Scotland/Alba weather discussion - Jan 2021 onwards

[edo]

Thanks @MAXcrazystormcan concentrate on the weekend and maybe window watching rather than radar watching... Make it old school. 

[Puffy MacCloud]

4 minutes ago, Sceptical said:

Make sure your snow chains are properly fitted. Years ago, I had the pleasure of watching a guy wreck the rear of his Range Rover after the drivers rear chain broke lose.

Eventually I started flashing my lights and gestured for him to pull over. Suffice to say he was fuming and blamed his wife as she had fitted them

I'll not be letting any female anywhere near my chains.

 

 

Well, then again..

[Puffy MacCloud]

Temperatures over the next few days look encouraging. Precipitation not so much.

 

[Hairy Celt]

Yay the snow's reached here. Oh no it hasn't, it's rain. Look on the bright side, I tell myself. At least there's ppn reaching the ground now. We'll see, wet baws and dewpoints and temps are all forecast to remain positive till Sunday.

[Duncan McAlister]

4 minutes ago, Puffy MacCloud said:

Temperatures over the next few days look encouraging. Precipitation not so much.

 

It’s strange the BBC week ahead forecast last night had oodles of snow reaching Ayrshire Sunday into Monday (and it certainly would be snow by then with those uppers) but their own app and the rest of the apps, not a flake

[Puffy MacCloud]

The BBC app is showing temps at 4 to 6deg.C over the same timeframe, which is patent nonsense.

[asjmcguire]

1 minute ago, Puffy MacCloud said:

The BBC app is showing temps at 4 to 6deg.C over the same timeframe, which is patent nonsense.

Over the last 7 days, the BBC forecasts have taught some of us.... not to pay any attention to them. Especially the video forecasts - according to the video forecasts, the Borders should have had lots of heavy snow - pretty much everyday.

[Stormeh]

3 minutes ago, Duncan McAlister said:

It’s strange the BBC week ahead forecast last night had oodles of snow reaching Ayrshire Sunday into Monday (and it certainly would be snow by then with those uppers) but their own app and the rest of the apps, not a flake

Let the cold Easterly winds arrive before worrying about if it will snow or not. Anything is possible in this upcoming setup. It will come down to nowcasting which makes me excited  

[Sceptical]

A messy mixture of sleet and snow, unsurprising given the current temperature of 1.5C. 

Said messy mixture is getting increasingly heavy!

[grifter]

I remember 2010/11 was more cold than snow, especially in Inverclyde. 2018 was a stonker!

[drm]

56 minutes ago, Ravelin said:

Temp creeping up here too but still only 0.6/0.2C, but even here the snow is definitely a bit wetter than earlier. The road past the house was easily turning white during showers earlier but is staying black at the moment. MetoO has the temp dropping a degree in the next hour or two, which combined with heavier snow, maybe? , might make the difference. I must say though that as the Amber warning time approaches the snow seems to be easing off, lol.

Agreed re the warnings this period today and tomorrow was always about the uppers being at their most marginal before they descend steadily on Saturday with the 528 dam line heading south across the border,Sunday I'd say it's snow at all levels with the North sea snow machine really starting to get going ,they err on the caution with the warnings which I think is reasonable,roll on the weekend so we can see nice low dew points arrive and the snow become the lovely powder variety we rarely see on the coast.im not jealous of those well inland and at elevation I swear  2.8c T,1.1c dp

Edited February 4, 2021 by drm

[edo]

Blowing a hoolie now 2 c and painful icy rain bouncing off my face as walk to the car. 

[LomondSnowstorm]

2 hours ago, edo said:

@Mr Frostthat third picture is incredible, i was in Dunoon last year and was in Gourock....hard to imagine it like that 

@Kirkcaldy Weatherpromises Thundersnow we will take that.....good stuff mate

is there any danger at all i will wake up to any snow tomorrow, im thinking not but from a work perspective i need to make an accurate call  

I think very unlikely in Perth at low levels sadly, the boundary will be fairly nearby but the dewpoints are, not what you'd want, to say the least:

South of the Tay and away from 250m+ I think the focus really has to shift to Friday evening at the earliest when the cold uppers start to come back down, and probably also to just hoping the rain or sleet stops for a bit because the flooding situation could become pretty bad.

[Mr Frost]

Ski resorts would be mobbed in normal times - just reading this on BBC news today.

One of my favourite pictures every Winter - Cairngorm summit weather station below. 

Covid in Scotland: Closed ski resorts have 'best snow in years'

Covid in Scotland: Closed ski resorts have 'best snow in years'

WWW.BBC.CO.UK

---

Despite the most magnificent conditions in 11 years, the slopes remain closed because of lockdown.

Just thinking back to the beginning of last March (all ski centres closed on the 23rd of that month of course) - Glencoe Mountain had amazing conditions that continued through the Spring season - as did most ski centres.

'Four metres' of snow in three weeks at ski centre

WWW.GOOGLE.CO.UK

---

Operators of Glencoe Mountain say lifts and huts have been partially buried.

Hopefully we are back to normality for Winter 2021/22.

[asjmcguire]

1 minute ago, Mr Frost said:

Hopefully we are back to normality for Winter 2021/22

And then, it will be 12C and dry....

[Ravelin]

32 minutes ago, Sceptical said:

A messy mixture of sleet and snow, unsurprising given the current temperature of 1.5C. 

Said messy mixture is getting increasingly heavy!

Up here at 200m+ it's definitely all snow and with the wind getting up it's pretty wild. Temp is slowly creeping back down again, currently 0.3/0/0C but lying snow probably a bit too heavy to be drifting. Falling snow is arriving at a 45deg angle at times though so will start piling up unevenly. No intention of any of us going anywhere so the driveway is being left until tomorrow at the earliest.

Edited February 4, 2021 by Ravelin
Always notice typos once I've hit the post button

[Ravelin]

12 minutes ago, Mr Frost said:

Ski resorts would be mobbed in normal times - just reading this on BBC news today.

One of my favourite pictures every Winter - Cairngorm summit weather station below. 

Covid in Scotland: Closed ski resorts have 'best snow in years'

If I'd known that winter was going to be like this, and that skiing at a center was not going to happen at all, I'd have seriously considered investing in a set of XC or Touring skis. I could have skied just about every day within 5mins of my house for the last 6 weeks. 

Edit: In fact, with the amount of snow lying up the hill from me I could probably safely say I could be skiing up there for the NEXT 6 weeks. It's going to take a long time to thaw, even when it does warm up.

Edited February 4, 2021 by Ravelin

[Sceptical]

7 minutes ago, Ravelin said:

Up her at 200m+ it's definitely all snow and with the wind getting up it's pretty wild. Temp is slowly creeping back down again, currently 0.3/0/0C but lying snow probably a bit too heavy to be drifting. Falling snow is arriving at a 45deg angle at times though so will start piling up unevenly. No intention of any of us going anywhere so the driveway is being left until tomorrow at the earliest.

Hopefully once darkness takes hold the temperatures drop up this end of the valley. A degree or so lower and it could be game on here. 

Visibility has been decreasing for the last hour or so, can barely make out Cairn William.

 

 

Edited February 4, 2021 by Sceptical

[101_North]

Hard to imagine an incoming cold spell as I'm looking out the window at the snow slowly retreating up the hill. Was at 200m this morning but now probably 250m. A hideous, damp day but thankfully, so far at least, we're avoiding the really heavy rain. 

[CameronWS]

37 minutes ago, grifter said:

I remember 2010/11 was more cold than snow, especially in Inverclyde. 2018 was a stonker!

Out of interest which one of those events does this set up look more similar to?

[Kirkcaldy Weather]

3 minutes ago, 101_North said:

Hard to imagine an incoming cold spell as I'm looking out the window at the snow slowly retreating up the hill. Was at 200m this morning but now probably 250m. A hideous, damp day but thankfully, so far at least, we're avoiding the really heavy rain. 

At least you can see out your window, mines is covered in raindrops thanks to the gusty winds

[Ruzzi]

MetO committing now to snow showers feeding through the central belt, Saturday to Monday.... Likely the case for Tueaday aswell. 

No mention now of the showers being light either 

 

[LomondSnowstorm]

Just now, CameronWS said:

Out of interest which one of those events does this set up look more similar to?

Difficult to say really - 2018 was more of a 'pure' easterly than November 2010, similar to this one it started more southeasterly:

 

The upper air temperatures for that one though were on another planet from really anything we'd seen since January 1987, just a crazy depth of cold:

2010 didn't have anything like the same depth of cold as far as upper air temperatures go, but was more directly Arctic sourced than 2018, and had a slightly more northerly tilt generally to the flow:

 

I kind of thing this one is somewhat in its own category - the blocking isn't really anything like as strong (albeit probably more extensive over the Arctic), the uppers are sort of in between the two in terms of depth but maybe closer to 2010 and it's being sustained more by a weak and very southerly tracking jet rather than just a big yellow Greenland high:

Certainly on the east coast I don't remember either being especially dry, hugely snowy but if anything a little disappointing because of how the breakdowns went without a nice anticyclonic period to finish. 2009/10 was more of a drawn out period with a few big snowfalls but also mostly sunny crisp days to enjoy the snow.

Not that I was around at the time but this setup looks far more like something out of the late 70s, like this for example:

 

[JoeShmoe]

Either would do here tbh! Dec10 we had 40cms !  (Pic is poor sorry it was probably an iPhone 4!)

[Eastern Scotland WX]

Latest ICON is the perfect Run for all of us.