LomondSnowstorm

Yeah, I do feel for NL, if this continues into April it will likely be one of the coldest springs on record and things could get really quite bad if there's still lying snow up there late April.

Snow on here, making a bit of an impression on the grass but seems to be clearing gradually.

I doubt it'll be quite as good simply because the uppers aren't going to be as extreme, but in some respects it could be better - total depths for example could be greater for many because it looks to be initially frontal rather than convectional. It won't have that same Arctic feel about it. Maxima could end up similar though if we see it snowing all day Tuesday because on Monday we had a bit of sunshine which dramatically raised the temperatures.

Well I've yet to see a 'mild' chart for my back yard (or really anywhere north of Yorkshire to be honest) in the reliable on any run from any model. Almost all bring the -8C line into eastern Scotland for Tuesday morning with an east-northeasterly wind, and even those which do have the trough moving further north almost invariable end up some kind of monster frontal snowfall which either brings the milder air in in FI or see the trough disrupting and an easterly follow like the 6Z: The north-south divide in these runs are at times very stark and that is often the case in March I feel, but nonetheless as SK's charts show many runs, including the ECM, extend the snow risk as far south as the Channel. By the way, I've always been curious about what the blue on those maps represent, a foot of snow? The beginnings of a reglaciation of the Cairngorms? Because if we're still sitting here with the same charts by May I think the latter may become a very real possibility

Hmm, the NAE very definitely did not look like this last night: An utter pasting to come for the east in the coming 3 hours if it's right courtesy of a colder sector developing in association with the band which must've been missed by the model before the band actually formed:

Definitely, some classic SS weather on the horizon

True to an extent, certainly it usually has shown the cold lasting longer than has transpired, but as far as 'extreme' synoptics verifying it's worth remembering that in February we had a prolonged period of -12C uppers sitting over the country and -14C uppers and a widespread ice day last Monday, which would've (and did at points) caused a rampede if it had shown up at +144. Still, seems to be cross model agreement for -8C uppers to move into eastern Scotland at least so either way it's looking like a very snowy outlook for this part of the world. In fact, having looked over the charts the ECM really underdid the cold for the last easterly at six days out: Compared to:

-10C uppers from here: through to here: That's six days where anything falling out of the sky will be snow with easterly winds in place throughout. Some incredible snowfall amounts possible with that setup, similar to the March '79 blizzard though in this instance colder and lasting for six days. Synoptically, it's on a par, if not even better than November 2010, and if we remember that five days ago we had -14C uppers over us it's just a staggeringly cold spell for March.

If the Aberdeen uppers are still consistently below -5C by the 26th as the mean shows here I think even I'll be wishing for some milder weather

That's terrible, but since there's nothing any of us can do about whether it's cold or not I don't see why anyone cold ramping on a weather forum (and I agree about it getting overly hyped in the MT) should feel guilty about that. My house got flooded out when I was a child but I've never felt that anyone who happens to enjoy heavy rainfall was being disrespectful to me. Almost all weather enthusiasts like extremes of some kind, and extremes tend to damage or kill people sometimes because by definition these are rare events that people are not really geared up for or perhaps are even impossible to gear up for. Enjoying a weather type doesn't mean enjoying the damage that sometimes comes with it.

And I'm here, still fuming at the candidate whose main pledge was 'chips after club nights in the union' beat a guy who was going to take a 33% pay cut and set up a housing association through the student union but that's a different issue. For the next 96+ hours we're going to have a trough in our vicinity, and this, as it did in December 2009, will provide for some precipitation surprises, and with cold air around much of it could fall as snow. Exhibit A: The 12Z NAE (18Z is being very slow tonight) we have a front straddling in a rather odd looking position from eastern to southwestern Scotland, with potentially very heavy snowfall for the inland southwest on Saturday. While this persists, with uppers sitting around -4/-5C, anywhere inland could see falling and overnight at least lying snowfall, moreso to higher ground. Tuesday is when things start to get really interesting, as the trough sinks and allows in a cold easterly flow: This could bring a good deal of convective snowfall to the east coast particularly Tuesday night into Wednesday, with possibly a better convective outlook, if a poorer uppers setup, than last time round: What we're then likely to see is the phasing of the Atlantic trough and our trough that I mentioned yesterday, and this is something that should really be watched out for because, looking at the angle of attack, it *might* just end up being a March 12th 2006 level battleground snowfall: UKMO very much slower with this and by +168 we'd likely still be looking at an easterly,maybe even with some of the more potent cold heading our way: GFS has been variable on this run to run, but on the 18Z the milder air makes it in before the front so the boundary line between snow and rain is pushed north of the central belt (either way the Grampians look good for a pasting by the way): Anyway, this isn't even the end of the story, because the last two GFS runs have had THAT trough disrupting southwards too and ushering in yet another Arctic blast from the east: In summary, cauld, very cauld, more snow likely for all, more lying snow likely for some, and potentially a really big event somewhere in the next ten days two. Temperatures may reach 10C in a few years time but at the moment there is very definitely a mild shortage in the model output.

I'll do an update when I'm back in from band, though i may still be reeling from the labour candidate beat the EUSNA-backed socialist in the EUSA presidential election by 70 votes.

On the colder side of the pack certainly, and if it came off March '47 might well be under threat: Still no runs give us anything above 10C until late on the 22nd, slight signs maybe of a creeping towards the seasonal average by the very end of the month but no sign of any warmth really in the medium term. ECM ensembles similarly, if not moreso, on the chilly side: Cold troughing dominated throughout but a sneak peek at what might be the eventual end game: Similar to the 18Z operational, our trough phases with the Atlantic trough which then brings in a battleground southeasterly (a potentially snowy one at that) before heights eventually rise east of the trough, southerly winds come in and the jet finally wins. Potentially quite drossy if the HP isn't close enough so no fun for people looking for genuine warmth yet but hints that winter *may* be loosening its grip. In the meantime though, lots of potential cold and snow fun and some classic pin up analysis charts to remind us of what December 2009 looked like.

In fairness 'they' (I'm not sure whether to count myself in this group since I am at least semi-seasonal in my visitations, but then why waste what little summer we get sitting indoors all day on a forum?) constitute most of the visitors to the forum and we have to accept that the majority of people really do love snow. I like all extremes of weather, even the ones which require a bit of statistical wonkiness to appreciate (like dullest first ten days of July in history as Scotland had last year), but I most especially love snow. I appreciate the disruption it can cause and some people find that an annoyance or something detrimental to business but for me a protracted spell of snow and cold like we had in 2009/10 and 2010/11 is just fantastic. The landscape is transformed, and more beautiful, there's the potential for winter sports from skiing to sledging, if you can get to the nearest hill the visibility can be magnificent in a frozen Arctic regime with snowcover, the air is crisp, there's less air pollution, no hay fever, no pesky wasps or midges and actually a greater sense of community spirit and happiness. We never really got to know many of the newcomers to the village for example until the snowfall of December 2010 when we had to dig out the path and the pavement and (and because the roads were impassible had all the time in the world to do so) walk to the village shop every day or take the bus to the baker in the nearest village to get supplies, and in fact the local shops were actually gaining a whole chunk of business because people couldn't just go to the supermarket as they usually would. I guess it's a sort of 'inner child' thing too, from anticipating snow days when I was wee to building snowmen etc., once you get past the unavoidable inconvenience to daily life it can be immensely fun.

Yeah, typical snow to rain event, flow is too damned westerly for anything more significant than a few cms at most away from the high ground. Snow chances for some continue until about 6pm though, which is slightly longer than earlier: Another issue is actual precipitation amounts, NMM/GFS would give 1-2 inches for much of western central Scotland in a line from Mull to Moffat with less intense precipitation elsewhere (so likely lighter snow and sleet for the east and not really much of an event) NAE looks a bit more toned down, probably more like 1-2cm for those areas before it turns to rain:

Yeah, as much as I'm flattered by the suggestion and the job does sound very interesting I'm probably too busy with uni stuff/piping commitments/political campaigning/potential internships or scholarships over the summer to do it justice, not to mention my highest qualifications at present are two Advanced Higher As at Physics and Maths. And yeah, I need to devote the time I do have free to my kilted congregation

I didn't mean in terms of the actual substantive model discussion, which I think you're one of the most balanced posters on here, and I agree with your broad analysis most of the time. Currently UKMO and ECM are cold and potentially snowy runs, potentially very snowy for my neck of the woods in fact (which isn't unheard of at this time of year but not in as prolonged a spell as we currently appear to be heading for) but with the GFS 12Z looking somewhat more benign. I simply meant that sometimes from a fair weather perspective Polar and Arctic airmasses can be more desirable than Tropical ones depending on the setup. Equally cold sometimes are often overly vaunted by cold 'fans', whereas in reality (moreso with continental flows) the end result can end up similar to January - overcast without much in the way of crispness or really deep cold around. Anyway, that's more a semantics point and this is why this is going in the mayhem thread so as not to irk the poor moderators!

Indications are that it's likely to be better than last year. However, that's much like saying 'Scotland's footballing fortunes are likely to be better in the 2016 euro qualifying group' - there's a very long way between 'better than last time' and respectable, never mind good (I know the group stage isn't finished yet but I'm not holding out much hope really). One of the wettest on record, the coolest in a long time and the first ten days of July had an incredible 1.6 hours of sunshine at Edinburgh Gogarbank. You'd struggle to find those kinds of numbers in early January, never mind July.

sub 520 thicknesses into northeast England, precipitation widely falling as snow for most places. Again, your hatred of cold weather does seem to blinker your view, just as the dislike of mild does of some in here. With those kinds of uppers another sunshine and showers easterly would become a distinct possibility, whereas the most milder uppers could deliver with the blocking we have in place at present is either a very wet southerly or a very dull southeasterly, neither of which are particularly desirable from an interest or indeed a good weather perspective. If something genuinely warm and sunny were on the cards I'd be quite happy about that but for now the main interest is in the cold prospects.

Snowing, albeit lightly and without much sign of it lying, here in Edinburgh at the moment.

As Ian pointed out it does show that a clear Arctic airmass can be a lot more 'pleasant' weather wise than a typical Tm southerly/ southwesterly. Showers tending to be confined to the usual spots in a northerly but they are quite beefy in nature.

Stunning synoptics from the ECM. If it comes off as shown presently we're looking at a sub 2C month, and we'll start challenging records set in a time when March was fundamentally a winter month. For Scotland, the March record is 0.2C from 1947 which is a full 0.8C lower than any other March value and at present this looks off the table(though in the end December 2010 did run February 1947 close for the honour of coldest month on record). The most recent of the 1-1.9C group is 1979 at 1.6C, which has the potential to be beaten. In the shorter term we're seeing indications that this northerly will not be as dry for the central belt as it typically would be in winter, with a bit of land based convection in operation and some decent (-8C or below) uppers in place up to Thursday it's likely to be a case of wintry showers and temperatures fluctuating around between 1C and 5C depending on sunshine amounts and cold with hard frosts by night up to Thursday evening when we'll have some frontal precipitation to contend with. Likely to be some snow but also some rain in places, with the westerly flow beforehand perhaps spoiling the event for lowland areas, but we'll see. After that, well below average is the form horse.

You may actually see less marginality ironically at this time of year than normal because of the lower SSTs, since your location is so strongly affected by that. Still very dicey by day but perhaps a better shot of something more significant after dark.

I think there's a justifiable case to be made for it having been 'the wrong kind of snow'. 3cm of slush with temperatures above freezing is a very different proposition to 3cm of powder with sub zero temperatures which is blowing and drifting in the wind. Utterly treacherous on the pavements today, managed not to slip and fall over but the ice was lethal. I haven't seen a proper freeze up like that since December 2010.

Coldest temperature of the winter looks set to be broken in the central belt, but unfortunately I believe it's an unofficial station. West Calder, which previous was an MO recording station and has previous surpassed -24C, is sitting at -11C with similar temperatures in the West Lothian-Lanarkshire area - -9C Symington, -8C Netherton, -8C Bathgate and -7C at Edinburgh Airport. Correction - the station in question which got below -24C was West Linton, not West Calder.