Badkittens just for fun winter weather guesscast thread.

[OhYouBadBadKitten]

Well, its that time of year where we start wondering about the winter to come. Will it be mild, wet, stormy or buckets of snow for all?

Of course it is impossible to tell, last years guesscast went quite well, but probably down to luck and vagueness of words

There is much talk of El Nino - and it is a very strong one at present. NOAA give a 95% probability of El Nino persisting through this winter. El Nino afftects temperatures in the Pacific – warming parts of it. This can have a knock on effect for us, though not always as great as people seem to think. However it cannot be ignored. It seems to be associated with cold winters, but not exclusively, mild and wet winters have also occurred during El Nino.

The North Atlantic Oscillation can also have an affect. It is hard to forecast this more than a couple of weeks in advance – there seem to be a wide spread of solutions in two weeks. To predict it we need to look at the temperatures in the Atlantic. The north Atlantic is colder than usual but the tropical Atlantic is warmer than usual. Interesting. The met office seem to think this will lead to a positive NOA led winter – which tends to be mild.
As a result of their positive NOA prediction the met office are suggesting that it is more likely to be a warmer than average Oct-Dec than a colder than average winter. here Somewhat amusingly though they also suggest that the Oct-Dec period is more likely to be wetter than average. Well, half way through Oct and looking forward, this forecast doesn’t seem to be playing out. Their next issue will be in about 10 days time .
Another factor to look at is towards the east – any long lasting cold air tends to come from that direction. And we have an impressive start to the season. Russia has had widespread snowfall, in fact, some are saying that it is a record start. If it doesn’t thaw (it is very early in the season!) this is good news for cold weather.

So where are we at? Conflicting ideas – it could be a very cold winter, there are indications to support that but equally many factors contradict those signals. We will just have to wait and see.

Next update, end of half term :)

Thanks Not planning on setting off too early, probably about ten to avoid traffic.

Severe winds here in North Wales again

Why are they naming all these winds/storms. They will run out of alphabet sooner rather later. We always have high winds this time of the year and One storm just blends into the next

T'is very stormy down here today. Is it still Clodagh?

Pesto ~ going by this report, I think this is the tail-end of Clodagh.

AlwaysBe ~ the metoffice decided earlier this year, to have a go at naming storms this autumn/winter.

Daily Mail report ~ Clodagh certainly has been causing problems.

The met office contingency planners reports are out today and...... they show remarkable consistency with early thoughts about it being a winter of two halves, with December being mild, wet and windy and then the potential for things to get much colder in the latter half with the winder, with the balance of probability lying that it will become colder than average. They are uncertain though as to whether it will be a snowy cold or a drier cold - it depends where blocking occurs.

temp plots

There is a difference between Netweather and the Met office - the met office seem to be implying that it is towards the end of Jan into Feb when the coldest weather will occur. netweather say it will be in January and will warm up at the end of Jan.

So whilst I wouldnt pin my hopes on a winter wonderland at Christmas necessarily, I wouldn't give up on winter based on the next couple of weeks forecast. Models do seem to indicate that come the new year it could get much colder.

Jazz hands in reply to the drum roll

Thanks as ever OYBBK

yay, jazz hands!

Gosh I love snow, I do hope we get tons.

Proof that we can get snow in Manchester....albeit 5 years ago (to the day)! Here's hoping for more!

Friend just told me she had snow this evening near London

at 12 degrees???

Maybe she was joking

Sorry, yes she said it was a joke cause she knows how much I love snow.Lol.

one day it really will snow and thatll learn her!

(If I'm reading things right), I think there are hints of something I bit more winter-weather-like from next weekend. 'Tis way into the future in terms of forecasting though.

yeah maybe, by the monday there does seem to be the potential I think.

thanks. you have inspired me to go back to decathlon and get a refund on faulty boots and buy some new ones. they were really good about it. I was in far too much of a tizz over nothing at all.

Still very very windy here in North Wales and a little bit of sleet too

Braemar snowgate cam is back online. No snow at the moment. They had some last weekend.

Snowgate Cam

Do you still think it will get colder next week, OYBBK and Gloria?

I have a vested interest as my boiler has expired and it is taking a while to sort out a replacement. At these sort of temperatures (am in London) living without heating and hot water is only mildly irritating, but if it drops below 5ish again it will start to become unpleasant.

Irene ~ the charts have been a bit all over the place the last few days and have gone from 'possibly getting colder' to 'more of the same'. At the moment, it looks like it might get a bit more winter-like around the middle of the week (around the 16th December/mid month time.) It is though waaaaay into the future when it comes to forecasting so that'll probably all change again!

Thanks Gloria!

I'm back :) been away without internet, so Desmond was a bit of a shocker. Didn't look nearly that bad when I had last looked at the models.

Some more prolonged rainfall this week I'm afraid. Not as bad (would be difficult - it was record breaking), but it will slow the recovery down.

Somewhat of a north south split this weekend I think - cold 'up north' mild 'down south' then as Gloria says its all over the place.