January 1978: Tornadoes, storm surges, blizzards...

[Weather-history]

January 1978 was a month with a great variety ranging from tornadoes, thunderstorms, freezing fog, severe gales, storm surges and blizzards.

On the 3rd of January, Newmarket in Suffolk was hit by a tornado which caused extensive damage.

 

On the 12th, severe gales swept southwards as a low deepened causing a storm surge and flooding to many east coastal areas. There were snowfalls further north

There as a short lived settled spell before another cold pool of air sank southwards bringing snowfalls and under the clear skies, freezing fog patches.

On the 19th, Atlantic systems pushed in from the west and this engaged with the colder air producing extensive snowfalls which were prolong in the north, Glasgow airport recorded 17cm of lying snow.

There was then a short period of cold zonality as Atlantic systems push in from the west intermingled with colder air in the airstream.

On the 28th, a depression deepened over the UK producing a severe blizzard across the far north of Scotland causing widespread chaos, trapping motorists, train travellers and cutting off villages.

The CET for this month was 3.5

Number of days with falling sleet/snow for January 1978

Stornoway: 19
Glasgow Airport: 18
Belfast: 13
Manchester: 13
Nottingham: 10
Heathrow: 7
Edgbaston: 8
Plymouth: 4
Manston: 2
RAF Lakenheath: 5

Usually a good indicator of a cold zonal month, when you see this sort of configuration with the far NW having the highest number of days falling sleet/snow than the far SE  

[A Face like Thunder]

I well remember the northerly gale of 11th - 12th January and of sitting in my flat in Croydon listening to the sounds of the fences splintering outside. Scary!

[Weather-history]

Squall line caused the Newmarket tornado by the sounds of it.

12th Jan

    

13th Jan

14th Jan

18th Jan

22nd Jan

29th Jan

30th Jan

31st Jan

[Chesil View]

I remember that January very well.even down here in Dorset we had some passing dusting of snow towards months end. There was definitely a sense in the second half of the month that something wintry was brewing and so it proved to be come February with a ten day cold spell culminating in the great South West blizzard. 

[Roger J Smith]

There was also some notable severe storms in eastern North America. Following a 15-20 inch snowstorm mid-month, the celebrated "Superstorm" developed near Alabama on the 25th and moved north into Ohio, tracking north into Lake Huron and deepening to 955 mb, the lowest pressure ever seen in the Great Lakes region. On the west side of the track, a blizzard with 20-30 inch snowfalls crippled Ohio, Indiana, Michigan and parts of southwestern Ontario. The storm deepened so rapidly that London, ON recorded -8 C with gale force southerly winds, and winds gusted over 150 km/hr, damaging hydro-electric pylons near Lake Erie. At Toronto, where I happened to be that day (26 Jan) the temperature fell from 5 C at 0700h to -8 C at 0900h and winds veered from easterly gales to southwesterly storm force with blowing snow. It was quite a day, especially as my job at the time was essentially met tech and forecasting assistant. The models of that time did a reasonable job indicating severe storm potential but they didn't quite catch the full extent of the deepening. The storm is sometimes called the "Cleveland Superbomb" or the Ohio blizzard of 78. About ten days after that, another memorable blizzard hit New England, with a deep low off the east coast combining with frigid air to produce Boston's worst snowstorm since the Blizzard of 1888.

[Summer8906]

My earliest memory of snow was, I believe, in January 1978. I remember one morning, it would have been a Sat or Sun (could have been one of several weekends from the description here) walking across Tatton Park in Cheshire in the snow and ice.

Interesting that I have no recollection of snow in the years before that, I get the impression that much of the 70s (aside from 1970, 1978 and 1979) was unusually snowless for the era.

I note one of the clippings mentions heavy snow at Whitchurch, Hants. Thus, significant snowfall occurred in southern England in 7 out of 10 of the winters from 1978 to 1987. If one adds the one-day wonder of February 1981, that becomes 8.  In this period, the only calendar years without significant snow in the south were 1980 and 1984. Given that the 40s, 50s and 60s produced frequent snow by all accounts, it shows (aside from the 1971-7 'desert' referred to above) that it isn't unreasonable to expect snow in southern England in winter. It shows how poor the recent era from 1988 onwards has been.

Edited January 21, 2022 by Summer8906