With Halloween and Bonfire Night out of the way, there is a clear run for Christmas and the UK snow stories are appearing. Even White Christmas claims. Steady on.
Halloween and Bonfire Night are now out of the way. Christmas stuff is everywhere in the shops. Will we have a White Christmas? Nobody knows yet.
With our warming climate, we would probably say not likely but there is still the chance of wintry showers on a NW wind, or even proper snow if an easterly wind sets in. That’s the joy of the UK weather, always keeping us on our toes.
Claims and downright random paragraphs just keep appearing in the newspapers. Is there is a calendar of articles and timings, fill in the gaps stories? Mid April – scorching hot May Bank Holiday coming up. One week later – May Day wash out. Early June – hottest summer on record. November 6th - Odds slashed for a White Christmas says William Hill/Ladbrokes.
Every year. Nothing to do with the weather. Someone is now bandying about “coldest November on record for UK”. Where are they living? It has been so mild. Yet the same story appeared last year. It does look to be turning colder for the last week and a half of November but it’s not going to offset what we have seen.
And “three days of snow/ six days of snow”. Where? Doubt it’s for London. Or is that just for the Scottish Highlands in a few passing showers?
“Forecasters predict a three-day flurry of snow will move in from November 14 and will continue for 72 hours - with as much as 2.5cm of snow expected to fall per day.” The Sun
Do they? Flurries with 2.5cm of snow, quite a heavy flurry. There is no snow forecast for Sunday 14th, the snow risk chart is empty.
And just an hour earlier -"The 72-hour flurry of snow could blanket the UK from November 21, seeing bookies slash the odds on this being the coldest November ever. " The Sun
Keep adding the weekly punt, might strike lucky as we get nearer to winter.
This time last year William Hill were offering Newcastle 5/1 and Scottish locations at 4/1, Liverpool 10/1. Similar, slightly longer odds Paddy Power not much difference apart from Birmingham which was 8/1 last year but only 4/1 this year. Strange for an inland location.
The scattering of sites offered by betting companies for White Christmas bets vary in latitude north-south but also likelihood due to the wind direction. A cold east or northeast wind will make Newcastle, Norwich and Edinburgh more likely, whereas a wintry NW wind will see Manchester being more prone. Even wintry showers working their way down the Cheshire Gap, a convergence feature that can funnel showers right into the Midlands, could reach Birmingham. Frontal bands from the southwest hitting cold air already over Britain would result in snow for Cardiff maybe even London. The ideal for the capital would be a lovely stream of snow showers funnelling along The Thames in a cold easterly.
Last year (2020) it was a White Christmas, for parts of eastern England with early snowfall around 5am. Northumberland, East Riding of Yorkshire and Suffolk all saw snow lying on the ground. Although for an official White Christmas you just need a snowflake to be seen from the official observation points.
Elsewhere, it has been snowing in Lapland. All seems well for Santa. Not lots of snow but better than awful 2018 when there wasn’t even any snow by the start of December. There is little snow showing over the UK, if any at all, for this month. You can just see a covering for the NW Highlands by late November.
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