William Downie

We're midway between Edinburgh and Glasgow at 610 ft (186 m) asl. It's -8C on my car thermometer this morning, after another probable ice day yesterday. It likely won't get above zero today either. Aside from a couple of brief thaws lasting only a day or two, we've had snow on the ground since 28th December, with 5 or 6 ice days. From what I've seen our coldest day was Fri. 8th, with a maximum of about -5C. The coldest night was -10C (can't recall when now). I see parts of England and Wales are getting snow today. I hope you enjoy it!

It's certainly been a snowy Christmas here in Addiewell in the central belt of Scotland. We're at 610 ft asl (186 m) and have had a blanket of snow for five days now. Today was probably our third ice day, with a maximum of about -2C. It was -4C at 6pm and we finally have a clear night sky, instead of the usual clearing around dawn and clouding up at dusk, so I'm expecting the coldest night of the winter.

Weather models are usually quite poor at predicting snow, especially in a marginal climate like ours, so with luck you might get some soon.

I'm sorry to see so few of you down south have had any decent winter weather so far (I'm not mocking you here - I sympathise). Here between Edinburgh and Glasgow at 610ft we've had snow lying for three days, with about 2.5 inches at present. Yesterday was an ice day and today so far has been the same (-5C this morning). The scenery is Christmas-card lovely, with every tree branch clad in white. It's all very seasonal here. I hope the rest of you get some snow soon. It looks promising for the next wee while.

I live near Edinburgh and 1995/6 was indeed a severe winter for us, although not on the scale of 1978/79, as you say, maybe another 1977/78. Glasgow Airport recorded -20C between Christmas and New Year 1996, during a severe 10-day cold snap. 1996/97 was a cold winter too - we had snow on the ground for six weeks, which isn't bad for a location only 300 ft asl. and I believe there was a coldish winter in 1993/94. So I maintain that these winters were indeed part of the 16/year cycle. If you look at historic station data for UK stations you will clearly see a general dip in winter temperatures between 1993 and 1997, although not as big a dip as usual. Yes, there are plenty of cold winters outside these clusters, but the clusters have persisted. If every 16 years or so you see a cluster of cold or even just coldish winters then that is a noteworthy pattern. More importantly is gives people a chance to prepare.

Since my teens (I'm now 61) I've noticed that we get clusters of cold winters at about 16-year intervals, often three cold winters in a row. The details differ every time but the pattern has persisted since at least 1947 and probably long beforehand (the severe winter of 1895/96 was probably one of them). Nearly all the 'great' winters are found in these clusters, generally the last winter in the cluster. So sixteen years after 1947 we had the winter of 1962/63. Sixteen years later we had 1978/79. Seventeen years later we had 1995/96 and of course fifteen years after that we got 2010/11. The next one should be around 2026/27, although I'd expect them to start getting colder around 2023/24. Not too long to wait if you love real winters (as do I). The last cluster fitted the pattern almost perfectly, with 2008/9, 2009/10 and 2010/11 all being colder than average. One unusual feature of 2010/11 was that it was all over by the end of December, but many stations recorded an average temperature for December of well below 0C. 2010 was an exceptionally cold year in fact, because of the big freeze of 2009/10, but again that winter was cut short. I have never come across any mechanism that accounts for this cycle of cold winters in the UK and NW Europe, but experience tells me that local councils should start stocking up on grit in a couple of years, something they conspicuously failed to do last time.

'White Christmas' traditionally meant snow on the ground on the day. If we use that definition, instead of the ridiculous meteorological one, then I can remember nine white Christmases in or near Broxburn, West Lothian (80m asl) since 1962, which was the first I can recall. Here they are 1962: we woke up to three inches of snow that lay all day. 1967 or 68: we had a white Christmas one of those years, the snow falling the day before. 1970: there was a couple of inches of snow on the ground. 1981: we had a thin covering of snow and a sub-zero day. 1993: we had another thin covering that lasted all day. 1995: we had a couple of inches that had fallen the night of the 23rd and a sub-zero day. 2000: we had an inch of snow on the ground, a little falling and a sub-zero day. 2009: we had about eight inches of snow, which had been accumulating since the 17th. It was to keep building up for another fortnight. 2010: there was about three inches lying from a fall several days earlier. The thaw began that day. That was Christmas days where there was at least a 50% covering. There were two Christmas days, 1980 and 1998, when it snowed and lay in the evening and a third day, 2008, when there were a few flakes of frozen snow on the ground. They may have been others, but from the white Christmases I can recall we have had between one white Christmas in five and one in seven in my lifetime, depending on your definition.

Ha! Okay, thanks for correcting me. I shouldn't have relied so much on my memory. Livingston, close to where I lived, recorded -21.1 on 10 January. It was an amazing cold snap though, unequalled for length and severity here in Scotland until 2009. We stayed below zero for the entire first half of December 1981 (we did that again in December 2010) and managed a white Christmas to boot. That's white by the traditional definition (white with snow) rather than the ridiculous meteorological one.

Hi there. The low temperature record was set in Shawbury, near Shrewsbury in Shropshire. It was -26.1C but I can't recall the date, although it was certainly mid December. I don't think it's been beaten since then.