Classic BBC weather forecasts.

[sunnijim]

Sorry if there is a thread already,couldn't see it.

Just found this today.

40 yrs since the big change!

[A Face like Thunder]

Michael Fish at lunchtime on Thursday 15th October 1987. That was a classic!

[sunnijim]

 A Face like Thunder your wish,is my command.

 

[Paul_1978]

I can't pass by this thread without posting this beauty

 

 

Edited February 17 by Paul_1978

[A Face like Thunder]

3 hours ago, sunnijim said:

your wish,is my command.

'Becoming quite windy', winds of 35mph in the SE, classic!

[A Face like Thunder]

2 hours ago, Paul_1978 said:

I can't pass by this thread without posting this beauty

I'm trying to imagine what the MOD thread would have made of this, heavy snow, windchill of -12 in the SE, and so on. I was in Blackpool at the time and, remarkably, I don't remember much about this very cold spell, although I do recall spending much of one week that month tucked up in bed with man-flu or something, and maybe it was that week. 

[damianslaw]

 A Face like Thunder I remember being jealous of the SE, we only managed a couple of inches at best on the Friday 8th I think. It coincided with half term week following on, and the snow stuck around until the following weekend. 

[Thundery wintry showers]

I doubt Blackpool would have got much snow, although it would have been very cold. Nearby Hazelrigg (Lancaster University's weather station) reported a maximum snow depth of just 2cm from the February 1991 easterly. In contrast Durham had nearly 40cm and although I was only 6 at the time I have vague memories of deep snow in coastal South Shields and the snow depth being larger than my hands.

Lots of nostalgia from the old BBC forecasts, I remember Weather-history uploaded a lot of them starting in January 1993 (coincidentally the month that I first started taking weather records) and I can still specifically remember watching some of them at the time.

[damianslaw]

Vivid memories of the 4 Feb 96 countryfile forecast if anyone can upload that. Predictions of heavy snow in the west, and indeed we received 18 inches 5/6 Feb, not bettered since. 

[Thundery wintry showers]

As I noted earlier Weather-history uploaded a lot of BBC forecasts, here's the 4th February 1996 one. I revisited that one not so long ago because there was a thread that mentioned that event recently. The forecast had the frontal systems making more rapid/substantial eastward progress than actually happened but looks like it was pretty accurate for north-west England. I remember at the time, being just 11 years old and having a relatively limited understanding of synoptic patterns, being amazed that we were forecast to have systems coming in off the North Atlantic and bringing a lot of snow rather than rain, although it wasn't the first time I had those feelings as I remember being similarly amazed by the snow from westerlies in early March 1995.

I remember watching another BBC forecast around that time with John Kettley saying that "the weather might go off the rails" but I haven't seen that one anywhere.

 

Edited February 18 by Thundery wintry showers

[A Face like Thunder]

8 hours ago, Thundery wintry showers said:

As I noted earlier Weather-history uploaded a lot of BBC forecasts, here's the 4th February 1996 one

Thank you for posting. I was in Blackpool in Feb 1996 and 5th & 6th Feb were classics, with heavy snow which stuck around for 2-3 days, then disappeared as quickly as it came. Arose from an innocuous occluded front which stalled over a line up the West coast of N Wales, NW England and SW Scotland. Certainly the heaviest snowfall I've encountered in my 35+ years in the NW of England. 

[cheeky_monkey]

 damianslaw i was living in Chelmsford in Feb 1991 and we got hammered that week (with snow) ..i rate this spell better than Jan 1987 for my location

[sunnijim]

Classic.

 

[SiGh]

 sunnijim i liked his closing words

"Wrap up well".

[damianslaw]

A more recent classic forecast was Rob McElwee's 16 Dec 2009 on the threshold of what turned out to be a 4 week freeze up, Dec 2010 was colder, but it was the coldest 4 week spell easily since Feb 86 I think... correct if wrong.

His infamous 'and then there's Monday' and comedy horror grin laugh... 

In the end I don't think the Monday delivered signficant snow, though here we had thunder snow showers and about 10 inches on the ground, so it was memorable here.

You can sense his excitement and sense of how cold and snowy the outlook was. 

Edited February 24 by damianslaw

[Weather-history]

 damianslaw

 

John Hammond, a few days earlier ended on a cliffhanger as that was an indication that something big was on the way

 

 

[Summer8906]

 Thundery wintry showers In the event it (early Feb 1996) turned out to be considerably more snowy than that in the south. The forecast suggests mostly a sleet-fest for the south but in the event, heavy snow fell in the Bath area (where I was) on the evening of Monday 5th and a good cover remained through the 6th and the 7th with dull and very cold conditions. The low shown for Wednesday was later forecast to produce more heavy snow in the south but in the event stayed over France with no new snow.

Thursday saw sunny skies and some thawing under slightly less cold air, before a full-on breakdown on Friday and a short-lived mild spell at the weekend before we got back into a slightly-cold regime of around 6-7C maxima again the following week, brought in by a thundery trough the following Monday.

I do remember towards the end of the previous week (around the 1st or the 2nd) a forecast of the Monday system bringing in a full-on breakdown to mild and wet. So a surprise spell right up to the end.

Edited February 25 by Summer8906

[LetItSnow]

 Weather-history Those graphics are my childhood. I'll never forget the unfathomable excitement of seeing the white spread over my area on these forecasts - something I vividly remember thinking was so rare yet happened a lot in 2010. I also knew it was going to be properly cold when the blue frost effect would show up - the same when the rain would go lime green, that's when you knew it was going to be a downpour!

I'm realising how literal I took these maps as a child. If they showed a shower in a certain area I really did believe it would appear in the exact same place the map showed it.

[Thundery wintry showers]

 Summer8906 Yes, I think their forecast which had the systems making rapid eastward progress probably had milder air coming into the south as a result. We were seeing polar maritime air masses coming in from the west which were cold enough for snow from the Midlands northwards but milder for the south, pushing against fairly cold continental air. There was an analogous setup on 21-24 January 1984 which saw depressions make quite rapid progress eastwards, rather like the forecast suggested, and southern areas often had rain and sleet while most areas from the Midlands northwards had a lot of snow. In the February 1996 instance, because the fronts kept stalling against the Scandinavian blocking high, the continental air held on for longer in the south and so we didn't get that kind of north-south split.

Edited February 25 by Thundery wintry showers

[cheeky_monkey]

 Weather-history weird i was living in London at the time but i don't remember this at all..probably too busy preparing to leave for Canada 

[Summer8906]

 Thundery wintry showers I can see the similarity but in 1984 it looks like the low track was further north. Down here there was, IIRC, precisely zero snow in Jan 1984, one of the least snowy winters of the 80s.

[Frosticle]

 Weather-history I have crystal-clear memories of this; I was working in sports journalism and had to go to Tottenham's training ground on the Friday morning, out in Chigwell in Essex. A good four inches of snow, sub-zero, blue skies. Back home in northwest London there was just a light dusting.

[Summer8906]

On 24/02/2025 at 21:21, damianslaw said:

A more recent classic forecast was Rob McElwee's 16 Dec 2009 on the threshold of what turned out to be a 4 week freeze up, Dec 2010 was colder, but it was the coldest 4 week spell easily since Feb 86 I think... correct if wrong.

The first time since 1986 that parts of the inland south had two separate heavy snow events in the same meteorological winter IIRC: here we got nothing (perhaps wet snow?) from Dec 2009 but I remember noting a thick cover in the Basingstoke area on the 23rd when passing through by train. There was a milder interlude round Christmas with a lot of cold rain, but of course early January delivered widespread heavy snow.

 

Edited February 27 by Summer8906

[damianslaw]

 Summer8906 I remember thinking how odd the developments of 8-10 Dec 2009 were with the azores high nosing through the UK after weeks of balmy SW winds and a trough stuck to our west producing very heavy rain here... and unusually settling over scandi where it ballooned ushering in the easterly 16th onwards.

Anyone else understand why these synoptics appeared suddenly. Nov 10 was even more bizarre. It was an unusual period for weather, explanations for the 2008-2010 period welcomed..  

Edited February 27 by damianslaw

[Summer8906]

 damianslaw I don't remember the exact development of the cold spell but I do remember the weekend before the really cold one (i.e the 12th/13th) being mostly dry and fairly sunny with temps a little below normal (maybe around 7-8C) and even that contrasted with the weeks of mild and very wet.

It does indeed appear that the low developed from the SW before moving over the country, then to Scandinavia before finally retrogressing out into the Atlantic, and allowing the northerly in.

I have to admit I always thought what happened was that a high extended from the east and pushed back the fronts into the Atlantic (similar to Feb 1994, start of Dec 1995, or later in Jan 1996) but it appears not.