Scotland/Alba Regional Weather Discussion

[snowidea]

A belated happy new year from Falkirk. We went for a chilly camping trip last night in Glencoe. The campfire was a necessity.

[asjmcguire]

Best photo I could get of the Moon and Venus.... (oh and Mars)

Oh and it's 1.9C

Edited January 2, 2017 by asjmcguire
Apparently Mars is there too...

[Cheggers]

3 hours ago, asjmcguire said:

Best photo I could get of the Moon and Venus.... (oh and Mars)

Oh and it's 1.9C

My attempt at the Moon and Venus as well as a night view towards Stirling. Been cold all day, and now a hard frost setting in.

[asjmcguire]

I too was expecting it be warmer by now - but the temperature is continuing to drop, we are now down to 0.3C here!

[NUT]

Must be warmer cause at 8 tonight a pretty decent frost was forming that's all disappeared

[mistyqueen]

Morning all! Another day in the dreichfest that is currently covering Skye. Just made sure my new year visitor got her bus home and I am now thinking about breakfast. Thankfully that's all the festive nonsense at an end now and we can get back to something almost normal!

[Norrona2015]

Morning. Dull overcast start to the day, the kind of day that it should rain but it never does. 7c so feeling mild........a prozac day!

Off snowboarding on Saturday and the weather forecast, if it holds, is looking great. Very cold and snowy.

 

Ignore the image below please.

Edited January 3, 2017 by Norrona2015
Woeful screenshot skills >.<

[Northernlights]

Dull dry overcast start to the day and currently 8c. Seems that winter is going to pass us by but I am sure it will return in April to freeze the first  green shoots of Spring like last year.. Thus adding credence to the observation   that the seasons are running two months behind now all year round.

[mardatha]

That's what we were saying the other day. Going to be hell on the food front if it's true.

[asjmcguire]

3 hours ago, Northernlights said:

Dull dry overcast start to the day and currently 8c. Seems that winter is going to pass us by but I am sure it will return in April to freeze the first  green shoots of Spring like last year.. Thus adding credence to the observation   that the seasons are running two months behind now all year round.

I've heard that theory before! (I also think it has some grounds for further exploration)

[skifreak]

1 hour ago, asjmcguire said:

I've heard that theory before! (I also think it has some grounds for further exploration)

I've certainly thought that the astronomical seasons were more meaningful in Northern Scotland than the meteorological ones.

 

[asjmcguire]

1 hour ago, skifreak said:

I've certainly thought that the astronomical seasons were more meaningful in Northern Scotland than the meteorological ones.

 

Must admit that certainly for Winter - I've always classed the start of Winter as being just before Christmas rather than the start of December. The same was true of Summer - being closer to July than the start of June - although now that seems to have changed somewhat and the last several years in a row Summer appears to have been a few days in May....

[ciel]

7 hours ago, Northernlights said:

Dull dry overcast start to the day and currently 8c. Seems that winter is going to pass us by but I am sure it will return in April to freeze the first  green shoots of Spring like last year.. Thus adding credence to the observation   that the seasons are running two months behind now all year round.

Not sure about that observation, NL. I do remember some sporadic very cold Aprils - Junes in the past.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/dec/28/climate-change-driving-birds-migrate-early-research-reveals-edinburgh-global-warming

[Northernlights]

47 minutes ago, ciel said:

Not sure about that observation, NL. I do remember some sporadic very cold Aprils - Junes in the past.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/dec/28/climate-change-driving-birds-migrate-early-research-reveals-edinburgh-global-warming

The unusual thing about last April was that  winter temperatures lasted for more or less the last week and did a lot of damage to fresh spring growth. Normally just one or two days cold and then a big warm up  Also the last two Septembers and Octobers have had much better sunshine and warmth than the preceeding summers which have been  cool  dull and damp. Much better grass growth in the autumn.

[Gogoslo]

Decent day here on the coast.  9 degrees but felt a lot colder in the wind.  Went for a walk at Newburgh beach.  Loads of nosey seals swimming about.  

[asjmcguire]

Let's see if it holds true then, if the supermarkets are right, this signals a cold snap within 2-3 weeks.

[Hairy Celt]

2 hours ago, Gogoslo said:

Decent day here on the coast.  9 degrees but felt a lot colder in the wind.  Went for a walk at Newburgh beach.  Loads of nosey seals swimming about.  

Seals in red coats practising terrestrial swimming? 

[edo]

2 hours ago, asjmcguire said:

Let's see if it holds true then, if the supermarkets are right, this signals a cold snap within 2-3 weeks.

50 p in asda aswell, now are you sure it's not a heinz promotion 

fascinated by this theory as I'm also a big believer in the animal models....

so if soups reduced and animals going bonkers we now have 2 indicators and I will have more confidence in those than strat and teleconnections 

[asjmcguire]

5 minutes ago, edo said:

fascinated by this theory as I'm also a big believer in the animal models....

so if soups reduced and animals going bonkers we now have 2 indicators and I will have more confidence in those than strat and teleconnections 

This doesn't mention the soup thing - but it helps explain it a bit more - http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/news/in-depth/human-swarm I'm really frustrated that I can't find a copy of the documentary online anywhere, But I've set a reminder on the All4 site so hopefully I'll be back at some point to remind people to watch it.

Yeah I don't think it's a Heinz promotion - like I said several days ago, since watching the documentary several years ago - I've kept a close watch on the price of soup to see if it was really true, and other than the Summer when they also reduce the price of Soup - it does indeed appear to be the case that they reduce the price of soup in advance of a cold spell - presumably so subconsciously people stock up - and then the price goes back up just before or actually during the cold spell (though generally with one of the flashy - hey look this soup is on offer) promotions - so people buy the soup thinking they are getting a good deal, apparently unaware that just a few weeks prior the soup was less than half the price.

[GraemeB]

Wait, what ?

We've now resorted to price checking tins of soup in order to find some snow ?

Really ?

SOORP or what.  (Soup Oot O Ra Pram)

[Richard Taylor]

Just been catching up on the Model Thread. Don't know why I bother sometimes! Sometimes looking oot the windae really is the best policy!!

[mistyqueen]

Morning peeps! Calm, cloudy and dry up here, a wee bit dull though. Just what I've come to expect from winter weather, but at least it's dry and there's no wind. Going to go through my boxes of car boot fodder and sort out what's for selling and what's for the charity shops. Can't believe the amount of stuff I have and the MIL keeps passing on her stuff to me too! You should see what her cupboards hold, unbelievable!

[101_North]

Nice sunny morning but it's cold in that breeze! Absolutely Baltic!

[Ravelin]

5 hours ago, Richard Taylor said:

Just been catching up on the Model Thread. Don't know why I bother sometimes! Sometimes looking oot the windae really is the best policy!!

Best just to have a scan through the models yourself and ignore all the Model Thread hysterics. I've become quite a fan of the GFS Ensembles graphs for a quick overview. The latest isn't looking too bad, nothing stunning either though.

Obviously that is just the GFS model and changes from run to run but good for a quick look to see the 'trend' in 850 temps and precipitation. The spread can be interesting too, and in fact in the graph above the spread is reasonably tight going forward given the range.

Now if anyone can point me to how to get those graphs for anything but the current run that'd be good.

Edit: Actually, found it, you can see the last 4 runs from links on the bottom left of the page, and a combined graph of the last 4 runs. Something like this.

Average 850s of -5C at my locations isn't a bad place to be starting but is more cool rather than cold and snowy. Hopefully that can trend colder.

Edited January 4, 2017 by Ravelin

[Bullseye]

Hello everyone! 

I greet you all with these picture from our hotel room and main sqaure in Krakow, currently snowing and around 1 celsius which feels much colder with bitter wind, bad news is tomorrow and especially Friday to be into -10 to -15 range. Will hopefully update tomorrow (if I survive). 

Edited January 4, 2017 by Bullseye