Winter 2021-22 Chat, Moans and ramps thread

[Frigid]

5 minutes ago, I remember Atlantic 252 said:

Unlike folk born after 1998, they don't know what a real winter is

Yeah, December 2010 and Winter 09/10 I can remember vividly, but other than that its been extremely lackluster in terms of cold and snow. Might have to go to America as it seems like they have a brutal cold winter every other year. 

[Wold Topper]

In the eighty's and up to the mid nineties we used to get what i would call proper Wolds weather in Winter, snowed in for a day or two, mostly by drifting snow, not so much in recent times, 2010 the exception, 

[Floatylight]

1 hour ago, I remember Atlantic 252 said:

March and April snowiest months! unlikely to settle long though at low levels

Exactly .

If it isn't sticking or melting I don't class it as snowiest.

Thats why I said feb.

Nobody is interested in melting snow

[weathercold]

Roll on Spring! You have to laugh at the models we’ve been seeing - a real sucker after so much early promise.

Looking back over the last few weeks it does really feel as though we’ve had all the key ingredients on our side (how rare is that) but sadly the dice just hasn’t landed for us

It’s hard to take for sure but a lesson learned this winter that sometimes however promising the signals look unless it’s snowing outside it’s all fairytale algorithms that in reality mean very little on the ground.

Time to look forward to some spring warmth soon, can’t come quick enough.

All the best 

[richie3846]

2 hours ago, Frigid said:

Yeah, December 2010 and Winter 09/10 I can remember vividly, but other than that its been extremely lackluster in terms of cold and snow. Might have to go to America as it seems like they have a brutal cold winter every other year. 

We had a localised event in February 2019. It was phenomenal, both in the snow depths and also the ultra local nature, a band no more than about 20 miles across kept the snow coming for around 27h without a break. Shame it wasn't more widespread because lacklustre it wasn't. The pics are from Lydiard park in Swindon.

[Sunny76]

2 hours ago, Frigid said:

Yeah, December 2010 and Winter 09/10 I can remember vividly, but other than that its been extremely lackluster in terms of cold and snow. Might have to go to America as it seems like they have a brutal cold winter every other year. 

Too far to travel just to enjoy snow.

Latvia is a fair bet. Only 2 hours east.

[North-Easterly Blast]

55 minutes ago, weathercold said:

Roll on Spring! You have to laugh at the models we’ve been seeing - a real sucker after so much early promise.

Looking back over the last few weeks it does really feel as though we’ve had all the key ingredients on our side (how rare is that) but sadly the dice just hasn’t landed for us

It’s hard to take for sure but a lesson learned this winter that sometimes however promising the signals look unless it’s snowing outside it’s all fairytale algorithms that in reality mean very little on the ground.

Time to look forward to some spring warmth soon, can’t come quick enough.

All the best 

Yes we have had a fair amount of blocking for most of the winter so far, but it has just completely failed to set up favourably to bring a significant cold spell to the UK.  This January HP spell has just been complete nothingness (just as though the UK's weather has gone on holiday), never building to a place where any truly cold air can reach the UK, no inversion cold days, little if any fog for most places either, just nothing at all.  The only worse pattern than the HP pattern of this month that in my view I can think of is something like 2013-14, and to a lesser extent 2019-20, nothing but raining all the time.  At least this month's HP pattern has not been as bad as the pattern of those two recent winters, but that is about all it is an improvement upon some recent winters.

[MP-R]

27 minutes ago, richie3846 said:

We had a localised event in February 2019. It was phenomenal, both in the snow depths and also the ultra local nature, a band no more than about 20 miles across kept the snow coming for around 27h without a break. Shame it wasn't more widespread because lacklustre it wasn't. The pics are from Lydiard park in Swindon.

This was a great event for those fortunate enough to live SOUTH of the M4 for once. This plus the record warmth made Feb 2019 a very interesting month here.

[sukayuonsensnow]

9 minutes ago, MP-R said:

This was a great event for those fortunate enough to live SOUTH of the M4 for once. This plus the record warmth made Feb 2019 a very interesting month here.

The crazy part about it is that it wasn't forecast very well. The forecasters a day or two prior were saying 1-3cm in total from this snow event.

I was at work and it was rain/sleet, but as the afternoon continued it turned to heavy thick snow and stayed that way until well into the night. Caught people by surprise. Had to close work early as customers/colleagues had to travel home by car and the roads weren't gritted ready for this surprise. At the same time if you were south of the A31 or north of the M4 barely anything from this (the heavier snow spell on the 1st I mean). It was literally from around the southern Cotswolds, Bristol/Bath and some northern parts of Somerset, Wiltshire, northern Hampshire/southern Berkshire, and the very NW of Surrey.

It reminded me of the 21st December 2009 snowfall (although that was quite slushy snow), which was also poorly forecast.

Parts of the Midlands (around Derbyshire) had a similar snowfall on the 24th January last year, although I think the heaviest snow was much more localised than the 1st February 2019 snow was.

Snowfalls can still happen but in recent years are much more localised rather than a widespread general area of the UK (regardless of altitude). Last February's cold spell another example (in part due to the Beast from the East being just offshore on the east coast due to the low being over the Low Countries/Germany rather than it being in France). Some very localised spots on the east coast had a good amount of snow, however a few miles down the road barely anything.

Certain parts of the UK are always going to struggle to see much snow due to various factors such as altitude and geography. For example some areas near the Bristol Channel around NW Somerset/N Devon and the northern coast of the SW UK are always going to struggle to see snow. Snow showers from the east will lose their strength once they hit Salisbury Plain/Cotswolds during an E cold spell. Snow showers from the north or northwest will lose their strength over the Welsh Mountains. Westerly winds are milder so more likely rain will fall out of the sky. The best chance here is a slider/channel low bringing snow north enough and in the right area. Isles of Scilly are also another area, due to being in the far SW and being less exposed to cold northerly or easterly winds than most of the UK. That said in some cold northerly spells (more likely with a Greenland High) a Pembrokeshire dangler can develop and bring snow showers to the far SW tip of Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly. In an easterly some southern parts of the SW corner of UK can be hit by snow showers from the English Channel that arrived after being pushed initially southwestwards from the SE of UK, then the winds change to E or ESE pushing them into Cornwall. 

[MP-R]

4 minutes ago, sukayuonsensnow said:

The crazy part about it is that it wasn't forecast very well. The forecasters a day or two prior were saying 1-3cm in total from this snow event.

I was at work and it was rain/sleet, but as the afternoon continued it turned to heavy thick snow and stayed that way until well into the night. Caught people by surprise. Had to close work early as customers/colleagues had to travel home by car and the roads weren't gritted ready for this surprise. At the same time if you were south of the A31 or north of the M4 barely anything from this (the heavier snow spell on the 1st I mean). It was literally from around the southern Cotswolds, Bristol/Bath and some northern parts of Somerset, Wiltshire, northern Hampshire/southern Berkshire, and the very NW of Surrey.

It reminded me of the 21st December 2009 snowfall (although that was quite slushy snow), which was also poorly forecast.

Parts of the Midlands (around Derbyshire) had a similar snowfall on the 24th January last year, although I think the heaviest snow was much more localised than the 1st February 2019 snow was.

Snowfalls can still happen but in recent years are much more localised rather than a widespread general area of the UK (regardless of altitude). Last February's cold spell another example (in part due to the Beast from the East being just offshore on the east coast due to the low being over the Low Countries/Germany rather than it being in France). Some very localised spots on the east coast had a good amount of snow, however a few miles down the road barely anything.

Certain parts of the UK are always going to struggle to see much snow due to various factors such as altitude and geography. For example some areas near the Bristol Channel around NW Somerset/N Devon and the northern coast of the SW UK are always going to struggle to see snow. Snow showers from the east will lose their strength once they hit Salisbury Plain/Cotswolds during an E cold spell. Snow showers from the north or northwest will lose their strength over the Welsh Mountains. Westerly winds are milder so more likely rain will fall out of the sky. The best chance here is a slider/channel low bringing snow north enough and in the right area. Isles of Scilly are also another area, due to being in the far SW and being less exposed to cold northerly or easterly winds than most of the UK. That said in some cold northerly spells (more likely with a Greenland High) a Pembrokeshire dangler can develop and bring snow showers to the far SW tip of Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly. In an easterly some southern parts of the SW corner of UK can be hit by snow showers from the English Channel that arrived after being pushed initially southwestwards from the SE of UK, then the winds change to E or ESE pushing them into Cornwall. 

Ah see here we were expecting a bit more than that, so roads had been prepared accordingly. It was pretty well forecast here until about late morning on the Friday, then the snow just kept falling after that for a good few hours, when we'd expected it to move on.

I'd love to say there was any consistency in snow events here but each one is literally unique. It's not like Kent which either gets buried in easterlies or gets sod all from anything else. Sliders and fronts coming in from the southwest into cold air tend to bring the heaviest snowfalls, as do Channel Lows but they're a rare beast these days. Where I am in North Somerset has less of a marginality issue to say low lying Devon or much of Cornwall or the Somerset Levels. Easterlies can deliver but 9/10 easterlies are useless affairs anyway, so it takes a trough within the flow to bring anything meaningful. Northeasterlies are much better in that respect, as are straight northerlies if there are showers on them. Northwesterlies are hit and miss, but whenever we have a northerly that veers NW/WNW over the Severn Estuary, we can quite often get streamers of wintry showers that give locally deep totals... funnily enough 21st December 2009 did just that - this is rare in December, and normally takes until January to remove the marginality. Unusually, the snowfall on 24th January last year came from a front crossing west-east with cold air throughout. That doesn't happen very often.

Fortunately there's plenty of higher ground around to go to. If there's only a few cm here, it's easy enough to head to the Mendips where there might be 10cm+. Just a shame we weren't supposed to go anywhere last January or I'd have travelled further into Wales for example to get the proper snow fix.

[Weather Enthusiast91]

On 23/01/2022 at 09:46, Nick L said:

Much of the last 12 months have been dreadful for weather here. Negligible snow, struggling to get frosts until the last week, occasional rumbles, strong winds absent. Even by the UK's low standards it's been poor.

Whilst there has been the odd blip here and there, the weather has been on the most part benign over the last 6 months or so for my neck of the woods and no doubt most other parts of the UK too. Even proper frontal rainy days have been very few and far between. The only noteworthy event for me during that period is storm Arwen at the end of November.

We had the most tedious autumn during my lifetime and winter is turning out to be so-so. Whilst the recent cold frosty blue sky days have been lovely, it still isn't enough to save winter unless the rest of January and February turns out decent enough.

Edited January 24, 2022 by Weather Enthusiast91

[Weather-history]

11 hours ago, I remember Atlantic 252 said:

March and April snowiest months! unlikely to settle long though at low levels

April snow is actually has been pretty rare since post 2001

Snowless Aprils here

2002, 2004, 2005, 2007, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2017, 2019, 2020

 

[joggs]

Well,I know there's still 5 weeks or so of proper winter but with what the model's are showing and no signs of a SSW I'm throwing in the towel on this mainly snowless winter.

Background signals were good but just goes to show how hard it is for our tiny island to enjoy some decent winter weather.

Saying that,I have enjoyed the dryness of the last few weeks tbh.

[North-Easterly Blast]

It has also been a virtually fogless winter for most places.  This high pressure has failed to deliver any widespread fog, like many anticyclones would have done years ago.  It has just been the whole pattern that has failed to come together to deliver any significant cold, and there has not, and looks unlikely out to the end of January, that there has not been a cold spell to speak of, despite high pressure around much of the time, and many areas have seen no fog, and snowfall has been limited to the few areas that caught some in the short lived northerly early this month, and some places that had some in late November before winter started.  

Last year's warm September has destroyed cold prospects for this winter, and this winter was already dead in the water last September after its anomalous warmth, and the warm September = poor winter theory has just followed suit again.

[North-Easterly Blast]

Yes you are right.  I think in the last two decades, Aprils 2008, 2012, 2016, 2018 and 2021 saw snow fall over some part of the country or another at some point in the month.

Edited January 24, 2022 by North-Easterly Blast

[TwisterGirl81]

I'm sorry but by March/April i'd rather an early start to spring, hopefully we'll have a beautiful summer this year 

[mathematician]

1 hour ago, joggs said:

Well,I know there's still 5 weeks or so of proper winter but with what the model's are showing and no signs of a SSW I'm throwing in the towel on this mainly snowless winter.

Let's face it, it's over. What a vile winter

[Empire Of Snow]

5 minutes ago, TwisterGirl81 said:

I'm sorry but by March/April i'd rather an early start to spring, hopefully we'll have a beautiful summer this year 

I'm now 10yrs in UK and all summers have been great. I don't get the complaints about summer here and this comes from someone that lived 2/3 of his life in Greece. I certainly don't want UK summers of long 30c+ periods. Even 25c it's unbearable for me over here especially when you have to work and A/C is a rare thing compared to countries like Greece. 

I'd say that summer climate in UK is a joy but maybe it's just me feeling this way. 

Oh, east Greece is getting battered again right now with snowstorms. This is what I mainly miss and not hot summers. 

[SqueakheartLW]

16 hours ago, Penrith Snow said:

No it hasn't always been thus, until 1988 UK winters often had spells of cold and snow now these spells are rare.

14 hours ago, I remember Atlantic 252 said:

Unlike folk born after 1998, they don't know what a real winter is

14 hours ago, Frigid said:

Yeah, December 2010 and Winter 09/10 I can remember vividly, but other than that its been extremely lackluster in terms of cold and snow. Might have to go to America as it seems like they have a brutal cold winter every other year. 

If you look back though the decades you should notice how in general the blocked and colder winters are grouped up into blocks.

These tend to be occasionally in the descending odd solar cycle phases, definitely around the odd to even minimum and even more so in the ascending even cycle phases up to around solar maximum even.

We are in the milder phase at present that runs from descending even through to solar max of odd so our most recent solar minimum period was never going to come together properly to deliver us any significant cold. Maybe because the sun's magnetic field reverses at each maximum there's something about the even to odd phase that clashes with the earth's magnetic field whilst in the odd to even phase they are in harmony.

Best to bank the winters from around 2028/29 through to around 2032/33, they are in the expected late descending odd through to around mid ascending even. Wouldn't be surprised if a few of those came together.

Think we saw teasers of what was coming before the 2008/09 to 2012/13 spell.

• 2005/06 - I think 2005/06 was a very early teaser winter of what was in store for solar minimum even to odd and the period just following it. Even though 2005/06 didn't deliver the cold winter it could have done it was more the pattern laying the foundations of what was going to happen a few years later
• 2006/07 - This winter broke the pattern and I think the weak El Nino was what scuppered this one as for some strange reason weak El Nino winters manage to fail to deliver cold but late January and early February 2007 did revert back to teaser mode temporarily.
• 2007/08 - This winter was another that was ruined, this time by the strong CP La Nina that formed and it drove the pattern. Having said that once the La Nina weakened somewhat we saw what happened around Easter 2008 and also early April 2008 too, maybe yet more teasers as to what was to come.
• 2008/09 - The first proper teaser winter and the solar minimum odd to even winter too. Finally a teaser winter that actually delivered cold even though the winter did end early in mid February.
• 2009/10 - The actual proper cold winter. This was the winter that all of the previous teasers had been hinting at and finally we got one that delivered actual cold and a good amount of snow too but even I didn't foresee that this winter was also even a teaser for what was going to happen the following winter.
• 2010/11 - That December, long in the memory it will stay and after 2009/10 this was a nice treat. Shame it ended so early in the January really. A winter that had potential to go on much longer than it did.
• 2011/12 - A disappointment after the couple that had just gone although we still managed some very cold weather in early February though.
• 2012/13 - The last of the colder winters in the block. We were basically around solar maximum even cycle by this stage so was always likely to be the last chance of any cold for some time. I think this winter was more SSW driven cold than anything else and without that SSW it could have ended up mild.

2013/14 through to 2019/20

As expected generally mild period as we entered descending even cycle down to the mild solar minimum even to odd. 2020/21 seemed to break that trend although this could have also been SSW driven too.

2021/22

Still in the milder part of the solar cycle phase so with no SSW I'm not entirely surprised this winter isn't delivering so far but with EP La Nina there is a chance in February and March to potentially get cold. There are exceptions as not all EP La Nina winters are cold. Likewise not all CP La Nina winters are mild either, 2008/09 is a good example of this.

[Azazel]

This has been a fantastic winter in these parts for my personal preferences.

 

It hasn't been TOO cold. There have been quite a few bright and sunny days. It's been DRY so walking the dog etc hasn't been a nightmarish swampy mud bath.

Long may it continue and lets hope for an early warm spring.

[Snowy L]

Can guarantee Greenland will be a magnet to the high pressure in April so that Spring will be a write off too. Everything conspires to keep us too cold to enjoy the weather but too warm for snow purgatory.

[SussexSnowman]

Had more single digit dry days here. Frosts have abated for the last 5 days, but in general I have enjoyed this weather which has been more seasonal. All I need now is a little dumping of snow and I'll be quite content, though models and forecasts not doing their part. 

[Froze were the Days]

Still waiting for the first 'hard' frost here this winter considering we've had HP not too far from these shores...just shows there has been no cold air mass within the high pressure. Other than that many useable dry days this month which has been far better in my neck of the woods to the misery of last January. 

[Beanz]

3 hours ago, North-Easterly Blast said:

It has also been a virtually fogless winter for most places.  This high pressure has failed to deliver any widespread fog, like many anticyclones would have done years ago.  It has just been the whole pattern that has failed to come together to deliver any significant cold, and there has not, and looks unlikely out to the end of January, that there has not been a cold spell to speak of, despite high pressure around much of the time, and many areas have seen no fog, and snowfall has been limited to the few areas that caught some in the short lived northerly early this month, and some places that had some in late November before winter started.  

Last year's warm September has destroyed cold prospects for this winter, and this winter was already dead in the water last September after its anomalous warmth, and the warm September = poor winter theory has just followed suit again.

This winter has nothing to do with what happened in September.  

[danm]

Diabolical winter so far, which seems to be becoming an increasing trend. With no real cold/snow prospects on offer we can now write off the rest of January and probably the first week of February. 

The winters between 2009/09 and 2012/13 all delivered some good/very good snow events even down here in London, then we had a horrid run between 2013/14 and 2016/17 with little to no snow. Recent years have been a little better with a heavy fall in December 2017, the beast from the east in Feb/March 2018, a couple of minor snow events in 2019 and two snow events last winter (a year ago today and in early Feb). 

However, to have multiple snowless winters in the space of a few years is not something I even experienced growing up in the late 80s and 90s. There was usually at least one good snowfall each winter, with only a couple of snowless years peppered about during that time.