Central Southern England - Cold Spell Discussion Part 7

[Slippery When White]

What does BFTE mean please?

cheers

[Dorsetbred]

Warmer now than any other time today up to 0.9C, unlikely to keep much lying snow if it keeps on like that.

BFTE - Beast from the East

[flyer]

What does BFTE mean please?

cheers

Blast from the East :smiliz19:

Edited December 22, 2010 by flyer

[coldfingers]

Hi all, had to come out of retirement as I saw some snow today when I went out on the bus, just passed the northern limit of Bognor and there was the snow lying. Not a lot but enough to satisfy when I expected to see green fields all the way to Havant. Looks like it was only 2 miles from the coast lost all it's snow.

As for the blob of precipitation over France I would say there is very little chance of that coming ashore anywhere West of Eastbourne. Even if it did get to Bognor would only be rain as my temp is currently 2C with a max of 4C today.

What does BFTE mean please?

cheers

I forget who coined the term on here but it was definitely Beast From The East.

[gottolovethisweather]

What does BFTE mean please?

cheers

Hoops, I had to think long and hard about that but I believe he's referring to a BEAST FROM THE EAST which is always worth a good ramp.

EVERYBODY ELSE.

IMHO at this stage, PB and anybody EAST OF BRIGHTON particularly those living in the extreme SE of our region are looking good for a good ole dumping tomorrow and into Friday.

The best thing to know whether this event is likely to disrupt or at least hit your part of the region is to look for the immediate trends for example...

Keep watching the animations on the radars as the day progresses.

Look at your Dewpoints and Temps as always with relation to Relative Hunidity readings as well, particularly if you are personally expecting rain in your location.

Watch cloud animations on websites such as sat24.com or the links posted by the Polar Bear.

Look at local weather websites to see if the Air Pressure tendency is also favourable.

And finally ignore the media forecasts as they are not usually updated often enough and follow gottolovethisweather's golden rules!(that's golden rules) as aforementioned.

Good Luck all and whoever is in the firing line Thursday PM and into Friday. West Sussex/Surrey/Kent look best for snowfall but who knows anything could and does happen and maybe my 45mm may get bigger!

Cheers

gottolovethisweather

Edited December 22, 2010 by gottolovethisweather

[sclarke]

temps now dropping like a stone here

Temp: -.0.1c

Humidity: 84% Decreased 4% since last hour

Humidex: -2.6°C

Dew Point: -2.3°C

I still don't think the Hampshire area will see anything from this low pushing from france, maybe the odd flurry but nothing more. (please prove me wrong!!!)

[Polar Bear]

Hoops, I had to think long and hard about that but I believe he's referring to a BEAST FROM THE EAST which is always worth a good ramp.

EVERYBODY ELSE.

IMHO at this stage, CF and PB and anybody particularly living in the extreme SE of our region are looking good for a good ole dumping tomorrow and into Friday.

The best thing to know whether this event is likely to disrupt or at least hit your part of the region is to look for the immediate trends for example...

Keep watching the animations on the radars as the day progresses.

Look at your Dewpoints and Temps as always with relation to Relative Hunidity readings as well, particularly if you are personally expecting rain in your location.

Watch cloud animations on websites such as sat24.com or the links posted by the Polar Bear.

Look at local weather websites to see if the Air Pressure tendency is also favourable.

And finally ignore the media forecasts as they are not usually updated often enough and follow gottolovethisweather's golden rules!(that's golden rules) as aforementioned.

Good Luck CF PB and whoever else is in the firing line Thursday PM and into Friday. West Sussex/Surrey/Kent look best for snowfall but who knows anything could and does happen and maybe my 45mm may get bigger!

Cheers

gottolovethisweather

Hello GTLTW

Thank you so much for your post and guide... great tips. I shall copy and paste and keep these on my desktop.....

If it doesnt for CF and myself the very thought of the potential and following the potential will be fun in itself and a warm up for the festive weekend! If it does well it just needs to let me get to Chichester and then I will be over the moon.!!

I hope yours does get alot bigger...I am sure it will soon. :blush: Have no doubt...

PB.

PS I did glance the SE thread and ooh heh talk about a couple of grumpies that were on there.. ooooh dear stroppy.... maybe though they were T and E from all the late nights of watching the snow? I dont know some people just cant take it the pace...

[CaptainHappy]

Evening all

I have to agree with what is said about media forecasts. They are not updated enough, and sadly don't seem to be backed up with anything more than is read off of the internet. I accept they are not Met men and women, but sometimes it seems they don'e even look out of the window when reading these things. Many a time I have heard 'Today will start cloudy and wet' and I find myself walking in glorious sunshine. I digress. Rant over

I agree that the lump over France will not grace our shores this far west, and in all honesty it is likely to be rain anyway I suspect. Still some snow lying here. Keep a weather eye on developments over the next few days and who know what may crop up.

It is the season for miracles after all....

[butler_son]

Well, unlike Dorsetbred, my temperature is lower than it has been all day, and has just hit freezing! Fantastic, especially as I need to drive tomorrow.

PS I did glance the SE thread and ooh heh talk about a couple of grumpies that were on there.. ooooh dear stroppy.... maybe though they were T and E from all the late nights of watching the snow? I dont know some people just cant take it the pace...

T and E? Tired and emotional? Like the Private Eye euphemism for drunk?

[Polar Bear]

Evening all

I agree that the lump over France will not grace our shores this far west, and in all honesty it is likely to be rain anyway I suspect. Still some snow lying here. Keep a weather eye on developments over the next few days and who know what may crop up.

It is the season for miracles after all....

Yes you maybe right on the rain thing but you are right and good call...it is the season for miracles!

Anyway I am merrily going off and reading into GTLTW cheat sheet into snowcasting...my first point was relative humidity and i found this site so I feel very pleased already in learning something new today! !

http://www.wusa9.com...d=5941&catid=75

Well, unlike Dorsetbred, my temperature is lower than it has been all day, and has just hit freezing! Fantastic, especially as I need to drive tomorrow.

T and E? Tired and emotional? Like the Private Eye euphemism for drunk?

T and E....yep you got it !!

By the way be careful driving home.....ice and all...

Edited December 22, 2010 by Polar Bear

[OldMetMan]

For the last 2 days the temperature here has only varied by1/2 deg, day and night, but at last the low cloud has cleared so it's starting to fall. I don't think there's much likelihood of the weather down over France affecting us, judging from the cloud motion the jet is carrying it away to the NE.

Something I have been meaning to mention and I don't know if others have noticed it in their areas but all the Oak trees in and around Southampton still have their leaves - all brown of course but I don;t think I have ever seen that before. I guess it shows how little we have had in the way of strong winds through autumn and winter. I suspect that, sooner or later nature will re-dress the balance!

[Jayboy]

Altnaharra currently a bone chilling -19c!

[Polar Bear]

For the last 2 days the temperature here has only varied by1/2 deg, day and night, but at last the low cloud has cleared so it's starting to fall. I don't think there's much likelihood of the weather down over France affecting us, judging from the cloud motion the jet is carrying it away to the NE.

Something I have been meaning to mention and I don't know if others have noticed it in their areas but all the Oak trees in and around Southampton still have their leaves - all brown of course but I don;t think I have ever seen that before. I guess it shows how little we have had in the way of strong winds through autumn and winter. I suspect that, sooner or later nature will re-dress the balance!

Hey OMM

Hello

Ill be quick as I am vey tired...but yes yes about the leaves....still just fallen and laying on the ground....only a couple of weeks ago too the trees still had leaves on them. I havent been out to country to have a good look this week though. This surely will affect some of nature;s living no? ....

[coldfingers]

Ah well, at least it is easy to find this thread, it is always the last one in the clist just above the closed threads.

Weather is just too utterly, utterly boring at the moment. Of for a good force 11 gale.

[butler_son]

Ah well, at least it is easy to find this thread, it is always the last one in the clist just above the closed threads.

Weather is just too utterly, utterly boring at the moment. Of for a good force 11 gale.

Not always, yesterday it was below 3 closed ones! I had to resuscitate it!

Usual garb, snow still on ground, bear does its business in the woods and the Pope is indeed Catholic. Oh, and my temp is 30.0F (a toasty -1.1C), 87% humidity and 1007mb of pressure. Happy days.

[coldfingers]

Not always, yesterday it was below 3 closed ones! I had to resuscitate it!

Usual garb, snow still on ground, bear does its business in the woods and the Pope is indeed Catholic. Oh, and my temp is 30.0F (a toasty -1.1C), 87% humidity and 1007mb of pressure. Happy days.

And my temp is o.3C (positively tropical) 91% humidity (disgusting to be that high when it isn't snowing or even, dare I say it, raining) and 1004mb pressure.

Were having a heatwave, a tropical heatwave.

Oh and thank you for giving your kiss of life to the thread. Why is our thread shown as a pinky colour when the others have sort of orangey colour on the file? Perhaps we should post more, i would hate to be amalgamated with the whinging SE thread.

Edited December 23, 2010 by coldfingers

[snow drift]

UKMO has been outstanding throughout this cold spell and is the only model now that has been consistently showing a continuation to the cold. This model has often been the messenger of doom when all others have been showing the much fabled 'BFTE' through from +240 to +144 so when it robustly holds back the Atlantic day in day out it needs to be given some notice. Last week I posted to look out for low pressure edging in from our SE and ridging starting to emerge from the NE for about Wednesday this week, again it was the UKMO that had the best handle on where we are now, 5 days ago. That said I don't think we are going to be thrust back into the extreme conditions of the past 2 weeks between now and the new year (and I think we may JUST dip out on the December CET record), but after then I am becoming more and more convinced that it will have been a transient interlude which will be followed by an impressive and fairly abrupt reload of sorts. As has been the way in recent times the poor old tropospheric polar vortex hardly has time to establish itself before getting ripped to shreds!

As for that mass of PPN moving up through N. France, I'd love for it to be a player but I suspect it won't be, those in the IOW may be best placed from our region if it does head further West than it looks like it will.

Thanks for the reply.

It is really interesting to see the Meto be out on its own like this. They have been very good and very interesting times ahead. The fronts moving in from the sw and the possibly stalling could lead to some heavy snowfall for some. Not in our region tho I feel.

[Dorsetbred]

Not deep but crisp again this morning as temperatures struggle to drop below the zero mark. Certainly not anywhere near the low temps found North of the UK.

But then again no frozen pipes either so shan't complain

[Duane S.]

For the last 2 days the temperature here has only varied by1/2 deg, day and night, but at last the low cloud has cleared so it's starting to fall. I don't think there's much likelihood of the weather down over France affecting us, judging from the cloud motion the jet is carrying it away to the NE.

Something I have been meaning to mention and I don't know if others have noticed it in their areas but all the Oak trees in and around Southampton still have their leaves - all brown of course but I don;t think I have ever seen that before. I guess it shows how little we have had in the way of strong winds through autumn and winter. I suspect that, sooner or later nature will re-dress the balance!

Hi OMM, yes I noticed the very low diurnal temperatures of late. I agree about nature redressing the balance, it often seems to be the case of the more extreme the weather on one hand, as extreme it will be on the other when it arrives!

That said there are no real signs of any real prolonged mild or stormy period on the horizon. We do seem to be heading for a warmup shortly after Xmas and personally I think it will warm sufficiently to scupper the record CET shot (hope not though) but looking at most of the charts this morning you would have to say the blocking wins out with very little Atlantic incursion over us. Fairly messy later on the ECM and GFS but that'll change over the next week I suspect as we start to get an indication of where the next cold shot will be coming from (and where it will be going to!). My concern is not so much that the Atlantic will bulldoze through and give us a month of SW winds, it's that the UK could get stuck in a bit of a no-mans land scenario during January where we get just below average temps, cloud, light winds (basically, no weather!). Still better than mild mush I suppose!

Thanks for the reply.

It is really interesting to see the Meto be out on its own like this. They have been very good and very interesting times ahead. The fronts moving in from the sw and the possibly stalling could lead to some heavy snowfall for some. Not in our region tho I feel.

No I don't really feel we have that sort setup at the mo but with a few tweaks it wouldn't be completely impossible

[snow drift]

No I don't really feel we have that sort setup at the mo but with a few tweaks it wouldn't be completely impossible

[Duane S.]

No I don't really feel we have that sort setup at the mo but with a few tweaks it wouldn't be completely impossible

Is this because you feel the ppn will not be very heavy or because it will fall as rain?:smiliz19:

It has the potential to be plenty heavy enough on into early next week but certainly for our location near the coast I can't see it being conducive to being snow.

[katemart]

Morning all! Bitterly cold here today (-0.2C with a windchill of -3.6 ) but *very* dry.

I shall be lurking on the South-East thread to see what goes down later on. Soon as I've joined battle with Sainsburys...

[Dorsetbred]

Nudge, to bounce it back to the top for 30seconds....

Sorta hoping the "window" of change holds on until 29th, that way I'll manage a quick trip to Bonnie Scotland and back without the need of the emergency services

[*Stormforce~beka*]

Like Dorsetbred I am going to abandon the Southern thread for some time! Sorry all!! I will leave the Southern thread at 10pm and arrive at the North West thread around 2am!! Hope I don't get stuck any where I shall return to the Southern thread on the 29th too! I might pop in and let you know what your (not) missing out on up there!

[SunnySouthCoast]

Another dull cloudy day here, 3C after dropping to 1C last night, no snow in any forecasts at all