I'm glad that the main bulk of the cold this winter (so far anyway) was in December and January and now February is looking mild, sunny and spring-like. For me there is nothing worse than a winter that is mild early on, just for it turn cold right when spring should be arriving. 8°C and rain all through winter and then through much of spring doesn't cut it for me.

And I agree with LeedsLad. There is absolutely nothing about -30°C that I am envious about, in the same way that weeks on end of 45°C is nothing to be envious about.

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Truly at a loss to find the words to describe how awful this winter has been 🤬🤬👿

Another week of horrendous windy, winterless, frostless ridiculously mild crud. No indication whatsoever that there has been a high pressure as it has been the same 💩 as it would have been with 980mb. 

The only difference is that a traditional low pressure westerly would relent to allow a frost to develop more frequently than once in three weeks.

Yet another disturbed nights sleep last night due to the ridiculous rattling wind that just never gives up. Rattling way again as I write to give nother evening of worthless twaddle with the temperature stuck at a revolting 7C for hours after tedious cloud all day for the umpteenth time this month 💤

Never known anything as dire as the past 7 weeks and it just keeps getting worse and worse. It's just a sick joke how it looked like there would only be a brief mild blip in the run-up to Christmas and it's ended up with this horror. Without doubt the most unceasingly grim and depressing devoid of interest period of winter garbage in my lifetime. 

One frost in 20 days and four in the past 30 days. I can't remember anything so pathetic - I have never in almost 18 years recorded either a January or February with fewer than five air frosts. 2017 had the worst total of 10 over January and February and was nothing like as poor as this. 

For the second year in a row the core-winter period has been a complete write-off with no measurable snow or a temperature as low as -3C in either year. 2019/20 was almost the same but it the temperature did drop to -3.9C. Prior to that only 2013/14 and 1988/89 would have been comparable winter-free.

The 2020s has seen a further descent into the abyss and it's got to the stage where just about anything with even the slightest possibility of interest has been replaced by complete and utter dross.

There was just 16 hours of frost last February and this month could well be the first ever frost-free February as the outlook is so dire and devoid of anything normal or seasonable for the time of year. An unmitigated turd of a month even worse than the bottom-of-the-barrel scrapings of January.

For the second month in a row Heathrow has recorded a lower temperature than Aboyne which incenses me. Never happened before without doubt and just sums up what an unbearable joke the climate is turning into up here. Worse still much of the Highlands including Loch Glascarnoch and Altnaharra have not seen a frost 😱

Incredulous, ridiculously awful and depressing nonsense 👎👎👎

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Another stunning day down here in CS England.

Bloody cold to start, we got to -6c on the dot, and very foggy so not exactly the most relaxing commute ever but not horrendous.

The fog burned off by lunchtime to blue skies and a max of 8c, it felt pretty warm out in town with a light jacket on.

The tarp is back on the car tonight to make things easier in the morning, another great day looks likely.

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2023 has turned into an abysmal winter with February devoid of interest only mild, cloudy, damp dross.

The weather reflects the rest of our Country, hopeless, depressing and as the song says 'The only thing to look forward to is the past'

 

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It was another fine, sunny day in Leeds too. The weather has been great since the middle of January - no rain, plenty of sunshine & frosty mornings. The ground is dry enough now that you can walk on the grass without getting muddy feet - unusual for winter. I’m tempted to even get out in the garden & give the grass a mow. 

Combine that with the crocuses coming up & various birds starting to sing again (especially the local song thrushes) and it’s feeling almost like spring. Certainly no cloudy, damp dross that the above user keeps going on about for some strange reason. 

Hopefully no cold spells going forward. Keep the snow in Athens I say. 

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I actually could do with some mild damp dross tbh. Getting awfully dry down here .. and this is meant to be the season to replenish the rain. .
A nightmare scenario is to have all this sunny dry weather in Feb/March then a dire washout summer as has happened many times before (2012 is the example that always sticks in mind )

Nothing but gut wrenchingly awful dross day after day after day. I'm at a loss as to comprehend how it's even possible to be getting a winter so dire.

It just continues to plumb new depths as well. Utterly diabolical yesterday. Windy, grey dull, horrrifically, mild autumnal filth that miraculously cleared just after sunset only to be back in place by dawn to give yet another stinking grey dull weekend. Temperature hasn't dropped below 8C overnight continuing the frostless horror show that just gets more and more ludicrous with each vile week that passes 🤮

High pressure used to bring crisp and frosty weather in winter not mild breezy clag. Struggling to remember the last time there even was a decent winter high. 

Last February there was eight frosts despite there being relentless wind and low pressure and yet this year when pressure has been 14mb above average there has been zero. It's a sick joke. It hasn't gone below +0.4C. Not even come close to recording a frost-free March before and only one April (2009) failed to go lower than +0.4C. Pitiful doesn't even begin to describe it.

4 frosts in five weeks. The most boring and detestable period of weather I have recorded in the near 18 years I've had a weather station. Nothing whatsoever to give even the merest hints of fulfillment. Just soul destroying crud day after day after day 💩

With the weekend curse in full swing again to add to the misery, and combined with the stupefyingly dull Festive period,  it feels like I have barely seen the sun since October 🤢

Seven years ago this weekend I had a brilliant day trip up to Braemar to enjoy fantastic snowy landscapes sparkling under brilliant blue skies.
It doesn't get any better than that in winter and couldn't be further removed from the current lifeless, bland, worthless nothingness in which even Braemar is struggling to get a frost never mind a flake of snow 🤬

This has to be the worst ever winter month for Scotland when even the bulk of the Highlands has failed to record a frost. Even February 1998 had snow and frost right at the beginning and end 🙄

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 Hillier Nurseries near Romsey recorded -9C a few nights back not official but it is a proper weather station they have there for obvious reasons.

The way it's looking so far, this could well end up being one of the most anticyclonic months in UK weather records. Here the pressure hasn't fell below 1022mb this month, and even today it's sitting around 1039/1040mb.

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And failed to keep skies clear been overcast for few days now,  HP outstayed it welcome.  To get lot of sunny weather HP need to be minimum 2 ir 3 days stay here then sod off with rain and then showers with sunshine before resuming sunny 2-3 days.  I notice it never exceed more than 2 days full sunshine in any HP.  HP is a winter and summer killer and wasted valuable time for deep cold and snowy weather and warm to hot and sunny follow by thunderstorms.

Is 10c the worst possible daytime temperature?

It's not cold, but it's also not really warm (especially is dull and drizzly)

You need a coat, but your normal winter one is too warm. Leaden skies, risk of rain.


I guess it sums up this forsaken island's borefest of a climate. Neither here nor fecking there.

 

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Another week of unadulterated garbage has passed taking us closer to the unthinkable horror of a frost-free February.

A month so awful I can't believe it is happening. The prospect of not even getting an air frost in February is beyond surreal. Feels like I've entered the Twilight Zone.

It's nothing but total dross day in day out. Couldn't even get a frost earlier in the week when Aboyne managed -7C because that vile wind continued to blow the whole night even with pressure over 1030mb. Nonsense for which there is no valid or rational explanation. Just never happened before.

Not really any more double digit days than you would expect in February. It seems to be 9C every day and exactly the same weather too. Laughable that a severe weather warning was issued for yesterday when it just brought the same windy, sunny frostless crud there was under the high pressure. In fact it seems that the wind is lighter today than it ever was under the high but yet again there is no frost due to cloud which is only just clearing now. Expect the wind to pick up considerably once it's gone.

Some examples of real severe weather from the past for which the much less weak and entitled population of the time just coped with and didn't need a 'severe weather warning' 

21st Feb 1955:


20th Jan 1958:


24th Jan 1959:


17th Feb 1960:


18th Dec 1965:


10th Feb 1969:


8th April 1975:



17th Jan 1981:

4th Jan 1984:


40 Years on I managed to snap a picture of what now passes as severe weather when I popped to the shops at lunchtime yesterday. This was taken when the City was under a weather warning.


Welcome to the weather graveyard that is the 21st Century in which cumulus and blue sky with a breeze consitutes severe weather. Note that there is even a workman out in a ladder in the picture I took yesterday. Can't imagine seeing anything like that in any of the true severe weather events listed above 🙄

There was even a weather warning issued the other week for a dusting of snow over high altitude areas. The same areas that in 1965 had 25ft snow drifts which only warranted a brief article in the local paper 🤡

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I want a mobile westerly to come in shift a lot of this crud now. This high pressure was nice when there was a lot of sunshine about, but now it seems that a load of cloud and drizzle has become trapped under it. We've had very little, if any sunshine since Tuesday here.

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Best results is HP only sit for a 2-3 days then sod off asap.  HP overstayed at day 3 onward can give weeks of cloudy weather. remember summer 2021 was HP dominated cloud and cold weather, sun only appeared when HP sod off.  On and off sun today then get cloudy in the afternoon but indoors remained warm enough at 18C and no heating for 2 days running.  

A really dire day in North Northumberland, the westerly wind finally dropped to be replaced with thick overcast conditions and continuous drizzle that lasted all day and well into the night,. The daytime high was barely over 6 C but the previous night was ovr 10 C!
At least things here are not as bad as Aberdeen, we did manage a couple of good frosts and one calm sunny day last Monday.
Loos like the wind will be back tomorrow though....
 

Don’t believe the hype, there have been some lovely (albeit not especially wintry) days here so far this month.  It has been much drier than average and almost certainly sunnier too so far this month in Aberdeen.

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The lamp post watching weather has still not arrived in N.E.Somerset. with only a few more weeks left of this winter. Most disappointing.   

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Looking back on this winter, it is hard to believe now that it actually all started on such a promising note with those ice days during December. That was a month when we did very well for air frosts and to date, it has been our only colder than average month of this winter.

The only downside of that month was that the cold weather wasn't able to hold on all the way to Christmas, and the fact that there wasn't a lot of snow around. What little snow which we had then though, went on to last for quite a long time.

Sadly though, that was as good as what this winter would get. In January, we still managed to get an average number of air frosts but that was now a slightly milder than average month which was then to set the trend for how the rest of this winter would go. Even then though, we still managed to get a little bit of snow which actually lasted for a while, but there hasn't really been anything on that front since then.

That then takes us to this to this month which has been an absolute disaster in terms of it actually being a "winter" month. We are now roughly two thirds of the way through this very short month and yet, we have only had two air frosts all month. Those came on back to back nights and amount to less than a quarter of our 1991-2020 February average and even less than what we get in a lot of years as far on into those years as April and sometimes even May.

Yet, the beginning of this month in particular is part of what should be the winter equivalent of high summer (for the same reasons that the beginning of August is normally seen as a part of high summer itself) and should therefore, be a part of our coldest period of the year as a result. Furthermore, it has also been a completely snowless month here up until now and it has also been quite a lot milder than average.

Indeed, the manner in which this so-called "winter" has gone on to completely fall apart in this fashion has been so incredible that it has already made those December ice days seem like nothing more than just another distant memory. At the same time, this month has still been very bleak despite the increasing length of daylight at this time of the year.

We were lucky enough to get a sunnier than average month during January but about two thirds into this month, we have only had less than a third of our 1991-2020 February average sunshine amounts so unless we suddenly start to get a lot more sunshine during the rest of this month, this month is clearly on course to end up being substantially duller than average here.

Due to the increasing amount of daylight at this time of the year, it is during this month that we should be getting our sunniest days of the winter and yet this month has been so dull up until now, that this just hasn't even happened up until now.

Finally and unlike in other months, it has actually been a bit wetter here than in other parts of the UK, especially during the last few days. In spite of that though, our rainfall totals continue to quite a lot lower than what the should be.

When you add all of that together along with the fact that there still hasn't been a single named storm which has been named under the joint British/Irish/Dutch system for naming these storms (it was the Danes who named Storm Otto and that is under a different system), this probably has to go down as one of our most boring and uninteresting winters on record in terms of our weather.

That is something which just seems to have got even more apparent as the winter has gone on (the fact that we had that cold start to the winter shows that it was actually quite interesting to begin with, but even that has now faded into just another distant memory). Because of that, I will be more than glad now to see the back of this winter altogether, and to at least see what the coming spring might have in store for us.
 

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It just keeps getting worse and worse in defiance of any realistic expectations.

26 days of frostless hell now – equalling the longest winter run I recorded from 14th Dec 2015 to 8th Jan 2016. Even that was leagues ahead of this pigswill due to having some degree of variation and interesting/memorable, if thoroughly unpleasant, weather in the form of Storm Frank.
Absolutely nothing about the ludicrously tedious, banal and monotonous tripe of the last few weeks could remotely be described as interesting. Stupefyingly unvaried and boring beyond words. Unfulfilling, worthless 💩
 
Cold front and winds from the NW failing to bring anything remotely cold just more lifeless mild windy rubbish. Looking odds-on for a record breaking 27th consecutive frost-free horror night with the temperature stuck at 5C and showing no sign of dropping. I suppose it is cold compared to the ludicrous 13C overnight reading a few days ago 👺

The stats are just off the scale of horror. Not even remotely comparable even to the worst of the shedloads of unadulterated dross there has been over the past decade 🤢

Coldest max this month: 6.6C. Previous highest in my 18 years of records for a winter month was 4.1C in February 2014 🤮

Coldest min: +0.3C. Previous highest for a winter month was -1.4C in Jan 2007 and Dec 2013 with February lowest -1.8C in 2007. Also well above the record for March of -1.2C in 2007 and 2012 🤮

At the same time there has been nothing like the maxes of 15-17C seen in other exceptionally mild Februaries such as 1985, 1993, 1998, 2012 and 2019. Highest just 13.3C. All of those months also brought a semblance of winter, something entirely lacking in this dismal catastrophe.

This “winter” truly represents the darkest days in the 30 years I've been observing weather. It even makes the most boring periods of anticyclonic gloom like Jan/Feb 2006 seem eventful and scintillating by comparison.
 

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29 days of frost-free hell now smashing the previous record of 26 days 🤬🤬

Beyond surreal. Where the hell is the colder weather? It's been the least cold week yet. Ridiculously mild with 13C overnight no sign of a frost or anything remotely cold. Thoroughly unpleasant with wind all the time and barely any sun since Tuesday. Godforsaken, useless, good-for-nothing filth 💩

Can't even remember the last time I woke up to sun on a Saturday. The few times there's been any sun in the past four months it's started cloudy like last week. Doesn't look as though it will break at all today. An utterly worthless day. Can't even get anything as good as anticyclonic gloom anymore as it's windy as usual. It would beggar belief that the wind could fail to drop out at all in a cyclonic month but when the pressure has been so high there are truly no words 🤢

It doesn't matter where the high pressure is situated any more all it brings is either cloud or wind or even rain. Can't even get a single day of calm, sunny frosty conditions.

Why anyone would believe an arctic blast or anything remotely memorable/interesting is be likely to happen? The 2010s were the most bland, boring, depressingly unfulfilling decade of weather in recorded history and so far the 2020s are making the 2010s seem action packed and thrilling by comparison. A weather wasteland ☹

All there is in the outlook is more mind-numbingly bland, unvaried, unchangeable, unextreme and uninteresting crap. That's all there ever is 🤬




 

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Good news: The models seem to be backing away from the idea of a cold northerly or easterly in early March.

Bad news: More anticyclonic gloom forecast for the next week by the Met Office. Still it's nowhere near as bad as the thought of a cold spell though.

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Agreed. By this time next week, I would much rather be getting on with spring and so, the last thing that I will be looking for then is for the cold weather to return which I would much rather have been getting over the last couple of months and which with the notable exception of that early part of December, largely avoided us for most of this winter.

Having said that though, I am just desperate to see some actual weather here and not that some old bone dry, cloudy and mild crud which we virtually get nothing but these days, and which is now being forecast for just about all of the foreseeable future.

To be honest, I would probably even go as far as saying that you get more interesting weather even on Mars than on this part of planet Earth. At least you get some decent diurnal temperature ranges on Mars which is something which we don't generally get here.
 

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Absolutely disgusting weekend. The 💩just won't shift. There is no longer any decent position for a high pressure. If it's to the south it results in dire breezy crud off the Atlantic and to the north or even directly overhead even worse filth off the North Sea 😡

It did eventually clear but back again after a few hours when the temperature had only got as low as 1C. It's just beyond surreal that things have sunk so low where it's become impossible to get a frost in a winter month.

The most toxic vile and horrific turd of a winter month I have had to suffer in my life. Absolutely not a positive thing I can say about this unthinkable horror of a frost-free winter month.

Just two months in and it already feels like 2023 is going to be challenging 2011 and 2014 in terms of unrelentingly awful and totally useless garbage. Two godwaful years but even those never plumbed the depths of having a frost-free pile of stinking crud in place of a winter month.

10 weeks of the most excruitatingly awful crap I have ever had to endure and no end in sight with another week of the meteorological equivalent of semolina to suffer. The soul destroying, ultra depressing hell is just never ending 🤮

Nowhere else on the planet gets such worthless, bland and inspid crud as the British Isles have to suffer relentlessly in the 21st Century. I have given up even updating my spreadsheet because I'm so sick to death of it. Feels like smashing my weather station to bits because that's what I feel has been done to my hobby of weather observing. Everything of interest worth recording has been replaced with lifeless mind-numbing gunk 🤢

Makes me sick reading this and comparing it to the 70 consecutive days of godforsaken poison I have just witnessed

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2023-02-23/san-bernardino-county-mountains-first-ever-blizzard-warning 

🤬🤬🤬​​​​​​​🤬​​​​​​​🤬​​​​​​​🤬







 

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This month had been good with many sunny days than I saw from last year poor summer sun levels on social hours.  Temps had been very mild last week which kept heating off for 6 days running and few odd days earlier on. Colder now but no effect on indoors temps due to longer daylight and lot of useful sun light warmth.

Another winter to chalk up in the 'utterly shite' column,

Not the first time a winter's started off with promise, but essentially been over before we've even got to Xmas.

I was hoping that 2009-2013 period would be a new era, but instead it was just a  false dawn.

 

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