Winter Model Output Discussion - 06Z 09/02/13 onwards

[Methuselah]

As Yogi Bear once said: Okayyy Booboo!

[nick sussex]

More jam tomorrow from the ECM which is fast taking the GFS mantle for FI cold scenarios that never see the light of day.

It's a long trek to get to the more interesting output especially with the UKMO having the pattern further east so a low probability outcome.

Certainly though if people want to see one last winter fling its essential to get deep cold uppers which the ECM just about manages but we've been here before with it many times recently so I'd urge people to not get their hopes up.

[weather eater]

Not miles of difference between the ECM and the GFS at 144hrs, although the UKMO appears to be heading off in a different direction. For what it’s worth the ECM is not dissimilar to its 12z output yesterday. However, does anyone still trust the ECM when it comes to modelling easterly’s, I’m happy to take bets against the ECMs 192hr plus charts being even close come the day. my suspicion is a watered down affair rather like the 12z GFS, cool and Dry with cold nights if we have clear skies. I saw some comments earlier about a warm and dry early spring, no thanks if that means another wet summer to follow, which seems to be the pattern in recent years, a cool damp spring and a hot summer would be much better.

[ribster]

And ECM ends on a cold note how many times this winter have easterlies been on the output only for them to disappear like "that ECM" did

Easterly or not, which remains to be seen, it looks to me like any thoughts of spring can be put on hold for now...

[lorenzo]

Maybe I am model weary and maybe the ECM has just done too much teasing this winter already.. hard not to look at it's latest temptation as another episode of look what you could have won.. !

Anyhow, throwing all that aside here are the upper cold temps across the continent from now and out at 216.

Dr Maue just posted up a useful chart highlighting a correlation of 0.93 btw. ECM and GFS out to 120 hrs, so for 5 days solid NH agreement then things go their separate ways as the Eastern US trough models differently. ECM deeper here.

Potential I guess in how the cold could quickly develop..

[weather_it_will]

So all in all winter is slowly coming to an end according to GFS tonight after Wednesday we see a return to average temperatures and drier weather with high pressure starting to influence our weather

Not according to the GEFS ensembles after a brief milder period, or the ECM.

ECM outlook looks very cold, and the GFS has been picking up on this last few days in FI. Meto also staying with cold outlook into March.

[Captain Shortwave]

Not miles of difference between the ECM and the GFS at 144hrs, although the UKMO appears to be heading off in a different direction. For what it’s worth the ECM is not dissimilar to its 12z output yesterday. However, does anyone still trust the ECM when it comes to modelling easterly’s, I’m happy to take bets against the ECMs 192hr plus charts being even close come the day. my suspicion is a watered down affair rather like the 12z GFS, cool and Dry with cold nights if we have clear skies. I saw some comments earlier about a warm and dry early spring, no thanks if that means another wet summer to follow, which seems to be the pattern in recent years, a cool damp spring and a hot summer would be much better.

Don't worry that 2 week warm spell which happens in May won't happen this year, as I've finished uni (seemed to get heat waves in every summer exam session when I was there).

Yet again only a few tweaks to the gfs output would give something like ECM.........

Wait I'm getting a sense of deja vu here

[weatherguy]

And ECM ends on a cold note how many times this winter have easterlies been on the output only for them to disappear like "that ECM" did

How many times has the +240h output been right so far this winter, regardless of whether it was showing cold, mild, unsettled or settled?

[cooling climate]

What failed easterlies are posters referring to, the one in December yes but other than that?.

The east/northeasterly delivered for many in January and now we are in another admittedly not

as cold as was originally modelled but many places have laying snow and snow showers

(not country wide cold and snow I know).

So now the ECM is modelling another east/northeasterly along with the GFS to a lesser extent.

Early days yet for this one but the trend is again for heights to build to the north/northeast and

with a bit more amplification it really could be game on this time. Admittedly with less heights we

are left with high pressure sitting over the top of us and the cold going down into southern

Europe but as I said earlier the SSW has not run its coarse yet and I would certainly not be surprised

to see better heights building to the north/northeast in coming runs with a stronger easterly flow.

This could very well be the one we have been waiting for.

Edited February 11, 2013 by cooling climate

[Gibby]

Good evening. Here is the evening report from the 12z output from GFS, UKMO and ECM for today Monday February 11th 2013.

All models show a gradual shift to less cold weather towards the end of the week. In the meantime the current cold and cloudy weather over the UK will last another 24 hours or so before a freshening Southerly wind brings a front in from the West on Wednesday with rain preceded by snow moving East across the UK through the day. Clearer showery weather will follow with the showers more likely in the North and East late in the week and mostly of rain. The South and West will become dry and reasonably mild with some sunny spells for a time though a frost by night is just about possible.

GFS then moves forward through the weekend with quiet relatively settled weather with a light Southerly breeze with the chance of patchy frosts overnight. Then through the week and throughout FI High pressure dominates over the UK centred close to NE Britain and Scandinavia. The weather would likely be rather cold and cloudy with some light snow grains drifting in across Southern Britain on a cold East wind. The best of the driest and brightest weather as well as the least cold conditions would be found in the extreme west and Northwest of Britain. Late in this run pressure falls down to the SW with some rain and maybe snow moving in towards Cornwall later.

The GFS Ensembles show the operational as a large cold outlier in it's second half in the South while the vast majority of the output shows members with uppers above the long term mean. There is a lot of spread between the members too though there is only limited precipitation shown.

The Jet Stream shows the current flow arching over the Eastern Atlantic and down over the UK in the middle of the week weakening and breaking up in association with High pressure close by to the UK and NW Europe by the weekend and into next week.

UKMO tonight shows Low pressure in mid Atlantic next weekend with a milder SSW flow developing over the UK. Fronts look as though they would be far enough away to keep things quite dry away from the far west and NW.

ECM shows a quiet and rather chilly weekend following the late week showers. There would be some patchy fog and frost over the weekend with some decent bright weather by day. Into next week sees High pressure settle to the North of the UK with a cold and raw Easterly flow developing over the following week, especially over England and Wales where some wintry flurries would likely move West over Southern England at times, especially at the end of the run when some heavier snow flurries will be knocking on the door of the SE.

In Summary there looks to be a long awaited break from the wet, cold and wintry weather we have all endured over the past month or so. Instead it looks like a sustained area of High pressure is going to park near to the UK with some dry and bright weather for many. It won't be that warm in fact it could be rather cold should the High position North of the UK bringing a light Easterly wind across England and Wales and the threat of some inconsequential wintry showers. Frosts could become a major feature at night, though with the late Winter sunshine sufficiently strong now temperatures by day will rise well above freezing.

[winterof79]

There seems to be a fascination with the easterly.The ECM is basicaly forcasting high pressure to become the dominant factor.

It shows cold uppers coming from an easterly direction http://www.meteociel.fr/modeles/ecmwf/runs/2013021112/ECH0-240.GIF?11-0 .We have had cold air filtering from the east this year whats new?And even the unusual sight of o low forming over n/e France and moving n/w giving copious amounts of snow due to orographic precipitation.Here in the lower Pennines we have had several bouts of snow from,as some have continually mentioned, a not very cold continent.It is showing a continental flow not a beast.It does tie in with some further outlooks thats all.

[Spurry]

At the minute it is pretty hard to tell. It the winds are from the east then quite a lot of cloud could get be blown in off the north sea, areas to the west of highground would have better chance of any sunshine and freezing temps at night. Fog could become a problem under any clear skys.

Thanks GSL

[StretfordEnd1996]

What failed easterlies are posters referring to, the one in December yes but other than that?.

The east/northeasterly delivered for many in January and now we are in another admittedly not

as cold as was originally modelled but many places have laying snow and snow showers

(not country wide cold and snow I know).

So now the ECM is modelling another east/northeasterly along with the GFS to a lesser extent.

Early days yet for this one but the trend is again for heights to build to the north/northeast and

with a bit more amplification it really could be game on this time. Admittedly with less heights we

are left with high pressure sitting over the top of us and the cold going down into southern

Europe but as I said earlier the SSW has not run its coarse yet and I would certainly not be surprised

to see better heights building to the north/northeast in coming runs with a stronger easterly flow.

This could very well be the one we have been waiting for.

You'd think there was a 'failed Easterly' every single week since December judging by some of the posts!

Only once this Winter have we truly been denied an Easterly.

I can remember one proping up as an outlier for the festive week back in December and also remember one or two of similar vein in January, but in all we get this every year (apart from Winter's which are mild and zonal)

[snowmadchrisuk]

Yep which is why you won't find any ramping from me.

The ECM +240 is exactly what we need though. I referred earlier to the requirement of colder upper temps due to the longer days, stronger sun and if an E,ly did occur I would be looking for upper temps in a range from -11 to -13C to bring the goods.

The ECM always seems to show Colder uppers in FI though than what we actually end up with ... Still a good 7 day High pressure cell would cool things down at the surface for sure and if we get an Easterly at the end of it then Winter 2012/13 will go out with a bang.

[Ryan Dutch Weatherman]

Ladies en gentleman we have a MAJOR projektion from the European model ECMWF from READING , A huge showdown .

Stay tuned for more analyse from my side.

I am waiting CMA for definitieve conclusions .

Hold on folks , hang on.I must say a stunning run ,it even surprise me little bit.

But still every thing is unsure , read my postings before.

But i have a good hope for prolonging , scharpening en also march winter.

[weather eater]

Don't worry that 2 week warm spell which happens in May won't happen this year, as I've finished uni (seemed to get heat waves in every summer exam session when I was there).

Yet again only a few tweaks to the gfs output would give something like ECM.........

Wait I'm getting a sense of deja vu here

Well the sun can come out for a week in mid May as I have a wedding to go to in Norwich and we have booked a B&B in Happisburgh (hands up those that can pronounce it) for 4 nights, I plan to pop down to Yarmouth for a few hours on one of those days as its the town of my birth, I might have some chips on the market, the best in the country.

CC it’s not so much failed easterly’s more watered down to the point of why bother, I include the December one in that, because we did get an easterly flow of sorts for a very short period. I have to say that it’s not just this year either, in the best part of a decade I have not seen a single easterly that was projected by the ECM in the post 144hr plus time range come to fruition that has not been watered down to nothing or next to nothing.

Edited February 11, 2013 by weather eater

[Dave Kightley]

Oh I missed out the fact GFS has us under colder upper air between 192-240 across south of England with the ECM a tad better..Cfs as of late been promoting Northern Blocking into March. Looking forward to how this all develops.

[chris55]

More jam tomorrow from the ECM which is fast taking the GFS mantle for FI cold scenarios that never see the light of day.

It's a long trek to get to the more interesting output especially with the UKMO having the pattern further east so a low probability outcome.

Certainly though if people want to see one last winter fling its essential to get deep cold uppers which the ECM just about manages but we've been here before with it many times recently so I'd urge people to not get their hopes up.

Thats an odd statement Nick, considering you don't even live in the UK. Surely you have the benefit of reading the models subjectively seeing as what they are showing for the UK doesn't effect you in any way.

[EML Network]

I think the difference is that the ECM keeps the UK on the right side of that high pressure for cold weather to develop from an Easterly direction.

The GFS places us on the wrong and milder side, I suspect the end result will be somewhere in between, with High pressure more or less sitting right over us, where it goes from there is another story, but from experience , when High pressure sits over the UK in Winter, it's a pre curser to something colder developing soon afterward.

I don't think Winters done with us just yet

[phil nw.]

Better agreement from the 12z runs with the overall trend of developing heights north across the UK then Scandinavia.

We will see a warm up from midweek as a frontal trough moves across from the west with rain preceded by some snow further north as the cold air gets pushed away.

Then the models show the High building into a block near Scandinavia with an easterly flow moving colder air west towards the UK next week.

This is quite a feasible evolution based on the height ens forecasts of recent days with +ve forecast anomalies between Scandinavia and S.Greenland in week 2.

http://raleighwx.ame...nomalyNH240.gif

http://raleighwx.ame...nomalyNH240.gif

This leaves open the possibility of that High being modeled somewhat further north west in future runs.

Nothing extreme being shown yet but this is a setup that could improve for cold lovers-maybe our last realistic chance for something decent before the end of the season.

Hints of a developing cold upper trough extending south west through Finland into Europe at the end of the ECM- now that would be a nice evolution to verify for a final shot of Winter.

[The PIT]

That is amazingly good agreement so far out at T240 between the big two. Well I think we can agree on one thing. A weak Atlantic. Now how that pans out we will have to wait and see. I doubt very much it will evolve as both GFS and ECM suggest as it's too far out but certainly worth watching to the east and north. Stalled low splitting one section going north and the other into the continent and cold coming back from the east anyone?

[BLAST FROM THE PAST]

ECM offers a temporary chilly day or two for the SE but the overall synoptic is not good. Maybe if the shortwave dropping South through Scandinavia and into Holland developed and the Atlantic really was as quiet as people keep saying it is despite the fact deep lows are being modelled then it could be interesting.

Miles out description of the ECM

BFTP

[nick sussex]

Thats an odd statement Nick, considering you don't even live in the UK. Surely you have the benefit of reading the models subjectively seeing as what they are showing for the UK doesn't effect you in any way.

The ECM may have called the correct pattern for the UK last week but overall I've not been impressed with its performance during the winter as a whole.

Yes and because I don't live in the UK I can be realistic about what it shows,its plausible synoptically but low probability especially given its recent easterly bias.

Because of the time of year we're left chasing colder and colder scenarios to deliver, of course these are historically possible, I've seen very good cold spells at the tail end of February but we need either a strong Greenland high or Scandi high with deep cold pool to advect westwards into the UK.

The ECM hints at the latter but the problem often for the UK is whether the cold backs west or sw into mainland Europe, I think you'd need to see a northwards correction in the ECM and a deeper cold pool for a bigger margin for error.

I'm not saying it can't happen just that its well into FI and the early foundation isn't backed by the UKMO.

[Timmytour]

The album Please Please me was released 50 years ago today. Apparently the temperature when the Beatles came to record it was -12C

I've seen a few model runs over this winter which have given the promise of these temps being seen in london....but none that have really come anywhere near verifying to that extent.

It's been a good winter as far as I'm concerned. Ended up with a few cms of snow this morning, but talking to my 11yo son he said it wasn't much! Well during the early part of his life i thought his chances of even seeing as much snow as this morning once in a winter were remote....I think he's a little bit spoiled over these past few years :-)

We probably all are, It's almost as if it needs to be 1963 again to satisfy us. I think it came very close to delivering in some ways, buy the failure to ever get some really consistent cold uppers over Europe in the end has done for us as far as that scenario is concerned.

i think the models will meet a consensus in their runs and we'll end up having a drift from winter into spring.....and that's the way it should be imo. Always hated those spring-like early February's when we were being warned it was the new norm and the result of global warming kicking in.

[Methuselah]

Miles out description of the ECM

BFTP

Come on then Fred...Stop teasing?