Model output discussion 9th April onwards

[MP-R]

3 minutes ago, mb018538 said:

Not a bad 6z so far, sunshine and heavy showers for Monday. 12-17c should feel quite nice if you catch some sun though.

Haha 12-17C with showers... sounds like a mid April description. 

No dressing it up, it’s looking poor next week at the moment, but hopefully not for too long. It doesn’t sit right that this last week we’ve had a trough that just won’t shove it eastwards, then next week we have a trough racing eastwards. No doubt modifications between now and then.

[mushymanrob]

2 hours ago, johnholmes said:

I am mostly in agreement there mushy. There is an Atlantic flow beneath the blocking effect though. Just how that will play out with the block is not easy to see. The NOAA 8-14, as it often does, smooths the trough/ridge pattern out to give a broadly westerly flow into a rounded trough with its axis looking to be over/very slightly east of the UK. Very interesting to see what the upper air pattern is in the 6-14 day period and even more so what the UK surface weather will be. 

yep, i was in a bit of a rush this morning to get out...

i think the 06z rolling out now will be closer to the mark as its closer to the anomalies.

[Guest]

Usual story from the GFS 06z, utter garbage through most of next week. Hints of the Azores coming in at days 10-12 but that needs to be an awful lot closer to get any level of comfort it might happen given that was the story 10-12days ago and we’ve now been wedged under a trough for 6days…..

[Methuselah]

Plenty to keep the foot-stampers busy, according to the GFS 06Z, as there's still no heatwave forecast (Oh calamity!) On the other hand, there's nothing particularly cold on the cards either? Settled? No, not really:

    

    

    

But, hey . . It's the UK; it's July; and the models are all struggling!

[Fourty Point Three Degrees]

I've remained positive so far this summer but recent model output is doing its very best to kill my positive optimism. The first ten days of July is looking like a total write off in my opinion and i kinda know in the back of my mind that any Azores ridging will just continously keep being pushed back until it never happens.  It will be dreadful to have to start reading posts writing off summer 2021 while in middle of July still stuck and blocked in a trough. 

[Frosty.]

It may not be to far into July before we see the green shoots of recovery replacing the green snot of despair according too the GEFS 6z! ? 

 

[Timmytour]

On 24/06/2021 at 20:25, Jon Snow said:

My advice is never take any operational as gospel!..but by the same token, never take any perturbations as gospel!... ...so the lesson is, never take any chart as gospel...hope that helps! ...on the other hand, early July might be really summery?  

Loving the optimism Karl but  the start of July was pushed to early July and now it's "not far into July" waiting for those green shoots!

I think restrictions on Covid might get removed first at this rate!  

[Frosty.]

25 minutes ago, Timmytour said:

Loving the optimism Karl but  the start of July was pushed to early July and now it's "not far into July" waiting for those green shoots!

 

Cheers, looking back on my comment of 24th June, it now seems rather optimistic but of course it was only based on the trend of that time, the models are expert at pulling the rug from under our hopes / predictions but I can’t blame the models, the models don’t control the weather...anyway, until my next prediction about mid July implodes, I remain positive about summery weather returning just before mid month...feel free to post this in mid July if the weather has other ideas!  ...and I did only say MIGHT be really summery regarding early July, actually, the early days of July look preety decent (22-25c range) ?...   

Edited June 30, 2021 by Jon Snow

[Cheshire Freeze]

No idea why people are losing faith.

I think some of the issues here are stemming from people believing (backed up by other posters) that we’d see a home run of fine weather throughout the summer. This was never likely. I was at pains to point this out back in the spring.
 

I used a phrase (wax and wane) to describe fine, settled conditions this summer and that’s what we’re seeing. After this troughy period we should go on to settle down again for a while. 

Just about to enter July, no need for people to be downbeat

 

[Downpour]

5 minutes ago, CreweCold said:

No idea why people are losing faith.

I think some of the issues here are stemming from people believing (backed up by other posters) that we’d see a home run of fine weather throughout the summer. This was never likely. I was at pains to point this out back in the spring.
 

I used a phrase (wax and wane) to describe fine, settled conditions this summer and that’s what we’re seeing. After this troughy period we should go on to settle down again for a while. 

Just about to enter July, no need for people to be downbeat

 

Absolutely agreed. I see no reason to change my view that benign westerly conditions should return to the south from around 6/7 July. All looks very standard to me. 

[Methuselah]

According to the latest GEFS ensembles, temperatures look like being fairly reasonable:

    

Certainly no suggestion of any 12C afternoon maxes!

[Pennine Ten Foot Drifts]

1 hour ago, 38.7°C said:

I've remained positive so far this summer but recent model output is doing its very best to kill my positive optimism. The first ten days of July is looking like a total write off in my opinion and i kinda know in the back of my mind that any Azores ridging will just continously keep being pushed back until it never happens.  It will be dreadful to have to start reading posts writing off summer 2021 while in middle of July still stuck and blocked in a trough. 

"Write-off"??? Since the beginning of June the weather has been by and large shorts and T-shirt weather, more than warm enough to enjoy being out and about most days. There have been a good few really nice days, and I can't recall a single 'howling gale, cold and rain' day since the end of May. Sure next week is a bit more unsettled, but it's not going to be wall to wall cold, wet and windy, and there will be dry and bright periods, before hopefully things start to settle down again (I know this is way out in FI but just to illustrate):

  

In other words British summer weather.

 

[Guest]

9 minutes ago, Ed Stone said:

According to the latest GEFS ensembles, temperatures look like being fairly reasonable:

    

Certainly no suggestion of any 12C afternoon maxes!

Are you sure? 
 

 

[Methuselah]

8 minutes ago, Alderc said:

Are you sure? 
 

 

I guess I forgot that it's colder up mountains!

[kold weather]

18 minutes ago, Pennine Ten Foot Drifts said:

"Write-off"??? Since the beginning of June the weather has been by and large shorts and T-shirt weather, more than warm enough to enjoy being out and about most days. There have been a good few really nice days, and I can't recall a single 'howling gale, cold and rain' day since the end of May. Sure next week is a bit more unsettled, but it's not going to be wall to wall cold, wet and windy, and there will be dry and bright periods, before hopefully things start to settle down again (I know this is way out in FI but just to illustrate):

  

In other words British summer weather.

 

I think that it really depends 0n where you live.

Down here in the SE the last two weeks have been *dreadful*, I've probably seen more rainfall than in the last 3 months combined and its been cloudy basically every day since mid June. I think maybe literally 10hrs of sunshine in that time?

However further north its been ok, maybe even a little above average as you've managed to escaped the constant frontal bands by in large that have been a near constant further south.

IMO having the LP over the top of us isn't as much of a disaster as some think. Yes it will be cooler than average, and it perhaps won't feel very summery at times but you do avoid too many active fronts that tend to rotate around such LP systems further out. hopefully it can stay more showery in nature as at least that does offer some sunshine opportunities.

A distinctly average summer so far IMO, BUT with the normal roles somewhat reversed in the last 2 weeks (with the SE getting the rubbish instead of the NW). Hopefully FI can this time come into the realistic timeframe rather than just tease us at 360hrs.

At this point in the SE a sunny spell with 21c will be more than acceptable, thats how poor the last 2 weeks have been down here.

Edited June 30, 2021 by kold weather

[kold weather]

The other thing we also need to remember is a pattern shift later in July probably won't be clocked by the models at this stage. Here was the forecast for Friday 31st July 2020 at 384hrs:

Note how similar alot of those GFS ensemble members look with the current set-up the models are also showing now. Most are LP dominated and most have temperatures between 18-21c max. (just 1 goes above 25c)

For context, in reality that day reached 37.8c and was the hottest ever mean in the CET zone. So yeah don't take the models that far out too literally, especially when in a long range holding pattern that could suddenly buckle.

 

Edited June 30, 2021 by kold weather

[wellington boot]

28 minutes ago, kold weather said:

I think that it really depends 0n where you live.

Down here in the SE the last two weeks have been *dreadful*, I've probably seen more rainfall than in the last 3 months combined and its been cloudy basically every day since mid June. I think maybe literally 10hrs of sunshine in that time?

However further north its been ok, maybe even a little above average as you've managed to escaped the constant frontal bands by in large that have been a near constant further south.

IMO having the LP over the top of us isn't as much of a disaster as some think. Yes it will be cooler than average, and it perhaps won't feel very summery at times but you do avoid too many active fronts that tend to rotate around such LP systems further out. hopefully it can stay more showery in nature as at least that does offer some sunshine opportunities.

A distinctly average summer so far IMO, BUT with the normal roles somewhat reversed in the last 2 weeks (with the SE getting the rubbish instead of the NW). Hopefully FI can this time come into the realistic timeframe rather than just tease us at 360hrs.

At this point in the SE a sunny spell with 21c will be more than acceptable, thats how poor the last 2 weeks have been down here.

Excellent post, and saves me writing out something similar!

[Thundery wintry showers]

Here in Lincoln I've been in the transition zone between the dull and wet SE and the sunny and dry NW, and since mid-June it's been mainly dry but overcast, with cool days and warm nights.  Usable perhaps, but the lack of sunshine has got rather draining after a while. 

I have more than a suspicion that the upcoming unsettled spell may see rather more sunshine here, with both the GFS and ECMWF runs pointing towards an emphasis on slack low pressure, thundery showers and some sunshine, though I'm aware that in these setups weak fronts and areas of cloud and rain can turn up at short notice, meaning that it could end up dull as well as wet.  Sunday in particular shows convective/thundery potential for this region:

There is potential for Monday (5th July) to have a rather autumnal feel with a deep low moving across the south, as is modelled by GFS, but there's a chance that the GFS could be overdoing the depth of the low.

I've been envisaging high pressure building from the south-west in the second week of July for some time now, but if it's to happen it needs to start showing in the model outputs pretty soon - the ensemble mean charts from GFS and ECMWF look very ordinary for the time of year at T+192-240, as does the 8-14 day outlook from NOAA.

 

[Frosty.]

I’ve been posting / commenting on mean charts for many years with mixed results but I honestly get the feeling that July will see an anticyclonic very warm / hot spell from around mid month / give or take a few days?...the extended GEFS 6z mean trends that way!...this comment may end up proven to be foolish but I’ve tracked settled spells and plumes in previous summers from the depths of FI into the reliable timeframe..it does work sometimes!!!  

 

Edited June 30, 2021 by Jon Snow

[Mike Poole]

20 minutes ago, Jon Snow said:

I’ve been posting / commenting on mean charts for many years with mixed results but I honestly get the feeling that July will see an anticyclonic very warm / hot spell from around mid month / give or take a few days?...the extended GEFS 6z mean trends that way!...this comment may end up proven to be foolish but I’ve tracked settled spells and plumes in previous summers from the depths of FI into the reliable timeframe..it does work sometimes!!!  

 

Well as far as I can it’s just the same data, along with the ECM ensembles, that is used in generating the all seeing anomaly charts, so I’m with you on this.  The ensemble signal is for an improvement, the op models are probably underplaying it at the moment because of not detecting the upsurge in AAM that is expected.  Why the ensemble members are seeing it is probably because there are many more of them.  

Feel we have to ride this one out another week before we get a clear steer on the main part of July…

[Mike Poole]

Good to see the GFS 12z nosing the high pressure in a little earlier, T204:

I wonder if the models are starting to smell the beer!

[davehsug]

1 hour ago, Jon Snow said:

I’ve been posting / commenting on mean charts for many years with mixed results but I honestly get the feeling that July will see an anticyclonic very warm / hot spell from around mid month / give or take a few days?...the extended GEFS 6z mean trends that way!...this comment may end up proven to be foolish but I’ve tracked settled spells and plumes in previous summers from the depths of FI into the reliable timeframe..it does work sometimes!!!  

 

The problem with means  is that when the operational are so bad, the mean will almost always look better. I've spent many years of seeing people post "not to worry, the mean is much better". Means are by definition an average, and with so many ensembles, they will tend to produce average weather charts.

[Mike Poole]

Another example of the shift, GEM T192 compared with T204 on 0z:

Models really starting to smell the asparagus now.

GEM has summer back at the end, a trend I expect to continue, here T240:

Edited June 30, 2021 by Mike Poole

[Uncle_Barty]

47 minutes ago, davehsug said:

The problem with means  is that when the operational are so bad, the mean will almost always look better. I've spent many years of seeing people post "not to worry, the mean is much better". Means are by definition an average, and with so many ensembles, they will tend to produce average weather charts.

exactly this. Better to look at the clusters. I usually pretty much ignore the mean.

[Methuselah]

12 minutes ago, Uncle_Barty said:

exactly this. Better to look at the clusters. I usually pretty much ignore the mean.

Each to their own?

Anyhow, I don't think the GFS 12Z operational run is too bad, a sea of oranges and yellows: