SW & CS England Regional Weather Discussion

[lettice]

Lovely day today, got to 6.4c at 13:47
Very pleasant for some gardening tidy up and a bit of raspberry cane pruning.
Wind has been very light WSW
Now 5.5c, 1027.7 hPa

It is too cold for the cat to venture out last few days though;

Edited January 3, 2017 by lettice

[Mapantz]

A couple of pics I took from my quad earlier.

Facing SW - Purbeck hills/Corfe Castle

Facing ENE-ish - Showing how close Poole Harbour is from me.

[matt111]

Today was a similar day to yesterday but with a bit more cloud around this afternoon. Felt cold in the wind with a high of 6.8°C after a low of -1.7°C last night.  

[lettice]

27 minutes ago, Mapantz said:

A couple of pics I took from my quad earlier.

Facing SW - Purbeck hills/Corfe Castle

Facing ENE-ish - Showing how close Poole Harbour is from me.

Takes nice pics, what model is that quad copter?

Hope you have seen and read the CAA guides for safe flying, nice video summary here.

 

[Mapantz]

22 minutes ago, lettice said:

Takes nice pics, what model is that quad copter?

Hope you have seen and read the CAA guides for safe flying, nice video summary here.

 

I bought the black version of this: http://www.gearbest.com/rc-quadcopters/pp_424346.html

For the money, you'll be hard pushed to find one with GPS on both the transmitter and quad for 'follow me' mode, and for flying home and landing by itself.

Yeah, i've had a good read up on many sites about quad flying - it is still a grey area regarding actual rules though. I think common sense prevails to be honest. I used GPS mode when I took those pics, at a height of about 25m, it's safer in that mode, and it will return to the place you took off from if anything goes wrong. I'll only be going higher and further out when I head to some numerous open spots around here - Old Harry Rock being one of them.

There are some people on YouTube who have managed to fly the same quad at a distance of 2km, and also got it to go 1.2km up, a bit excessive for my liking, and out of range of your own sight. It would be good to add some kind of lightweight sensor array to it, and measure temp/humidty as you ascend.

[khodds]

Tentative signs of things moving into our favour on the MOD thread...? I wish Ian was able to post his thoughts 

Come back Ian  

[AWD]

Just now, khodds said:

Tentative signs of things moving into our favour on the MOD thread...? I wish Ian was able to post his thoughts 

Come back Ian  

Not really.  Just looks like something a little wetter (though not excessively wet) might encroach our shores next week.

A lot of the cold air currently over Europe gets mixed out & we end up with no notable cold upper air anywhere near our shores.

Should the EC Det verify, then some convective activity might spruce up the interest levels a little.

[Dorsetbred]

4 minutes ago, khodds said:

Tentative signs of things moving into our favour on the MOD thread...? I wish Ian was able to post his thoughts 

Come back Ian  

Sad in some ways as Ian is not the first to start in the "local" groups and venture into the bigtime in the MOD, only to get burnt through information dissemination.

[Dorsetbred]

1 hour ago, Mapantz said:

A couple of pics I took from my quad earlier.

Facing SW - Purbeck hills/Corfe Castle

 

Facing ENE-ish - Showing how close Poole Harbour is from me.

 

Any chance of fitting a cloud seeding device, to see if we can improve our wintry mix chances?

[karlos1983]

Wouldn't rule out wintry precipitation if this verified, shall not hold my breathe but the signals have been saying colder mid month. Elevation would be your friend.

[jethro]

6 minutes ago, karlos1983 said:

Wouldn't rule out wintry precipitation if this verified, shall not hold my breathe but the signals have been saying colder mid month. Elevation would be your friend.

This will verify. I'd go so far as to say it will improve beyond all realms of imagination and we'll all get an absolute pasting. Based on science? Intuition? Weather Lore? Nope, just knowing NK is off on his hols on the 14th  Have a great time NK, don't rush back.....

[khodds]

8 minutes ago, jethro said:

This will verify. I'd go so far as to say it will improve beyond all realms of imagination and we'll all get an absolute pasting. Based on science? Intuition? Weather Lore? Nope, just knowing NK is off on his hols on the 14th  Have a great time NK, don't rush back.....

Poor NK! He really does get stick from us haha!! 

[jethro]

12 minutes ago, khodds said:

Poor NK! He really does get stick from us haha!! 

I'm sure he knows it's all in jest. Well, apart from the staying away to make the snow last here.....

[Nights King]

38 minutes ago, karlos1983 said:

Wouldn't rule out wintry precipitation if this verified, shall not hold my breathe but the signals have been saying colder mid month. Elevation would be your friend.

Who knows I might just scrape a wintry shower before I get on plane.. 

[jethro]

10 minutes ago, Nights King said:

Who knows I might just scrape a wintry shower before I get on plane.. 

You never know. We may get a hefty aperitif for you to enjoy before you go.  

[Gibby]

Nothing in the models to excite me at the moment so I leave them to waffle on. While it looks like it might become a bit wetter, windier and more unsettled in Week 2 its unlikely to my eyes that a WNW or NW flow will do much for us down here in the SW-Just cool and breezy with a few showers and occasional night frosts. The problem remains the continuation of stubborn persistence of High pressure out to the SW of us throughout. On the MOD thread they get excited every day about FI charts and new trends which dissolve in the next run. Then there are those that bang on about the ensembles etc and how accurate a guide they can be. What about those ensembles of Christmas time which were all pointing towards cold icy weather for the UK from about now...I wonder. I can sum it all up for the next few weeks by saying 'There will be no big freeze across the UK in the next week to 10 days at least let alone the SW. Why? There are no definitive signs from within the models as at present that winds and pressure systems will change to a more favourable position for the SW to get notable cold and snow until the second half of January at least.

Edited January 3, 2017 by Gibby

[jethro]

1 minute ago, Gibby said:

Nothing in the models to excite me at the moment so I leave them to waffle on. While it looks like it might become a bit wetter, windier and more unsettled in Week 2 its unlikely to my eyes that a WNW or NW flow will do much for us down here in the SW-Just cool and breezy with a few showers and occasional night frosts. The problem remains the continuation of stubborn persistence of High pressure out to the SW of us throughout. On the MOD thread they get excited every day about FI charts and new trends which dissolve in the next run. Then there are those that bang on about the ensembles etc and how accurate a guide they can be. What abut those ensembles of Christmas time which were all pointing towards cold icy weather for the UK about now...I wonder. I can sum it all up for the next few weeks by saying 'There will be no big freeze across the UK in the next week to 10 days at least let alone the SW. Why? There are no definitive signs from within the models as at present that winds and pressure systems will change to a more favourable position for the SW to get notable cold and snow until the second half of January at least.

Starting on the 14th.....

 

All joking aside, the mod thread does my head in. Loads of comments along the lines of 'the GFS is king for the USA' quickly followed by 'ECM & UKMET have it right this time, they're singing from the same hymn sheet, GFS is wrong'. How on earth can one model be right, the king of a continent, then blithely ignored when the Euro models show an evolution which benefits us?

[khodds]

23 minutes ago, jethro said:

Starting on the 14th.....

 

All joking aside, the mod thread does my head in. Loads of comments along the lines of 'the GFS is king for the USA' quickly followed by 'ECM & UKMET have it right this time, they're singing from the same hymn sheet, GFS is wrong'. How on earth can one model be right, the king of a continent, then blithely ignored when the Euro models show an evolution which benefits us?

It's ridiculous... it's so confusing. I know everyone has different opinions but it makes it worse for people like me who haven't a clue!

[karlos1983]

28 minutes ago, Gibby said:

Nothing in the models to excite me at the moment so I leave them to waffle on. While it looks like it might become a bit wetter, windier and more unsettled in Week 2 its unlikely to my eyes that a WNW or NW flow will do much for us down here in the SW-Just cool and breezy with a few showers and occasional night frosts. The problem remains the continuation of stubborn persistence of High pressure out to the SW of us throughout. On the MOD thread they get excited every day about FI charts and new trends which dissolve in the next run. Then there are those that bang on about the ensembles etc and how accurate a guide they can be. What about those ensembles of Christmas time which were all pointing towards cold icy weather for the UK from about now...I wonder. I can sum it all up for the next few weeks by saying 'There will be no big freeze across the UK in the next week to 10 days at least let alone the SW. Why? There are no definitive signs from within the models as at present that winds and pressure systems will change to a more favourable position for the SW to get notable cold and snow until the second half of January at least.

Come on Gibby, that's a bit harsh I think. At the end of the day all those in the mod thread have as much passion about the weather as you, perhaps not as much knowledge, but god loves a trier!!

i use the ensembles as a guide, so are you saying I should stop? It's a waste of time? 

 

[Gibby]

I think those that are knowledgeable get blinded by their own science. The way some of them talk I am bewildered why they aren't working for the Met Office with their talk in such technical terms that most people including me just don't understand. Then there are those that  post seemingly all day at this time of year but disappear in the Summer when the chance of that elusive flake of snow disappears.. Then there are those that hunt every minute of the day for that flake of snow to fall on Day 13 or whatever they totally miss the weather that they purport to be interested in.

Anyway for the here and now there looks to be less chance of frost tonight. I'm currently sitting at 3.3C with a gentle wind from the WNW and a lot of clear skies still surprisingly.

[Gibby]

16 minutes ago, karlos1983 said:

Come on Gibby, that's a bit harsh I think. At the end of the day all those in the mod thread have as much passion about the weather as you, perhaps not as much knowledge, but god loves a trier!!

i use the ensembles as a guide, so are you saying I should stop? It's a waste of time? 

 

Oh I think many over there have much more knowledge than me Karl as I state in my post above. In no way was I making any personal dig but it really becomes a bit mundane when trying to find a straightforward insight into what the models are showing instead of wading through pages of nothingness. The ensembles you mention certainly do act as a guide of course but I feel some members over there do read into them what they want to see and report it in a way that comes across that it's going to verify when in fact they are often as volatile as the operationals.

On tonight's efforts I notice the ECM Mean Chart has the UK on the cold side of the Jet come Day 10 and that should mean that there are many colder polar maritime air types within its ensembles blowing in on a stronger and much more unstable airflow from the West or NW towards the end of next week. That's a step forward for ECM over recent weeks. Lets see how it develops and whether the air becomes deep enough and cold enough to benefit the SW as well as the more usual suspects in the north and west.

http://old.wetterzentrale.de/pics/Reem2401.gif 

Edited January 3, 2017 by Gibby

[Nights King]

So winter starts on the 14th..  

Frost from last few days still on ground here but no air frost as of yet tonight. 1.2c

[Andy Bown]

33 minutes ago, Nights King said:

So winter starts on the 14th..  

Frost from last few days still on ground here but no air frost as of yet tonight. 1.2c

And that's winter right there, the second spell of 'permafrost' we've had along with stunningly sunny skies. A billion times better and wintrier than the last several winters!!

[festivalking]

What a difference 24 hours make. 4c no breeze almost got a sweat on walking the dog tonight!

[Gibby]

http://old.wetterzentrale.de/pics/Reem2401.gif

I get slated a lot over on MOD for my use of this chart but I find it very useful when followed daily. On tonight's offering I think a lot can be read from that chart that is different than it's shown for days. Those that follow this chart a slow trend has been picked up over the last few days which has led to tonight's offering. For weeks it has shown High pressure over or to the South or West of the UK. In recent days it has shown High pressure slipping further SW and a strengthening gradient to the West or NW flow indicating a lot of members support such an evolution. More importantly the Jet Stream has repeatedly been positioned further and further South in relation to the UK to the extent that tonight it lies with a mean position South of the UK meaning a better but not guaranteed chance of colder conditions lying on the cold side of the Jet as we do at Day 10. I have told my followers on Facebook tonight that I am becoming increasingly confident of a stronger and more unstable WNW flow across us with rain and showers possibly turning wintry at times later next week as a result. I mention nothing more than that at the moment to see how the models develop this clear trend in the next few days.