November 26/27 Intense Snowfall

[A Winter's Tale]

I remember that my first snowfall last winter was one of my highlights during the Big Freeze. What looked like a promising band of snow from the North Sea was approaching there were impressive reports of blizzard like conditions and thunder snow. Once it arrived I've never seen such an intense snowfall (albeit it was short). Within moments a sudden burst of heavier snow arrived and the entire area was covered in a decent layer of snow within a minute. In just over half an hour there was atleast 5cm of snow, some drifting after an intense blizzard that also had thundersnow.

Here are a few charts:

I would like to know what caused such an intense snowfall and other examples of short-lived snowfalls that delivered decent accumilations in a short period of time. Also it would be great to hear about this event from other members.

[Isolated Frost]

Oh, this was amazing. 'The finger'. It was more than well anticipated in the northern regionals! Delivered half a foot of snow in 2 and a bit hours (amazing, intense snowfall), IIRC it was the first of 3 thunder-snow events aswell. Some of the pulses were amazing intense snowfalls and it took the depth past 25cm, an amazing night. It began around 9pm IIRC.

[Aaron]

Yes I remember. The snow was like a streamer moving in off the North Sea which began in the late hours of the 26th and continued into the early hours of the 27th

Was nothing special for this area though, just your typical snowfall.

Edited November 24, 2011 by Aaron

[summer blizzard]

The snow was not a streamer.

Basically, around tea time there was a large batch of showers moving towards the coast stretching from Scotland to about the Wash. As the evening progressed, they organised into a trough feature which moved inland.

This for Leeds was the first snow event although for the following week we had several events reaching a peak of 23cm in my garden on December 2nd.

[Aaron]

I know it wasn't a streamer, that's why I said it was like a streamer.