Severe Siberian icy blast

i haven't saw one forecast that's going for low level snow tomorrow night , the bbc have really talked it all down from last wk when they did talk about snow . And for any places south of Stoke there's not even the sniff of any wintyness at all on the bbc graphics or the euro4 Hi res . I hope to be proved wrong . But yes re the cold spell , it's looking increasingly likely we will sell an extension to the so called cold snap . Should be getting colder as we move deeper into it . It will be nice to get.a traditional undercutting low bringing snow but I doubt any trough disruption will get to the uk , but interesting none the less .

Hi mate, your in Austria aren't you ? We are off the zell em zee sat 23rd Jan , next sat , for a week , I no it's one of the lower resorts isn't it ? But do you happen to know the situation there at min ? I no europes going cold so don't see many probably , hoping the ukmo is right as it would ensure Europe's nice and cold , and snowy hopefully , any news welcome

Under she goes , southeasterly winds with -4 850's , spells snow . Which should help drag colder uppers west . Not sure how much legs the greeny high will have in fi but it's definitely a step in the right direction . Gfs on its own !

its easy to see that all 3 of them have not just prolonged the cold but all 3 have a form of trough disruption . The gfs has been showing the Atlantic steaming in , only to backtrack , the ECM has been some what in the middle , but goes into ramp mode in fi .

Completely misleading post , why are you using charts that's over 200hrs away to illustrate why the ukmo is on its own considering it stops at t144? The ecm especially has moved a lot closer to the ukmo this morning as it attempts to undercut the low to our southwest , it's only really once it gets to t168 it goes into ramp mode , the gfs also gives us slight trough disruption with a snowy breakdown , the ukmo in my opinion is on the money , why ? 1-its been rock solid this last 4 days and dragged the other models into line . 2-low heights into Europe already . 3-northern blocking already in place time after time this happens. The models are almost always too progressive in moving the cold on and we see evidence of this already . Also once we have low pressure into Europe and the jet pushed south the other areas of low pressure usually follow suite .

Absolutely agree my old Mucka , feeling optimistic now for a massive turn around tomorrow, I expect the ECM to fall in line with the other two , but it's the ramifications this has longer term also , if we can get the Azores low to keep a separate entity then it good open the door for the beast . But I'm getting ahead of myself there !

Deep fi but let the easterly commence

Wow I did not expect this backtrack from the gfs , game on !

I have no idea where you got that from . On average it's 21 days . Sometimes a little longer . Let's not forget we also can have an almost immediate response. If the vortex is primed rightly it can happen within 5 days

The gfs has a deep trough north of Norway. The ecm doesn't. The gfs has blew up a massive low in the atlantic with pressure down to 960mb . Where as the ecm has it at 990/985 with an undercut. They model things quite differently but the one similarity they both have is low pressure in Europe. With that there the high can't sink so that in itself will keep things interesting. I'l challenge what you say and say it looks better this morning for a long cold spell .

Absolutely agree . Anything after t120 just for speculation . And perhaps trends . A much better UKMOand ECM this morning . The high pressure on the ecm moving north certainly has the 'potential' to drift northwards . Whether that's east/west/ or directly above us remains to be seen . Or if at all . Very scatty across the board for the last 3 days or so . So let's enjoy next week . Poss snow event on Thurs. Plus any disturbances/troughs in the flow before then have the potential to be wintry. Particularly at night .

Or maybe the shallow low will get sucked northeast with the Azores low moving northeast as well !LOL what a mess

Better angle on the deep trough over Canada , still a southeast movement but a slower evolution , also this low/short wave south of Greenland having a good negative tilt on it should move across southern England moving into the cold air , all pie in the sky but interesting none the less

It sounds like ECM clusters v there own models , with no clear signal , although 'some ensembles' trending blocking to our north/northeast , but saying that all this is in the realms of fi , next week we still have the cold air coming and with low pressure around I'm sure there will be some of the white stuff for some !;)

Absolutely agree , the models are simply toying with different scenarios , and it's gonna take time to get it right, anything after 96hrs is simply guess work at the minute , there is as much chance of these the latest mods been right as there was yesterday . All we can do is try and spot trends , and we do no it's about to turn cold , with some snow for some . The gfs does this time and time again , any model that goes that far out will dramatically loose there way once they get into fi , think how many times we see the ukmo 144 chart verify ? Rarely right , so a gfs chart at t192 has how much chance ? People will see snow next week ,and I'm personally expecting upgrades from this point on , Iv model watched for years and this isn't a rarity , the background signals are working , and I know that people find this annoying at times , but I'm a believer in background drivers , and I certainly don't expect the vortex to reform like it does on the gfs , remember each run is only worth the time of day for 10 hours !

Going from experience , my take on this is , firstly the models pick up on the -NAO , and make them the over riding factor and brings freezing conditions to all. Secondly they'v picked up on the low subtropical jet and the associated Azores low , and just like they did with the Greenland high, they over egg the implications on the uk . What happens next ? The models get to grip with the handling of the major pattern change and slowly corrections are made , the greeny high will probably end up over central Greenland , a slight west based but not as dramatic as today's models , and the Azores low will move slightly northeast , but into France , perhaps bringing snow to southern counties , although I think it will only graze the far south . So we end up with a blend of the last weeks worth of models. We go cold , not sub -10 850's , but -6/7 . All in all much to be positive about .

I'm sorry but this place is so predictable. The very first words I look at is "this is a very depressing morning " is it really ? Firstly its only depressing if you allow yourself to be taken in by every signal model , secondly what makes charts after t120 any more likely to come off than they showed yesterday , or the day before that ? We still have a cold spell on , ok not freezing cold next week like everyone was hoping , still cold enough for snow , which is enough for me . i didn't believe for one minute we would be basking in -10 850's , it's been a developing situation and it still is . The models will play around with different outcomes until they get it right , and they won't get it right until inside t72 with this type of scenario . just enjoy the ride and don't get depressed every time the models change.

This I think is about as much detail as any of us need at the minute , the models are looking good for prolonged cold , and I suppose we can say there's a signal there for attacks from the south , very much what Gp has been saying , so yes we all no what that can mean , the gfs has a poor orientation on the trough early next week and makes hard work getting the cold in place , the ukmo is much cleaner , but thankfully ALL models give us a true greenie high and one very beat up polar vortex , so suddenly looking very very good for the second half of the winter , If I was been really picky I would say ECM and GFS refuse to give us true cold air until fi. Mainly down to the orientation of the trough ,they get there in the end but late on . Which ironically is exactly what happened last January from that northerly around the same time of year ! But much better Synoptics this year and really looking on the northern hemisphere view , but like I said no point in looking at detail when it's still over 100 hours away , so the main pointers seem to be favourable high pressure moving north through the Atlantic into Greenland , WWA directly into the pole thanks to the deep trough over North America tanking -AO/NAO one beaten and distressed vortex a deep trough to the east of uk fuelling the winds from northerly quarters possible attacks from the southwest bringing battle ground scenarios (aka 2010)!! Let winter commence

Well I think it's fair to say , I don't think any of us saw this coming , as in , so potent so soon , a 3 day cold snap was touted by some , glazier point , it's fair to say , please never leave us again ! But we'v really gathered momentum over the last few days pointing toward more prolonged cold , so maybe this winter really is gonna be a winter of two halves ? Anyway let's all enjoy the ride , and hopefully all of see some snow next week and beyond , but please refrain from despondency when the models 'downgrade' it's an evolving situation and it's very much like a rolarcoaster , but try not to get sucked into every new model that comes out , leave the specifics for inside t72 , just focus on the northern hemispheric view to get an idea of the Synoptics , and the annomalys John Holmes relies on to get an understanding of what pattern we are going into . very excited though of some proper winter weather for the first in 2.5 years for many south of Manchester .

Very optimistic there timbo but a massive statement and one that unfortunately will leave you disappointed. If you truly believe that to be the case then please , share ? Because it's excactly the kind of statement that leads peeps up the garden path .

Steve even you can't believe what you've just said . The first month of winter rarely delivers for us , it was always gonna be a late burner this one . And it was only you that said an easterly was on the cards , nobody else thought it was gonna happen , I hoped , but never believed . We have every chance of a northerly of sorts mid month , and Ian f has always said it was a colder second half and continues to do so . All to play for

Absolutely. I guess the UKMO wasn't mentioned as it don't go that far . But is the gfs and gem really even worth disecting at 192hrs ? His post is so misleading infact it normally is because there is no way you can accurately make a forecast that far out by using the means . The fact we have trough disruption regularly between now and t144 then surely that's area we need to focus on ? The ecm ,UKMO and gfs to an extent have all moved significantly closer to a colder spell with a continental influence with snow events a possibility next week . We no how all models struggle with HLB and the gfs is notorious for blowing up the atlantic . This morning there is much better charts to look through if your hoping for colder weather next week .

But you no that this is a completely false way of looking at things and it's just another way to throw a toy out of a pram. So if we apply your annalogy then I could say if we can get our winds sourced from Spain then we will have a temp of 4c ? Or an easterly wind will get us well below freezing ? The temp is unusual in the sense the southerly sourced air gets so far north but it's not the fact that's 'somethings very very wrong' , it's just an unusual set up , but very plausible given the set up . Once we loose the euro high and low pressure goes south then we loose the warm temps so far north . Also it's very normal for warm air to move north on the western side of the high with cold air flooding south on the opposite side , it's basic physics. .

The way the low pressure has a positive tilt rather than a negative one straight away tells you that it's never gonna go under, the same applies to the shape of the high pressure , it's not even vertical , it's slanted clockwise which will always result in one thing , it will get blown out the way and shunted eastwards . All models are struggling at the minute and until the orientation of the high and correct position of the high , and how the various shallow areas of low pressure move in association to that , and how the vortex behaves then the models will continue to flip around with different scenarios

The 2 main reasons why this December has and still is exceptionally mild is : 1 a record breaking El Niño pattern which favours an extensive European ridge , and 2 : wQBO which helps to wind up a strong mighty vortex early doors in winter . Low pressure to North , high pressure to South = southerly/southwesterly uncle Barty !! I for one can not wait to get rid of this disgusting warm mush . A land on our latitude should not have 16c and grass growing in December . I can't remember the last time I saw the sun , let alone a frost . Thankfully signs of a change afoot , a northwesterly air stream for 7 days or so into the new year followed by a break down of the vortex come mid jan would be great . Like many have said already , winter 12/13 started around 12 jan with the first significant snow Thursday/Friday 17th , which continued off and on until April . December was always a right off and so far bar a slight delay things seem to be going to plan for chiono's forecast , which will be incredible given the limited data smaller organisations have . Hears to a very snowy second half of winter