Scotland & The Far North Of England Regional Weather Chat

[Hawesy]

Morning all, bright start with the sun now out and after the wet beginning to the month the next few days look pretty decent, mostly dry with some mist and fog and possibly a touch of frost overnight. A way to go yet for an air frost in Crail, lowest reading to date 5c.

[Scottish-Irish Skier]

Frost the morn. Puddles frozen over.

 

Weather station was in a forlorn state - batteries needing changed in both external sensor and internal readout. 

 

Done and back to life.

 

Getting these bad boys fitted on the 27th. For now, just occasional visits to the shed to admire them.

 

[SW Saltire]

Glorious day today.

It's funny how a couple weeks ago, there was a slight wind and the intermittent sun felt quite weak. Yet, today in the crystal clear air without a breath of wind, it felt quite strong and warm actually despite a 13c max today. The 'feels like' temp would have been circa 16c or so.

I'm unsure as to whether we have recorded an air frost as my weather station was previously broken and I've been away so couldn't fix it.

Fixed now.

There have been 3 days when at about 12 all cars were steamed up and there were traces of frost at 11am or so.

Probably scraped below 0 on one occasion, I'm sure it was 2010 when I recorded -3.5c end of September/start of October.

Therefore, nights haven't been particularly cold but I'd say consistently cool. A hat full of sub 5c nights have been recorded (at uni and home) already which would give last winter a run for it's money!

Edited October 11, 2014 by SW Saltire

[Norrance]

Glorious here today too. Just back from walking the dug in shorts and a t shirt. Ok it's only 12 C but in the sun it really feels warm.

Edited October 12, 2014 by Norrance

[SW Saltire]

Same here Norrance

After a 3.8c low, temperatures have steadily climbed to the dizzy heights of 15.2c. There has always been some cloud in the sky but most of it just high level stuff, rarely interrupting, the now fairly weak sun

[Ross Andrew Hemphill]

Currently 8.5C, could be in for the first proper frost of the season. Feels like its going to be foggy too.

[LomondSnowstorm]

Finally got my super cool new Davis weather station set up:

http://www.wunderground.com/personal-weather-station/dashboard?ID=ISCOTLAN155

The data logger I got with it only links to the laptop rather than straight to the router though, so it will only record when I'm back unless I manage to get my old netbook set up to permanently record the data or until I can get some sort of link up device which doesn't go through the laptop (I've seen some solutions for this for under £30 so I'm hoping to have something in place before the winter).

Anyway, a bit of a 'downgrade' on the pattern over the last few days as Catch noted, with more Atlantic influence on the horizon, and consequently an easing of the very negative OPI values (although, having said that, the 12Z takes it back to -3.15 http://app.til.it/opi/ ). While I'd rather have something other than dull, wet dross for the remainder of the month I'm much more concerned that we avoid the awfulness of another strong PV dominated winter. I had a look back at the forum from last winter and, while there was actually more in the way of snow and cold potential than I remembered, there were scarcely any events where snow lay for more than a few hours on low ground. Even in 2012/13, which in hindsight was a pretty good winter, we were about a degree or so in upper air temperature away numerous times from a big dumping for low levels. From an initial look at the composites along with some of the upstream predictions of a cold winter for the eastern seaboard it does look as though the PV may well attempt for the third year running to base itself out of NE Canada, which makes getting proper Greenland-Iceland blocking in place imperative. Fortunately, that also looks more likely than last winter, and perhaps about as likely as it was in 2012/13, which synoptically came very close to being a classic, but if the jet keeps on with the same voracity and persistence as it has done for the last two winters then the margins between the first and second bits of The Day After Tomorrow (i.e. massive flood or ice age) will be even tighter. 

Anyway, what are we looking to achieve in October to try and bolster our chances of a cold winter? First off, the OPI - while it's quickly gaining a reputation for being frustratingly difficult to pin down, the gist of it is that the more negative it goes the more disrupted the vortex is, which leads, further down the line, to more high latitude blocking and, we hope, snow. An example of a strongly negative OPI (or at least what I can assume is a strongly negative OPI since the actual daily figures aren't actually released) is this:

Basically, you want as little of the blues and purples over the Arctic and Greenland as possible, mid latitude blocking is helpful too, and the vortex being displaced to central Russia is another thing working in our favour. Cut off troughs in our vicinity is fine, ideally not anything tilted on a SW-NE axis, the main thing is that the vortex is not where it 'should' be. 

This is, in spite of what looks like a fairly chilly flow over us, a poor chart, from last October:

A big blob of dark purple over the pole indicating a well organised vortex, which was what we saw much of last year, albeit once displaced to Canada.

The other thing to look out for is the Snow Advance Index, which is a measure of the snow gain over Eurasia over the month of October, effectively measured as the gradient. The importance of this is that it increases the propensity for stratospheric warmings over Asia, which in turn propagates back down the atmosphere either through localised wave breaking or spectacular SSWs (e.g. 2012/13). It's important to remember that the monthly ablation, rather than just the totals, are the critical part - last September was incredibly good for Eurasian snowfall, which many took to be a positive, but as October came out with snow cover only just above average the Advance Index was poor, and we saw what happened next. This September also saw fairly strong snow accumulation over Siberia but not as strong as last winter, which, perversely, is 'good' for the advance index, while the gain so far has been fairly reasonable - lots of snow south of 60 degrees north (which is particularly helpful) and with that troughing for the next few days over Russia things are nicely set up for more gains:

What you really do not want is something like this:

SWerlies from North Africa all the way into central Russia melting all our precious snow. If we can avoid that (which incidentally is also a terrible chart for the OPI) then it puts us in a really good position for winter, and if not then we're gonna need a bigger boat 

Edited October 12, 2014 by LomondSnowstorm

[A Winter's Tale]

A nice day after a foggy start and it's now a cloudless and starry night with a chill in the air.

[mardatha]

Can somebody give me a link to that snow site please - the one that shows the snow cover over the northern hemisphere?

[Scottish-Irish Skier]

Bloody roasting and humid as hell here in Dubai. Cannae go oot - would melt in minutes.

 

I want 7 C and pishin rain the morn when I land back in Edinburgh.

[BleakMidwinter]

By the looks of today, you could well get your wish, SS!

[Scottish-Irish Skier]

By the looks of today, you could well get your wish, SS!

 

9 C and light drizzle on arrival. Not far off.

 

Apropos of nothing, but on the Amsterdam-Edinburgh leg I ended up seated next to this 'lovely' (very) old deep south Georgia dear who introduced herself straight up as 'Alice'.

 

Full on southern drawl and telling me all about the good old times back in Georgia...growing cotton etc, and how she was so looking forward to visiting Scotland. Friendly as hell.

 

Then somehow she got onto how the US had all gone to hell with 'one of them Blacks' as president ('Don't get me wrawng, there's some good black folks but') and how she's gettin a gun to protect her from those gangs. This was all said in apparent complete innocence.

 

Jesus wept. I didn't know what to say so steered the topic back onto Edinburgh castle as soon as I could.

 

World's a weird place.

 

EDIT. Maybe I was hallucinating. Need to go to bed now - 4 hours sleep in the past 48. Surreal.

 

Anyway, back to the weather.

Edited October 14, 2014 by scottish skier

[SW Saltire]

9 C and light drizzle on arrival. Not far off.

 

Apropos of nothing, but on the Amsterdam-Edinburgh leg I ended up seated next to this 'lovely' (very) old deep south Georgia dear who introduced herself straight up as 'Alice'.

 

Full on southern drawl and telling me all about the good old times back in Georgia...growing cotton etc, and how she was so looking forward to visiting Scotland. Friendly as hell.

 

Then somehow she got onto how the US had all gone to hell with 'one of them Blacks' as president ('Don't get me wrawng, there's some good black folks but') and how she's gettin a gun to protect her from those gangs. This was all said in apparent complete innocence.

 

Jesus wept. I didn't know what to say so steered the topic back onto Edinburgh castle as soon as I could.

 

World's a weird place.

EDIT. Maybe I was hallucinating. Need to go to bed now - 4 hours sleep in the past 48. Surreal.

 

Anyway, back to the weather.

My Dad went into a bar in New Orleans and it happened to come up in conversation that ALL the people there were white. The man behind the bar responded by saying "we don't serve their kind, round here"

Delightful -_-

Back on topic, nice sunny day here again (Stirling). Around 12c and sunny. All the trees are lovely colours now

[Scottish-Irish Skier]

My Dad went into a bar in New Orleans and it happened to come up in conversation that ALL the people there were white. The man behind the bar responded by saying "we don't serve their kind, round here"

Delightful -_-

Back on topic, nice sunny day here again (Stirling). Around 12c and sunny. All the trees are lovely colours now

 

Good that someone appreciated my odd post! Was like something out of planes, trains and automobiles. Me in a surreal state after being on my feet for 48 hours bar a short nap the night before, and this wee, 85 yr old or so innocent looking gran on the plane turning into a glock wielding (not literally thankfully) red-neck nutter. Help, get me off this plane!

 

Slept since my last post and feeling better now - I hate work travelling these days!

 

Anyway, back to my preferred below 10 C with light rain. Ahhhh...

 

Was my first time in Dubai; been to Saudi before, but the climate is different even though they're right next to each other. Saudi's quite dry heat so more bearable. Dubai it seems gets high humidity because the peninsula is surrounded by water; that made 35 C or so seem much worse.

 

Weird place too; like an arabic vegas. Glass and neon towers galore, bars, pools and tourists partying. But with calls to prayer from minarets...

[LomondSnowstorm]

OPI holding steady at -1.86, down from -1.6 on yesterday's 12Z and -0.9something on the uber progressive 6Z http://app.til.it/opi/

By the 20th we should have a value which isn't far off the final number, and with the Arctic High still holding sway on the modelling out to D10 (the 24th) then I'm fairly confident of a sub zero value at the very least:

 

 

As far as the Snow Advance Index goes (I think the site you're looking for Mardatha is this one http://climate.rutgers.edu/snowcover/chart_daily.php?ui_year=2014&ui_day=286&ui_set=0 ) it's in a phenomenal position - the most Eurasian snowcover at this point in October since the records began. That's the anomaly chart by the way - the blue areas are placing which have snow but 'shouldn't' ordinarily have any at this time:

 

In addition, there's a Stratty bonus for us in the forecast at a time when the vortex is just starting to get established:

 

Exactly the right spot as far as vortex disruption goes (reading Chiono's thoughts it'd be most likely a displacement if anything) and hard not to think that this is directly related to the massive snow gain feeding back up into the strat over the same region. Worth remembering, if you'll permit a slight ramp that in early November 2010 we also saw stratospheric warming, and of course we all know what happened next. Of course, that winter didn't even feature a -QBO and the OPI and SAI weren't all that negative...

Edited October 14, 2014 by LomondSnowstorm

[mistyqueen]

Been a few stonking days up here, wall to wall sunshine today but Baltic this morning at 2.3c. Took me ages to thaw out and take off a few layers at work! temp dropping again, now down to 5.8 and falling. Looks like it won't last though, some windiness headin' oor way for the weekend.

[Bullseye]

Started reading the forums again on build up to the winter. I recently came across OPI figures dating back to 70's (correct me if wrong) and like always I didn't save the image (i know). As my mind can't help me recall where i seen this image i need help, so basically if anyone can help that would be great (and yes i checked OPI topic, no success). Cheers. 

[LomondSnowstorm]

Started reading the forums again on build up to the winter. I recently came across OPI figures dating back to 70's (correct me if wrong) and like always I didn't save the image (i know). As my mind can't help me recall where i seen this image i need help, so basically if anyone can help that would be great (and yes i checked OPI topic, no success). Cheers

 

 

 

These are the numbers that BFTV derived from the chart of the OPI against the AO (which is the only data we have about the values):

1976:  -1.75

1977:  -0.95

1978:  -1.8

1979:  -0.5

1980:  -0.05

1981:  -0.4

1982:  -1.1

1983:  -0.3

1984:  -1.8

1985:  -1.9

1986:  -1.3

1987:  -0.45

1988:  1.45

1989:  0.25

1990:  0.55

1991:  1.1

1992:  1.75

1993:  -0.15

1994:  0.7

1995:  -0.65

1996:  -0.75

1997:  -0.75

1998:  0.1

1999:  -0.2

2000:  -0.75

2001:  0.45

2002:  -0.9

2003:  -0.7

2004:  0.3

2005:  -0.7

2006:  0.85

2007:  0.75

2008:  0.25

2009:  -3.15

2010:  -0.85

2011:  0.65

2012:  -1.65

2013:  1.6

Just for comparison, here's the Scotland temperature series anomaly for DJF of the following winters (not including 2013/14):

-1.4 -0.7 -2.0 0.0 0.5 -1.1 0.1 0.1 -0.3 -1.1 -0.4 0.7 2.7 0.9 -0.4 1.5 1.0 -0.7 0.5 -0.7 0.1 2.1 0.8 0.6 -0.3 1.0 0.5 0.8 1.5 0.9 1.9 1.2 0.2 -2.0 -1.1 1.1 0.1

[skifreak]

Been out for a walk along the River Ness for some fresh air, didn't expect the nip in the air - 1c out at the airport at Dalcross!

[mistyqueen]

Well, after yesterday morning's nippy start, we now appear to be be back to normal. It's a bit cloudy here, temp currently 16c. Now that's a bit warm even for here. However, I fear not the winter! I have just taken delivery of my heating oil and the price this year was 10p cheaper than last year...whoop, whoop! I got 10 bags of coal last month and we've got 15 tons of wood in the garden for sawing and chopping. Winter? Bring it on!!!

[NorthernRab]

Been out for a walk along the River Ness for some fresh air, didn't expect the nip in the air - 1c out at the airport at Dalcross!

Lower than that in here man, a proper frost starting when I went to bed. Weather station reported -2.6'C between 11PM - 1AM but up to 6'C by early morning. Hint of a Highland winter on its way, can't wait for the deep frosts and fog!

[NUT]

Golly that sun feels warm today! Think the mild air well and truly set in

[Hawesy]

Golly that sun feels warm today! Think the mild air well and truly set in

 

Certainly has, 17c here in St Andrews at 1pm. Lovely day!

[Ross Andrew Hemphill]

Midges are out in force once again, hopefully this is the last mild spell of the season, hate the wee things!!

[Northernlights]

17c here too today with sunny periods Cattle lying out in the sun very summer like. Very busy calving cows  with another ceasarian a legacy of grass growth in the summer making cows a bit on the fat side and big calves inside them. Trees nearly all cut to south of farm huge change in the view and shaded areas in the neighbouring fields drying up in the warm sunshine.