I’ve ever experienced. The next day, though it was still very cold, most fields were clear of snow, it having been blasted away by the force of the wind into enormous drifts anywhere in lee of the east wind. Places only a couple of miles from here directly at the foot of the Pennine escarpment were almost buried. It’s the only time I’ve ever experienced anything quite like that.

There was some year in the 1810’s, 1812 possibly, after I think Tambora erupted where they pretty much didn’t get a summer. Appropriately named ‘the year without a summer’. Well, I don’t think we’re far off having the opposite. At some point in the next 10, maybe 5, years we’re going to hook up an entire run of crazy months together right through. An Indian summer October like we’ve had plenty of, a November like this, and a November/December 2015 but in December and January. Then we’ll follow that with one of those Februarys where we get 20c sunny weather, followed by a similar March and a red hot April like we had a few years back. I’m pretty sure it’s coming.

Is there a chance there was more snow in west Cumbria (where I lived at the time) than at your location? My memory seems to have started working fully in around 1993/94 but I do have a relatively good memory from earlier than that of a spell of very cold weather and quite deep snow. It was a Sunday, I can remember a woman trying to drive away from church up a small hill in a Ford Capri and just slithering around. After walking home from dreaded Sunday school I got in and dad was melting snow because the water pipes had frozen, which is the only time I can remember that happening. I can remember it quite clearly but I was too young to be aware of when it was.

That’s the thing. We’re all complaining that it’s mild but nobody is expecting 2 foot of unbroken snow cover and -20 at night. But in the north of England at some point in November I would expect a cold wind, a bit of snow on the tops and a couple of frosty mornings. Intermingled in amongst all the uninspiring mild wet days. But even that is a long shot at the moment. It’s 16c in places today and the headline on this website is for it to get milder in the coming days!

What I’d give for only 4 total washouts in a fortnight.

I’ve just driven from Workington to Penrith and followed it the whole way. Very heavy rain and a drop of 2-3 c.

I can remember doing GCSE Geography at school and global warming was still a relatively new thing. I read predictions that the south of England could have a Mediterranean climate in the future and thought ‘yeah right’. But they were pretty much right.

It’s maybe a north/south thing. Certainly April and to a lesser extent May can still be pretty frosty. A clear night at any point up to mid May here is likely to produce a frost, if only a very slight very early one in May. Frost in October has become pretty none existent. This time of year (late September/October/November/early December) seems to just merge into one long cloudy monotonous drag where you are waiting for winter but it just doesn’t seem to want to arrive. Low to mid teens by day and 6/7/8 at night in a kind of reoccurring dreary nightmare. I don’t like autumn in case it wasn’t clear!

It’s interesting to see Alston on there. I’ve always wondered why Alston and the places around there, Nenthead, Nenthall, Garrigil etc don’t feature more often as overnight cold spots. They certainly feel colder than anywhere else round here, the car always says they’re colder and they often have snow when nowhere else does. I thought there maybe just wasnt anyone recording it?! Or that the Pennines hold/attract so much cloud it holds minima up.

Light frost here this morning on grass and cars, 0c.

Sky darkened and a heavy snow shower started with decent sized flakes giving a quick covering. Flakes now very small though!

Another mild, wet, dark, miserable morning.

Yeah, but it’s 12. Which is.

‘Many fellside villages were cut off by snow several feet deep’ If only…

Heavy snow in Scotland yesterday. Heavy snow in Lancashire (!) and Yorkshire today. Not even a hint of a flake here either day. Absolutely textbook.

Yes, if there is any kind of significant frontal snow on the cards we miss out. Either to the north or south, it seemingly doesn’t matter. Bity on/off sleety snow showers that don’t settle, no problem. Days on end of rain, no problem. But proper decent snow is a no.