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12z Is a peach for continental chill out past day 12

1st post of the new season. That’ll work. Greetings fellow snow nutters and also to a few strange people who don’t like it.

Pretty impressive upper scandi ridge on the mean

Almost certainly... But at least the Hunt is On!

S S S SNOW

Nice bright dry morning but has decended into rain this afternoon after a 5c start. Nice morning for my father in laws funeral.It was quite a surreal affair with only 7 family members joined online by around forty others.Aurora Storm made a lovely eulogy for Grandpa along with one from my brother in law. Just listened to recorded hyms. Lady minister who led the service in front of the seven family members was excellent too. Think Grandpa would have been pleased with his digital funeral . It is indeed strange times that we live in.

Evening all, What a wet, cloudy month it’s been on the east coast. Rainfall at Leuchars currently running at 187% of normal and sunshine just 56%. Has certainly felt that way in normally dry NE Fife. Was over at Killin last weekend. Plenty of rain around there too, the Falls of Dochart looked spectacular. The first couple of photos are from the Birks of Aberfeldy, also looking good!

Now the 12z GFS is pretty interesting... -6c uppers for the east coast!

Extended eps takes the NAO slightly negative with lowish Azores anomaly and higher sitting above .... it’s an interesting set up approaching middle period of November

The GEFS 12z mean around mid nov wasn’t a million miles from something very interesting for coldies...nearer 500 / 600 / 700 miles?...work in progress!!...in this situation you have to look well beyond the u k at the bigger picture and if you’re a coldie, hope the Gfs 12z op was the start of a new trend...from little acorns..grow..etc..etc..!!!

If that verifies it will mean the October Fog Index is a load of old cobblers lol

Yes, yes it's in FI but the NH view is nice to look at

Guess who's back? Back again. Been a while! Had a wake up call from Catch My Drift (in April!) which I noticed for the first time today. Won't go into details, but it has been a horrible year for us this year. Anyhoo, the only thing that remains the same is the weather! Ala this... Hope you are all well.

Thursday 29th A while since I updated this although, as usual, I have been checking each day. I’ll put the charts in first (getting near the end of my page) and the text below them. http://mp1.met.psu.edu/~fxg1/ECMWF_0z/hgtcomp.html http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov//favicon.ico Climate Prediction Center - 6-10 Day 500mb Outlook WWW.CPC.NCEP.NOAA.GOV Certainly some changes on the ec-gfs outputs. Both now have a marked cut off upper low with fairly small –ve heights in it, both have the ridge and +ve heights to the north of this feature, over the uk (with strong S of W 500 mb flow. The rest of the charts are reasonably similar too. This pattern has been developing on these models for a couple of days. Noaa, has also shown a similar pattern, especially with the prediction of the ridging/+ve heights extending towards the UK from the SW. It was a bit slower to go along with the cut off idea but last evening it agrees pretty well with the other two. Upstream (W of the UK), the chart is also similar to the other two. This normally does indicate that the 500 mb flow, as an average over the 6-10 days, is about 70% likely to validate. The 8-14 is somewhat different in the area of interest for the UK. The ridge is replaced by a rounded trough around 20 W, from the main Arctic trough coming out of NE Canada/western Greenland, with some minor +ve heights over/E of the UK. This perhaps suggests that the build of surface heights over the country may be a shortish term feature. So a break from the current disturbed, wet and windy in places to a shortish spell with ridging being the main influence on our surface weather for most areas away from the far NW. Then probably a return to some kind of Atlantic flow again, how active is too far ahead to judge yet. The amount of fog and frost will be dependent on just where the surface high spends most of its time before declining along with cloud cover overnight and the strength of the flow working down to the surface.

If only.....

Yep, though that could certainly work in our favour if we can get any sort of decently cold uppers dragged across it.

A relaxing of the destructive interference caused by the AAM spike is what will restore the Niña base state and thereby the North Atlantic ridge. Not so much opening the door as shutting the window.... From there I still see the last week of November as the realistic beginning of any cold interest. That first week I suspect will be a NW flow primarily and more cold rain than white diamonds....but the ridge may just gain traction into Greenland as December begins, assisted by lag impacts of wave 2 forcing underway next week. A cold start to December? Maybe. Evidence? This from ECM extended - not the first run to flag the ridge for the end of a November. And to add a bit of cannon fodder spice - the most recent CFS monthly for December reflects pretty closely what I see as our best hope for the month. Ridge holding into Greenland as the vortex struggles to kick on and the early winter Niña base state set within a lowering GWO orbit holds sway. Low heights digging into Western Europe underneath. Even though long range forecasting is a fool’s errand I do enjoy these early season musing opportunities...

Looks like the month is going to end just as it started...wet It's been not too bad on Deeside over the last couple of days, even managed to sit outside for a couple of hours on Monday still a hefty ninja shower popped up from nowhere. Our walking challenge at work is almost finished but my other one goes on until the end of the year. Pleased with my 60 miles so far, I just hope we get a prolonged dry, cold spell over the next few weeks to let me get my miles up.

Evening all Interesting contrasts between the 12Z models on the Northern Hemisphere profile. GFS OP keeps the PV in its usual place while GEM moves the PV over to Siberia and ECM significantly weakens it in situ. GEM and ECM look similar while GFS OP is very different - take your pick or if you play ice hockey, take your puck.

18z GFS..so far so good

That feed from the continent would sure be chilly. Low single figure max temps for a few I'd have thought, especially given weak solar input.

You could make a last minute switch-up.. No fog = snowy winter?

Just had a look at the latest models and on the face of it, it seems as though the upcoming anticyclonic spell has become more diluted, meaning, weaker height rises in the vicinity of the u k with ridging rather than a full blown intensifying anticyclone...BUT..it’s certainly not game over in terms of a nice crisp fine spell with overnight / morning fog & frosts according to the GEFS 6z / ECM 0z ensemble mean, as just two examples!!!!!!

She was very real in my head for a moment

Only because you’ve fallen for his imaginary sister-in-law who’s going with him.

Permanent position....very disappointed in him...

Ice growth is finally taking off along the Russian Arctic seas, doubling in extent over the last 7 days.

Can certainly see interesting charts from a cold POV appearing over the next few weeks

I really do think the charts over the next few weeks are worth keeping an eye on, I’m still going for the higher pressure building across Scandinavia and looking out for the cold air / cold pools to the E / NE. 10 years on from that magic winter we couldn’t could we

Models starting to firm up on a bit of detail through next week now. The building high looks to be a short lived affair as it builds from the west, before sliding off to the east: GFS ensembles look similar, and thankfully a fair bit drier into November:

Evening all Well, I'm sure the GFS 12Z OP FI has attracted plenty of attention. The NH profiles at T+240 this evening: - GFS, GEM and ECM respectively. One lobe of the vortex is where you'd expect it to be while the other is over Siberia (again as you might expect). Not quite sure what to make of it at this time but I'm not really seeing a raging Atlantic and a zonal train. Hints of heights over Scandinavia but nothing substantial.

I should have posted this ripped chart here instead of the winter thread. Only 2 cold months in strong Niña years since 1950: Feb 1956 at -0.2 CET and Dec 2010 at -0.7 CET. But it still looks unclear to me whether we will get a sustained period of Niña circulation at strong levels or just a pass through it. JAS came in at -0.6 on the ENSO index and from the look of it ASO will come in at about -0.8. This puts us quite a long way behind 2010/11 values which were already at -1.4. I’m very keen to see the UKMO update on 12 Nov (or thereabouts) to see whether things may bottom out in OND and not drop below -1.5. The closest Niña analog in terms of depth/shape looks to me to be 1955 and as already stated Feb 56 was cold. Mind you....back then our climate/weather was a very different beast...

Gfsp are not updating regularly but this mornings 00z run just popped up on meteorites those of a coldie disposition shouldn’t look at the back end of week 2 hemispherically to avoid server overload .....

Yes had to move during lockdown in May.. to be fair i did find a house on the highest ground in Ellon. But dont you worry I've already convinced mrs Snaw that this new place isn't a permanent thing and a move to higher ground is already being planned.. she say no higher than 200m asl.. im making that the minimum if i can..

Still raining here too. Ahem.

I thought I could blame your altitude, but I see you are only at 70M?!

Yes, I'm sure she was. Just wait there while I go and get the folded arms jacket...

@Northernlights sorry to hear of your loss.. and a shame you couldnt say goodbye in the normal way. @Blitzen good to see you back among us in this crazy place. And none of us are talking to @CatchMyDrift due to him naffing off to a cold snowy country

Fits in with a lot of LRF predictions for a Nina winter - the Pacific high to really intensify through the second half of winter and likely reduce our chances of cold through Jan and Feb. The first half however.....very interesting as you say!

Certainly a good leap off the diving board.. as we enter/move into November. Some stark 500 height plots for an early blocking sequence scenarios. And I’m personally tuned up via the lack of early bank- Pacific ridge anomalies... obviously early days... but with certain interest!...

I've not heard rain rattling off my skylights for over 24 hours.. i think that might be a record for the last 2 months..

Don't worry @Puffy MacCloudthat drizzle will soon turn into torrential rain. I'm planning on walking the dog around 2.45pm - so around then would be about right.

GFS 06Z at T+336... quite a lot of frost & fog methinks?

It's a drizzly sort of morning. No use to anyone. Temperature currently 8.6deg.C up from a minimum of 5.9deg.C at 07:00, humidity is 94%, very light south-southeasterly breeze, pressure is 1001.6hPa falling, and there's been 3.2mm of rain today and 14.4mm in the last 24 hours.

The world record for largest hail may have been broken in Tripoli, Libya yesterday. World's largest hail record may be challenged by exceptionally large 20+ cm (8 inches) hailstones hit the capital of Libya on Tuesday, Oct 27th WWW.SEVERE-WEATHER.EU A hail size of 8 inches (20 cm) would fit into the world's Top giant hailstone events, besides Vivian, US hailstorm, and a... The hail in this video sounds ominously like gunfire.

Nothing wrong at all with that top chart. Sceuro high migrating towards the Urals... trough pushing into western USA. You correctly reference the standard global setup which sees a high pressure belt to the south and lower pressure to the north....and all winter cold opportunities hinge on disrupting that default setup. Opportunities for disruption are most certainly on the table - your top chart showing one of them. This has been said umpteen times before - but in early November it probably rings more true than at any other time.....: Patience Required!

It is getting close to that time when we look at the models for winter more closely. I was heartened by this from the UKMO contingency planners forecast at the end of the October update: ’nevertheless, the chances of cold spells are higher for the season has been typically been the case in recent years’. Well thanks for that! But actually it is a massive plus that the UKMO are not writing winter off now, they did last year, with the infamous IOD and look how that went. Although, given Covid, I now miss so much the trudge across the swamp from the car park to the office during last winter, who knows when we will see those heady days again Today’s 12z at t240: Looks disturbed vortex on all, and maybe some drying out for the UK too. Can’t say much beyond that at the moment but it will be interesting to watch things as we go through November with some interest for coldies...we will see...

We’ve been watching weather records being broken left, right and centre over the last 5 years or so. I’ve been trying to work out how much of it is due to increased media coverage and how much is actual increased frequency of extremes. As a historian I know quantity of data brings its own challenges, and we really can’t claim to know the whole truth about the pattern of extremes 100+ years ago. History is full of references to extreme weather contexts and references. However, I’ve come to the conclusion that we have passed a tipping point, that warm records (and occasionally cold ones too) have become so obvious and frequent that the planet’s distress is there for all to see. Arctic sea ice extent (or lack of) is being reported in The Guardian but not so much else where in the U.K....and it is a grim watch. Siberian warmth was jaw dropping this summer. We now have unprecedented NA snow extent, and are watching a top end Hurricane season unfold. The vortex past winter was near record strength....the +IOD the same. We could go on and on. Which basically means I agree. We will see 40 degrees in a U.K. summer before too long, and I also think we will witness a cold/snow event of significant proportions too....if not this year then before too many more pass by. The Beast is the sort of event I expect to see again even though warm and wet spells will probably outnumber cold and snowy ones many times over. Im waffling. Yes - we will see interest this winter because extremes are here to stay for the foreseeable. The weather enthusiast in me is excited by this, like you. The global citizen in me is extremely gloomy.

Wouldn't surprise me if it came off, given the craziness of 2020..

The 12z ECM shows this at day 9... pretty decent chart.