Winter Weather outlook

[OhYouBadBadKitten]

Disclaimer: I'm only a weather enthusiast, not a professional meterologist. Take anything I say with a good pinch of salt, I do get things wrong sometimes!

In a normal year I wouldn't dream of starting a winter weather outlook thread at the beginning of September. This year there is a great deal of anxiety and interest about what the weather may hold for us.

Outlooks at this point can only ever be rough hand waving exercises, taking into consideration lots of factors and are likely to be inaccurate. I've been doing a lot of thinking and research over the last couple of weeks as to what might happen this winter. At this point the honest answer is: I haven't a scooby! (this might make this thread a bit pointless at this time!)

Looking at various long term models, solutions range from wet, mild and stormy, to cold and blocked or cold and snowy! I have an instinct that we are more likely to end up with a milder, dry scenario, with some colder incursions at times, but that is instinct and not based on anything quantifiable.

For someone who can talk through the various factors at depth, watch Gavin's winter outlook videos on Youtube.

As long as people can still see the threads and I'm not booed off stage I'll keep going, though of course sometimes real life gets in the way! But please do remember I'm amateur ( that isn't false modesty, it's being realistic!) I was just worried, and I am still concerned about the idea of long running threads becoming hidden by accident.

Cold weather fans will love the latest GFS run. It starts off with the chilly settled note for the first week of December, then in a rash of probable over enthusiasm it brings in decent cold from the East and the potential for decent snow for some or many during the second week of December. I'm not sure whether it is a realistic scenario, but it isn't totally outlandish I don't think. Let's see what the 18z run brings!

I have the weather board bookmarked in my most liked section as I visit it every few days or so. I have a couple of guys on my FB who are amateur weather forecasters so when they put something on I come and see what you or Gloria have put and you all invariably singing from the same hymnsheet which is more than I can say for the BBC weather app.

Keep up the good work 😀

We had early December snow in 2010 in the South East of England. So certainly possible to get some if the conditions are right.

Long running threads - maybe have a new thread each week and in really busy weeks have daily. Bit of a pain though to keep starting new threads.

I think we might need to keep an eye on on how old threads are and make sure they aren't more than 30 days old in future. The issue is that people will keep posting on the old threads and then we'll have multiple parallel threads. That gets confusing already when for instance the winter thread and the christmas thread starts merging, or when we get a named storm.

If you are a cool damp grey weather fan, then the latest GFS run is for you! It's grim. . The weather still cools down and settles from where we are, but then just sits as nothingness. It's also right at the top of the GEFS ensembles.

Big range of solutions still especially for the second week of December, as you cn see in both the ECM and GEFS ensembles.

Also a long time lurker and check weather regularly. I'm on the East Sussex coast - don't mind grey but we could do with a let up in torrential rain here! Flooding in the low lying town centre has been noticeable- luckily I'm on top of a hill but still ...

Thankfully it will let up Vixen, but in the meantime there's another rain warning out. www.metoffice.gov.uk/weather/warnings-and-advice/uk-warnings#?date=2022-11-27

Parts of Sussex have had around double the average November rainfall this month.

Ta-Da! www.mumsnet.com/talk/weather/4686426-the-annual-mumsnet-christmas-weather-thread

The Christmas thread is up and running! I'll keep general winter forecasts in this thread and aim to keep the focus of the new thread purely on the few days close to Christmas and Christmas week itself.

I know! ground in my garden is saturated but luckily slopes away from the house. Was planting bulbs only a few weeks ago and the ground was rock hard, now it's mush.

Mush here. Doggy prints on the kitchen floor again

Final model run for today. The 18z GFS. Shows proper cold second week of December. It's not known as the pub run for nothing though!

Slightly pushed for time this morning, so I'll come back properly later. But models are still showing decent blocking setting up, with a chilly easterly feed. Not beast from the east though, more like a hamster from the east! This week looks pretty murky for many with low cloud and fog and where skies clear, in some areas frost. A general drift down in temperatures.

GFS once again gets quite excited for the following week, so I leave you with this image to tease. This is not a personal forecast for snow, just a picture from a model run.

To add to this mornings post, there are huge inconsistencies showing between models for what happens after around the 3rd or so, with a wide range of solutions ranging from mild to cold.

Haha saw snowflakes on my weather app so ran over to see what you had to say about next week!
Thank you for your posts OYBBK

You're welcome Woggle! Roughly which area are you in (if you are happy to say) and which app? I'm interested because of the uncertainty as shown above.

Hi

I follow this blog from Dr Judah Cohen. He's pretty good. You may like his models @OhYouBadBadKitten .

I'm in NE Scotland so prefer to keep an eye on snow forecasts in winter rather than wake up surprised 😁.

Forgot the link 🙃

Arctic Oscillation and Polar Vortex Analysis and Forecasts.

He uses the above and also analyses the jet stream and any il nino/el nina.

Thank you coffeebeans

In your area too and this will be handy too. 👍🏼

Just popping in to say: I'm another lurker who loves your threads, and has followed them for years! Please don't stop!

Thanks Coffeebeans!
www.metoffice.gov.uk/binaries/content/assets/metofficegovuk/pdf/business/public-sector/civil-contingency/3moutlook-djf-v1.pdf

Met office say it is most likely to be an averagely cold December with average levels of wind and precip, but there is heightened risk of it being colder, calmer and drier than usual.

The latest GEFS is less all over the place and showing a prolonged cold phase for the first couple of weeks of December.

ECM shows a big old block over Greenland and advects very cold air over us by the end of the first week of December.

It's all getting quite interesting!

The weather accounts I follow on twitter are starting to get a bit excited

The three things that are holding me back from joining in are 1) the spread of results in the ensembles 2)The Met Office are being very cautious 3) We don't have a decent deep pool of cold air to tap into yet.

I'm also really conscious of the energy crisis.

It's colder out there than it has been all autumn so far but because it's (finally) not raining my house doesn't feel any colder.
I do not want snow or silly weather on the 9th or 10th. 🤞

Morning all!

Less divergence on the GEFS model with a stronger signal for blocking to continue. Alll the models are now trending colder for longer, with less uncertainty. That doesnt mean that they won't switch as new information comes in. But for now we can say it is pretty likely that a prolonged cold blocking will set up. During mid December, GFS warms things up a little, before bringing cold air back in.

Wintery showers are possible from this weekend onwards, especially in the east.

It still does not look like a Beast from the East. But perhaps the hamster is baring its teeth.

Have you seen the latest NAO (North Atlantic Oscillation to non weather nuts lol) forecast @OhYouBadBadKitten ? Looking very interesting as it’s showing a negative trend that hasn’t been seen in 12 years (if memory serves, menopause has be constantly befuddled 😂). Could point to a northerly or easterly wind flow for a nippier winter than usual!