February 2024 C.E.T. and EWP contests

[Summer8906]

 Summer Sun Good grief... will Feb 2024 end up being as infamous as Dec 2015 I wonder?

Certainly only that month seems to be comparable in terms of mild, dull and damp.

Really getting concerned now that this extreme mildness will wreck spring, with everything flowering at the wrong time. So after a poor summer, autumn and winter, we'll have a spring lacking its usual joy, irrespective of what the weather's doing.

Edited February 8 by Summer8906

[The PIT]

A big drop today down to 7.2C +2.7C above normal. Rainfall unchanged.

Another big drop for today then probably a slow fall over the next five days.

[Roger J Smith]

To clarify situation with running CET, no value was posted for 7 Feb and it now reads 9.1 for 6 days.

[WYorksWeather]

 Roger J Smith On the site it says it's for 7 days?

[Roger J Smith]

I only see data for 1-6 Feb and it adds up to 54.4 (54.4/6 = 9.07). I suspect one of the daily means that was there before was adjusted but I didn't make any copies, it would need to be  6 Feb altered. 

Copy of screen I see (removed irrelevant info below 7th and no data mar to dec). 

2024 _0.9 _5.3 

2024 _4.7 _9.1

_ 1 __ 8.0 _5.7 

_ 2 __ 8.4 _8.4 

_ 3 __ 8.1 11.0 

_ 4 __ 5.9 10.7 

_ 5 __ 5.6 _9.7 

_ 6 __ 3.8 _8.9 

_ 7 __ 2.3 -99.9 (-99.9 = no data)

(etc) 

The first column would be Jan data, second column is Feb data. 

First row is anomaly and second row is running CET average. 

They may well say it's provisional to 7th but it does not include any data for 7th. 

[Roger J Smith]

Looking at model runs, would say a 6 to 6.5 ending is most likely, it won't compete for warmest February, but it won't drop a lot more than it does by Tuesday.

 

[Roger J Smith]

Anyway, I see the CET site is now updated, 7.8 after eight days and it would have been 8.4 after seven days if a value had been posted yesterday for the 7th. The last two days are both in low 4 range. 

[Summer Sun]

7.8c to the 8th

4.0c above the 61 to 90 average
2.9c above the 81 to 10 average

[damianslaw]

 Summer Sun Quite depressing stats for anyone who appreciates cold. Nothing especially cold on the horizon though the CET should drop somewhat in the days ahead. 

[WYorksWeather]

Probably quite a few days averaging in the 6-7C range is probably a good bet for now. Looks like then another warm up mid-month, then something colder after that, if we take the ensembles at face value.

The big wildcard is really the SSW.

[snowray]

So we could possibly be looking at a very mild 1st half and a cold 2nd half of them month.

[summer blizzard]

If there's an impact from the SSW quickly then it will be felt in the final third of Feb and first third of March.  So yes, a good chance of a cooling month albeit we can't price in proper cold at this stage so well above average appears likely.

[Roger J Smith]

On our way to 100+ mm if GFS is correct, 25 mm to 7th and probably nearly that yesterday, so 50 mm so far and GFS indicates a grid average of 50-60 mm. Would bring a total of 100-110 mm by nearly end of February. Also an unsettled pattern at end of run, could easily see 10-20 mm more by 29 Feb.

[WYorksWeather]

 summer blizzard Of course, sometimes an SSW can lead to the opposite trend - we could end up on the warm side with an early spring. Lots to work out yet - we don't know what sort of SSW it will be.

[Metwatch]

Perhaps a slight cooling trend already from around next weekend so that could help to lower the CET from there on forward, but isn't really clear to me at the moment, a lot of scatter with all the ensembles. First half will overall be quite a mild one.

As Roger mentions above, the EWP graph should update tomorrow to show yesterday's deluge, so probably exceeding 50mm. Later next week seems to be trending wetter so my 105mm guess doesn't look too far off given current modelling. There is potential for this month to become quite wet, so already a complete flip to last February, maybe similar to 2022. A 2020 repeat seems unlikely but can't be disregarded.

[The PIT]

Got yesterdays average wrong duh however sunny Sheffield down  to 7.3C +2.8C above average. Rainfall up to 43.7mm 67% of the monthly average.

[SqueakheartLW]

It isn't just how mild Feb 2024 has started but another thing of note is how mild the winter is overall.

This is the latest snapshot of where winter 2023/24 stands compared with the top 10 mildest winters overall at this stage in the winter (8th Feb). At present after allowing for the couple of colder days we have just had we are just scraping into the top 10 at this stage, pushing 1989/90 out of the top 10.

If we do indeed see mean CET's hovering in the 6C to 7C range for the rest of the month then a top 10 finish will almost be a certain done deal. If we go ridiculously mild again then could a new record mildest be a threat?

If we averaged at 9C for the rest of the month we would set a new mildest winter on the CET by just 0.003C over 2015/16 but I can't see us getting an average of 9C for the rest of the month.

The lowest value we can achieve whilst getting 10th mildest would need to be an average of 6.21C between 9th and 29th. Anything below this would see us fail to set a top 10.

[Summer Sun]

7.8c to the 9th

4.0c above the 61 to 90 average
3.0c above the 81 to 10 average

[The PIT]

Sunny Sheffield down to 6.9C +2.4C above normal. Rainfall 46.7mm 71.6% of the monthly average.

[The PIT]

Sunny Sheffield down to 6.8C +2.3C above average. Rainfall 49.5mm 75.9% of the monthly average

[Summer Sun]

7.9c to the 10th

4.1c above the 61 to 90 average
3.2c above the 81 to 10 average

[feb1991blizzard]

 Summer Sun

Couldn't believe it when i saw this! - obviously wrong now i saw your post.

EDit - its the maximum my browser gave me when i searched! - never had that happen before. 

 

Edited February 11 by feb1991blizzard

[SqueakheartLW]

 Summer Sun

5 hours ago, Summer Sun said:

7.9c to the 10th

4.1c above the 61 to 90 average
3.2c above the 81 to 10 average

Do note that 7.9C is equal to the mildest February on the CET record from 1779 which was 7.9C

Is this seriously looking to be under threat this year as it currently looks that way

[WYorksWeather]

@SqueakheartLW

It's all going to come down to the last week or so, in my view. We have absolutely nothing cold in the next 10 days or so, quite likely that CET will stay static or fall only slightly. Some days next week look very mild with temperatures up to the mid teens in places.

It will then come down to whether we continue mild, in which case a record is very much on the table, alongside one of the mildest winters overall, or alternatively we do see a late cold spell which drags the CET back down a bit.

Milder than average 1961-1990 is a virtual certainty, even only a third of the way through the month. Milder than average 1991-2020 is highly likely.

Probably a more useful figure is the last 10 year average, which is 5.7C. If we beat that, then it's a mild February even by the most modern of standards in a context of some positively spring-like ones. And worth mentioning that this recent 10-year average is milder than the 1961-1990 average for March!

Even hiking the standard up to 5.7C, I'd still say at this stage it's really quite highly unlikely we finish below it. It would require the next 19 days to average only 5.0C, which looks like a tall order.

Edited February 11 by WYorksWeather
Mentioned SqueakheartLW in relation to earlier post.

[North-Easterly Blast]

One point of note now is that we are very likely to be looking at the warmest first half of February for 20 years (since 2004), and possibly since 2002.  Another notable point is that the warmth of this February so far began on January 21st, not at the turn of the month, and the last eleven days of January were overall almost as mild as this month of February has been so far.  The mid-January to mid-February period this year must be among the warmest since 2002.

Although what happens after next weekend for the remainder of February is still up for grabs, a notable statistic that is now almost a certainty, is that the CET for the 28 day period from January 21st to February 17th this year could get close to the record 7.9 CET for the calendar month of February 1779.