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UK "Snow Streamer" events.


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Posted
  • Location: Windermere 120m asl
  • Location: Windermere 120m asl

We're not best places for 'streamer events' due to local topography and shelter, however, we do sometimes see such features from the Irish Sea under very unstable cold NW airflows. 20/21 Dec 2009 being a great example, thundery outbreaks from shower activity over Morecambe Bay, by the morning of 22nd there was level 10 inches. A rare set up.

 

If Lake Windermere was a few miles in width we might create a less extreme version of the Great Lakes snowfall effect, alas its a mile wide only!

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Posted
  • Location: Dundee
  • Weather Preferences: Snow, thunderstorms, gales. All extremes except humidity.
  • Location: Dundee

28th November 2010. A warm North Sea, cold uppers and very unstable air on an East wind gave us almost 12 hours of thundersnow. Further snow and showers gave us a total depth of 45 cms after sublimation at just above sea level by early December.

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The 2005 event was the best I've experienced, affecting parts much further east than usual.  Here in Carmarthenshire we had the deepest snowfall I'd seen since at least 1996, possibly longer (although we've since had more in Feb '07, Jan '10, Dec '10 and Jan '13, so that may just illustrate how poor the 1997 - 2004 period was for snow here).

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/4470188.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/4468222.stm

Some good analysis here: http://www.geologywales.co.uk/storms/autumn05b.htm

 

J10's earlier post also reminded me of the 2001 event which delivered some decent snowfall on Boxing Day for us:

 

Rrea00120011226.gif

 

We also had a dusting on Christmas Day 2004. For Christmas Day snowfall though 1993 was the best I can remember, although looking at the charts I'm not convinced it was a northerly streamer set-up:

Rrea00119931225.gif

 

There was a very large period of time, from the 90s to about 2007, when there were no frontal snow events here at tall, and we depended on streamer events for snowfall, luckily they delivered in spades around that time.

 

Strangely enough since then frontal snow has made more of an impact, perhaps due to some very cold spells, conversely streamer events have diminished in terms of snow they have provided although Dec 10 gave a lot of snow here as mentioned.

 

Notable snow events 9 Feb 99 = about 4 inches of snow. from a snow streamer event, with some snow on both the 8th and 10th Feb.

25 Dec 2001, apart from a bit more snow over the general Christmas period, the New Year was virtually snow free.

 

The other one of note was 26 Feb 04, which gave again about 4 inches, but the sun melted this rapidly, and much of it was gone by late afternoon.

 

Notice the big lack of notable snow events in January which was a common theme to the weather around that time.

Edited by J10
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Posted
  • Location: Matlock Derbyshire
  • Location: Matlock Derbyshire

Rrea00120101201.gif

 

01.12.2010.

 

might not look much but gave 30 to 40cm in my town, topped out at 68cm at bottom of garden, streamers set up in North Sea funnelled down humber estuary and came up against the Southern slopes of Pennies and dumper all that moisture as snow. Went to bed at about 1.00am approx. 8 to 10 cms, and at 7.00am everywhere was over knee deep.

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Posted
  • Location: Broxbourne, Herts
  • Weather Preferences: Snow snow and snow
  • Location: Broxbourne, Herts

What magic days they were...but poor old Paul!!

I remember my wife at the time and kids were in Ireland at the time. And due to come back on the monday, so I'd taken the laptop home with me to work at home as I was due to pick them up. It started snowing around by me at 7pm on the sunday evening. And it just kept on and on. There would have been no getting to work the next day had i been going in, but the kids flight was cancelled so i had no excuse not to work!

The thing I really recall was the forecast.....this kept referring to a possible six inches of snow due to fall FROM 1pm onwards on the monday....by that time we'd already had seven inches!!! So that was something to really look forward to! Only it never quite happened. the Streamer gave us loads that wasn't forecast, the forecast gave us nothing but sleet and cold rain!

Nevertheless a good covering remained. When my kids were finally able to fly back on the thursday, into Luton rather than the nearby Stansted, they were amazed to see the snow that had fallen. It was the most they had ever seen in their young lives....they had seemed to be destined to be the kids who would never see snow due to Global warming!! even so I was a tad disappointed that they weren't seeing it at its peak at around lunchtime on the monday.

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Posted
  • Location: Inbhir Nis / Inverness - 636 ft asl
  • Weather Preferences: Freezing fog, frost, snow, sunshine.
  • Location: Inbhir Nis / Inverness - 636 ft asl

Can someone with a bit more knowledge than me explain what sort of set up we'd need to get something like the Buffalo event in Britain?

A trip, in fact, a permanent change of location to the Scottish Highlands and some patience.

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Posted
  • Location: Cheddington, Buckinghamshire
  • Weather Preferences: Winter: Cold & Snowy, Summer: Just not hot
  • Location: Cheddington, Buckinghamshire

I'd love to live in a location that gets streamers, I never have! In Cannock we'd occasionally get showers feeding through the Cheshire Gap, but it was never a real streamer.

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Posted
  • Location: Surbiton, Surrey (home), Uxbridge, Middx (work)
  • Location: Surbiton, Surrey (home), Uxbridge, Middx (work)

The Feb 2009 Thames Streamer was the best snow event ever for me while living in the London area (also enjoyed the very heavy snow falls of late 70s/early 80s in the west country). The main road off the A3 through to Kingston was completely snow covered, something I've not seen before or since, and everyone was out enjoying the novelty of feeling snowbound, even though a few drivers were braving it. It's hard not to get excited about this year's possibilities reading Cohen's forecast and seeing the state of the stratosphere, but we are always right on the edge it seems to me, and a few millimetres on a forecast prediction can make all the difference for this little dot on the globe.

 

Re: Paul's amazing analysis of the 'lack of snow' on the east coast, I had only recently joined NW at the time and was gobsmacked at the level of analysis and detail in that breakdown of events, I remember being deeply impressed. Looking in the archive, it's funny seeing members who are no longer here (I checked a few) who were regulars back then, and of course some will have changed their names over time.

Edited by Reefseeker
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Posted
  • Location: Lee, London. SE12, 41 mts. 134.5 ft asl.
  • Weather Preferences: Cold, Snowy Weather
  • Location: Lee, London. SE12, 41 mts. 134.5 ft asl.

An example of a decent early season snowfall from a Thames type Streamer, came in the first week of December 1995.

 

TUES 5th DEC 1995

 

The weather turned pretty mild in late November but an abrupt change started to take place in the first few days of December, as an area of high pressure became established over Scandinavia and a bitterly cold easterly flow advanced towards the southern half of the UK. The charts below depict the situation some 12 or so hours before the first snow showers arrived in my location, as an area of --10 uppers moved across the S.North Sea and on into the S.E

 

 

Rrea00119951205.gif

 

Rrea00219951205.gif

 

 

I distinctly remember Philip Eden telling his listeners on the Friday beforehand, on his weather slot on LBC radio, not to be fooled by the benign weather that had seen out November, we were about to experience a wintry shock to the system.

 

On the morning of Tuesday 5th, myself and my partner had to take 2 of our cats to the vet for small ops. They didnt seem too impressed as we made our way outside, with already a real edge to the easterly wind and a hint of snizzle in the air. As we returned home to our area of the Kent/London border around lunchtime, the first lightish snow shower began to fall but a quick observation of the sky, away to the E/N suggested something more substantial was stirring in the Thames Estuary, the clouds taking on that tell-tale solid whitish/grey appearance. Sure enough the next shower was far heavier and spell of prolonged snow showers set in, soon after. By the time we had to collect the cats from the vets in the early evening, 2-3 inches had fallen, with the snow still falling thickly, the cats looked even less impressed than they had in the morning, no doubt a combination of the bitter cold wind and post-op soreness, poor things! The snow petered out soon after we arrived indoors.

 

Two to three inches of snow may not seem much but its a very respectable amount for this area, in the first week of December. The snowfall had caused many problems on the S.E section of the M25, especially on the Kent/Surrey border, near to the Clacket Lane services, where a few hundred drivers were stranded all night, as traffic was at a standstill. Although the snowfall wasnt that heavy, it began to freeze and gritters werent able to get through the gridlocked traffic.

 

Below is the BBC forecast a few days beforehand (3rd/4th Dec), note the change in emphasis on how wintry conditions would become, in Peter Cockcrofts forecast, a day before the event.

Thanks to Kevin (Weather History), for the clip.

 

 

Regards,

Tom

Edited by TomBR7
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Posted
  • Location: Windermere 120m asl
  • Location: Windermere 120m asl

Post above takes me back to the wonderful December of 1995, after a long run of mostly very mild Decembers (1992 and 1993 saw cold in the latter part but nothing too extreme), it was a very refreshing change to experience a proper cold December.

 

Yes it was a major change in conditions, a very mild start quickly turning into a wintry hit on the 5/6th, it stayed mostly on the colder side of average thereafter with plenty of frost, with some snow a few days before Christmas, before a shortlived wet mild spell around 21/22 and then we were forced into the freezer for a week.

 

It has indeed been surpassed by December 2010 temperature wise, and snowwise the second half of Dec 2009, but it still ranks as one of my favourite winter months.

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  • 4 years later...
Posted
  • Location: Kirkcaldy, Fife, Scotland 20m ASL
  • Weather Preferences: Snow,Thunderstorms mix both for heaven THUNDERSNOW 😜😀🤤🥰
  • Location: Kirkcaldy, Fife, Scotland 20m ASL

Here in Kirkcaldy we get the Forth streamer with snow showers starting in the North Sea then moving into the firth of forth before arriving here, the 2 best I have experienced in my lifetime so far (I am 23) were November 2010 and February / March 2018 Beast From The East.

The perfect setup is as straight of an easterly flow as possible and 850 temps usually from -8 and below.

November 2010

Winds were alternating between east and north easterlies on the 27th archives-2010-11-27-0-0.thumb.png.59772d62fe6b4f2429fd04d1a3ff4ac6.png  archives-2010-11-27-12-0.thumb.png.3a5f5d8db4ae254af8904a63fa42a957.png with the first signs of the heavy snow arriving on the Saturday night 


By midday on the 28th the flow was perfect with a straight easterly continuing to feed in non stop bands of heavy snow which were quickly piling up the snowfall amountsarchives-2010-11-28-12-0.thumb.png.48189a9c2f0b4f06219187730456f9ba.png  archives-2010-11-28-12-1.thumb.png.876ab9dd352c3b115cfc73adbfb29827.png the easterly flow persisted even heading into the 30th archives-2010-11-30-0-0.thumb.png.6710958913c927f730e0d5dae491e190.png some more forecasts of the event 

 

 

I was living in a higher part of Kirkcaldy at the time and by the end of the event there was over a foot of snow. Some other youtube videos from Kirkcaldy of this event 

February / March 2018

27th February 2018 saw the easterly begin to arrive up here with a bitter cold pool accompanying it   archives-2018-2-27-12-0.thumb.png.073e82234a2689a8bae53b1ec9263a13.png archives-2018-2-27-12-1.thumb.png.97223a1b99467e5065f407abb95c5169.png  through the night into the 28th the easterly strengthened  1334920792_archives-2018-2-28-0-0(1).thumb.png.01432f25de2c2f78f23ad80a195732a6.png with the gale force easterly winds blizzard conditions set in with the non stop snow showers and also plenty of thundersnow archives-2018-2-28-12-0.thumb.png.67f5d8790db48fa0ed10350086ce74f3.png archives-2018-2-28-12-1.thumb.png.516cf6410dacfb15d17bbe5da0796a6c.png archives-2018-3-1-0-0.thumb.png.91843009116d6e6a9bd27a8556a86412.png archives-2018-3-1-0-1.thumb.png.c67d07995292c4ed90995fbf037fdc83.png archives-2018-3-1-12-0.thumb.png.74ff8f188634a4c9379f4e05cc483366.png archives-2018-3-1-12-1.thumb.png.23d8f6b87a062e7c79a1b96d92459435.png archives-2018-3-2-0-0.thumb.png.496ef2fb371b2bdada8c5cdfb304e19a.png archives-2018-3-2-0-1.thumb.png.af6e9ef21642f730dff310bec25dda1d.png archives-2018-3-3-0-0.thumb.png.2b5c35df93d8408a04a42b06bc972026.png  archives-2018-3-3-0-1.thumb.png.c52ef65192174430f8a8773e786fc834.png even here at 20m ASL by the end of the event again I had a foot of snow which is quite an achievement at that altitude, also was in the center of a RED snow warning from the met office 

      

 

 

 

my pictures from the event

DSC_0018.thumb.JPG.6acd8630161fe6f3269a96c908f1dd2c.JPGDSC_0025.thumb.JPG.fe4b0270b6bbb1711b5de8d29c01898e.JPGDSC_0026.thumb.JPG.19d4b377e8dd9a4d270d4e48f2b95d74.JPGDSC_0036.thumb.JPG.3d03a14476e780fe197fbf53f7a38059.JPGDSC_0037.thumb.JPG.87223ca240835daf6eece342a2906a47.JPGDSC_0039.thumb.JPG.27f1a5b800ea15641c10a467a5b85ae4.JPGDSC_0040.thumb.JPG.a80d1611ce87aa0bfbb1055a9da85b86.JPGDSC_0041.thumb.JPG.11cb6fa09270cc8ed78e853118ed6371.JPGDSC_0043.thumb.JPG.ddb83dbf960e2e404d022396afe53234.JPGDSC_0045.thumb.JPG.2902ec90fef8b6cc5f78f803f73d2cc8.JPGDSC_0046.thumb.JPG.0f5394a790ec542b8c815d3f06c4fefc.JPGDSC_0050.thumb.JPG.8be8c6327c945dd5295e982366b50ec0.JPG

 

On 21/11/2014 at 01:03, LomondSnowstorm said:

archives-2010-12-6-12-0.png

A very interesting event where a trough developed along the (almost unforecast) west-to east 'kink' in the flow almost perfectly aligned topographically for central Scotland, bringing over a foot to the M 8 and leading to the sacking of our transport minister for failing to consult the forum instead of relying on the MO ice/1-2cm of snow yellow warning issued the night before (upgraded to orange once the snow was already on the ground) :rofl:

Another event that I remember vividly and one which delivered another few inches on top of what we had already got at that point in December 2010 and as stated the transport minister lost his job due to the chaos on the M8 https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/scotland/8189583/Scotlands-Transport-Minister-urged-to-resign-over-snow-chaos.html

https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2010/dec/11/scottish-transport-minister-stewart-stevenson-resigns-snow

https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2010/dec/08/transport-secretary-scotland-perfect-storm

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-11924616

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/weather/8188603/Scotland-calls-in-the-Army-to-clear-snow-and-ice.html

archives-2010-12-6-12-0.thumb.png.5d066a86f8b7296a1c56103bdc3de01e.png

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On 20/11/2014 at 22:05, J10 said:

 

Many of those events delivered snow here, on the evening of 25 Dec 2004, we had snow showers, but only gave around 1 inch and it turned slushy by Boxing Day morning, however this is not as good as a similar event on 25 Dec 01 which gave several inches of snow, and stuck around for a few days.

25 Nov 2005 gave around 4 inches of snow and this stuck around for a number of days.

17 Dec 2010 was a fairly rare beast, not only a snow streamer which gave about 4-5 inches of snow, the cold at that time, meant that is stuck for around 10-11 days.

Late December 09 doesn't ring any bells but I'll check my records

After such a good start to the century in terms of NNW winds giving snow streamers, things have gone very quiet on that front for a number of years.

The recent years continue to be weak for meaningful snow streamer events.

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Posted
  • Location: Wildwood, Stafford 104m asl
  • Weather Preferences: obviously snow!
  • Location: Wildwood, Stafford 104m asl
On 22/11/2014 at 03:10, Nick L said:

I'd love to live in a location that gets streamers, I never have! In Cannock we'd occasionally get showers feeding through the Cheshire Gap, but it was never a real streamer.

Aye agree, crappy location really, tends to be too far east, Telford/Shrewsbury is well placed, as we saw on 8th Dec 2017

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Posted
  • Location: Scouthead Oldham 295mASL
  • Location: Scouthead Oldham 295mASL
19 minutes ago, I remember Atlantic 252 said:

Aye agree, crappy location really, tends to be too far east, Telford/Shrewsbury is well placed, as we saw on 8th Dec 2017

Its funny how even small changes geographically can have big effects - north westerly usually rubbish here in recent years, need a WNW or easterly for my location.Unfortunately the warmer Irish sea now means uppers as a rule of thumb need to be -9/-10 here even at 200m! easterly no such issues.

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Posted
  • Location: howth,east dublin city
  • Weather Preferences: extremes
  • Location: howth,east dublin city

I live in Whitehall an area elevated just north of Dublin in the suburbs  and in late November 2010 we had a streamer which brought  thunder snow in very light nne wind conditions but my God the flakes where huge and between 10pm and 1am I measured 20centimeters and have never seen the likes of it since. 18th to 23rd dec 2010 produced similar amounts and the beast from the east brought more snow but they were grains not the big fluffy flakes everybody loves. 

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Posted
  • Location: Windermere 120m asl
  • Location: Windermere 120m asl
On 21/11/2014 at 21:16, Jackfrost said:

December 17th 2010 was a classic streamer in these parts. It was very localised with a band of very narrow, very intense snow stretched across Wales from NW to SE. Fortunately I was under it for the duration and it deposited 12-15 inches eventually.

 

Pictures here.

 

https://forum.netweather.tv/gallery/image/13037-picture-11467jpg/

 

December 21st 2009 was quite an unusual event in that it saw a continuous stream of showers moving into South Wales from the Bristol Channel; very localised but that deposited five inches or so in these parts. 

Just seen this thread resurrected - yes I am also going to reference 20 or 21 Dec 2009 it was the Monday, quite unusual event here, with a very similiar set up, a convective SW flow from off Morecambe Bay produced a good 4-5 inches of snow here, I think it was the position of the low pressure to our NW which allowed it to happen, there was no trough or frontal feature. Not a normal synoptic, but shows we can have our own streamer from off Morecambe Bay. Generally most of our snow comes in the form of frontal or trough features, or showers from the west or more commonly NW, occasionally NE, and east, very rarely from the N or points between west and east (south points).

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Posted
  • Location: Cleeve, North Somerset
  • Weather Preferences: Continental winters & summers.
  • Location: Cleeve, North Somerset

21st Dec 2009, 17th Dec 2010 and 14th Jan 2015 (more marginal) are the most recent snow streamer examples here.

2009, although a more unusual synoptic, was a typical WNW off the Severn with embedded cold air that readily brought a line of snow showers through the night (actually starting late on the 20th).

2010 was more of a NW angle and a narrower band that started over South Wales but gave a heavier covering.

2015 was purely a polar maritime westerly (common in that winter) and a typical Severn streamer often seen with rain and hail showers brought snow in the early hours.

Christmas 2004 also saw a similar steamer to 2010 further west but we only had a few snow showers here.

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Posted
  • Location: Dundee
  • Weather Preferences: Snow, thunderstorms, gales. All extremes except humidity.
  • Location: Dundee

Living just a tad North of Kirkcaldy snow I can confirm the two events that he quoted. Being somewhat older I could add two more that lasted for more than a day or so for East Central Scotland. Those were in February 1978 and January 1987 when Easterlies lined up perfectly to give  prolonged streamers in the Tay estuary. There was also a briefer streamer event in late December 2009.

Edited by Norrance
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Posted
  • Location: Coniston, Cumbria 90m ASL
  • Weather Preferences: wintry
  • Location: Coniston, Cumbria 90m ASL
2 hours ago, damianslaw said:

Just seen this thread resurrected - yes I am also going to reference 20 or 21 Dec 2009 it was the Monday, quite unusual event here, with a very similiar set up, a convective SW flow from off Morecambe Bay produced a good 4-5 inches of snow here, I think it was the position of the low pressure to our NW which allowed it to happen, there was no trough or frontal feature. Not a normal synoptic, but shows we can have our own streamer from off Morecambe Bay. Generally most of our snow comes in the form of frontal or trough features, or showers from the west or more commonly NW, occasionally NE, and east, very rarely from the N or points between west and east (south points).

I well remember the snow on the night of the 21st Dec 2009. We had a serious incident involving a casualty with very severe hypothermia, it was snowing like Billyoh! I was driving a Defender with a full set of chains and was glad of them!

Massive flakes too. Exactly one year later we had the Coniston Earthquake!

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