I have been tempted to point out that the climate models predicted that we would see warmer, wetter winters with more storms.  Plus the general underlying trend of more flooding and more droughts.

Our only chance of sustained cold probably lies in a shutdown of the AMOC…..🤔🥶😉

The chance is there hopefully the timing can coincide with the big day. Just runs out of steam this time. Let’s hope they are struggling - I remember that seemed to be a favourite when there was an outside chance of cold!

Ideally we would get WAA straight up rather than angled over the high but the PV doesn’t like that

GEFS:

EC:

Beyond the 22nd, the GFS 850 ensembles (for London) have been showing a spread of around 15 C for a few days now. It's almost comical how the Op run has been switching from the top of this range to the bottom from one run to the next. Anyone looking at the Op run in isolation would conclude that the model doesn't have a scoobie what's going to happen at that stage....... which is probably a fair conclusion.

Yes, it’s not exactly been consistent lately.  But I think the issue is just that the evolution is very finely balanced and probably the usual missing data in the opening position is more critical than normal (there is always some missing data because there are more horizontal and vertical grid points to populate than there are actual values for each variable).  I think we have to remember that the professional forecasters look at the mean, not the operational, and don’t peer out as far into the future as we amateurs like to do.  If you read the commentary by the US Forecasters generally they don’t really go much past 5 days.

GFS 18z at around the same timeframe seems to be thinking along similar lines, but never really gets as far with it and keeps HP positioned to the S/SW of the UK.

Hi David, if you compare the jet stream profiles you can see the critical difference: GFS takes the southward plunging jet down over Scandinavia whilst ECM brings it down through the British Isles. GFS has the next surge of the jet running flat west to east from the southern tip of Greenland across over northern Scotland and that steamrollers the pattern flat.

 we are once again falling into the trap of model teasing 10 days out.  Its going to be another normal boring Christmas, perhaps those up north at elevation might see something but that Greg Lake Christmas song always springs to mind "They said it would snow at Christmas, They said there'd be peace on earth, Instead it just kept on raining...."

GFS Op 00z - repetitive; HP coming and going over France with (briefly) settled weather and SW-lies so often cloudy, alternating with LP running into the northern N Sea and NW-lies. HP Tue 17th, Sat 21st, Fri 27th, Mon 30th  ; LP Thu 19th, Wed 25th, Sat 28th. Overall mostly W-ly and nothing dramatically cold.

ECM - similar pattern but with different timing, in particular HP Sat 21st much weaker allowing LP in Mon 23rd compensated for by HP Wed 25th

GEM - more like ECM

GEFS - temps up and down to start with, notably dipping Fri 20th after which ens members disagree but a majority suggest several days of mild weather over Christmas. Small amounts of rain widely from time to time, though runs agreed on rain in the S Fri 19th, and on more extensive rain in the NW. Snow row figures occasionally significant for Inverness (27/33 on 19th, 17/33 on 23rd)  but minimal elsewhere. 

Interesting you mention that. I've just been checking the CET analyser (see https://www.theweatheroutlook.com/twodata/cet.aspx) and to me it looks as though a top 10 position is possible for December. Unless we get an inversion developing it's difficult now to see how the CET won't be significantly above average. In the north of the UK (outside the CET area of course) the anomalies look smaller on the whole, with a greater possibility of polar maritime incursions. Of course this post may end up looking foolish down the line, but it increasingly looks like we're following the trends of recent years. A stone is thrown into the pond in the autumn and through the winter the ripples progressively smooth out. I expect some people will point out that is (and was) the default behaviour of the atmosphere, but it really does look like the pattern has become more firmly entrenched and is harder to break out of in recent years and decades. We did have a period recently where GEFS London grids point was showing below or slightly below the norm 850hPa temperatures for much of the 16 day period, but more often than not we see something like this regardless of the time of the year.

As I mentioned recently, what we’re seeing is exactly what the climate models predicted: warmer and wetter winters. The North Atlantic is mostly anomalously warm (not checked the detail lately), providing both the warmth and extra moisture.

Yes but then why are we seeing the potent cold spells in Spring? Last winter we had snow in March and April as we did the previous year 2022/23 and we are also seeing potent cold northerlies in Autumn months like November just gone when 2 thirds of Devon was under 6" of snow including major cities like Exeter saw 3" of snow. We had snow in Exeter last winter on 30th November 2023 as well. BUT we are NOT getting potent cold northerlies in December or any winter months? Why is this? I was going to suggest it is to do with the strong PV but in November just gone the PV was very strong and the NAO/AO was positive and we still had a cold northerly blast.

ATM the PV is strong and looks like it will continue to be strongly positive and then go record breaking positive almost off the scale.

http://www.weatheriscool.com/prod/gfs/eps/strat/u10serie_gefsonly.png

 The thing is that this time last year I recall we actually had weaker zonal winds yet STILL didn't get cold so this proves it's NOT just the strength of zonal winds that drive us milder weather.

It's because of what humanity is doing to the atmosphere, and (to a lesser extent with climate) the biosphere.

It’s about trends, not specific synoptic patterns, so cold spells still happen but less often. Plus, climate change is destabilising the atmosphere and giving rise to more extreme weather events.  Also, if the behaviour of the jet stream is disrupted then you see greater advection of cold and warm air.

Good pint and is all down the HP is the winter killer, they are just there control where the Low goes and then butt in to prevent the LP moving SE to Europe that give us cold and snow every time,  See the USA they get mild rain at first then deep cold from exiting LP.

HP is the main reason for ruining our winter seasaons full stop and easily can been see on the charts how the horrible HP nose in toward UK.  Other countries don't have a problem with HP with sunny skies or if they got snow early it will continue to be cold with snow until Spring season arrive.

More concern by late Jan or early Feb to see if Spain and Portugal going to be warm to hot early start which happened in 2023 and this year then gone off and our summers ruined.  Need to see colder wetter weather over the W Med regions and cooler.

......and as mentioned recently by scientists, causing much more cloud worldwide which hadn't been fully factored into climate change before.

The 6z GFS has a cloudy high for us, with only a few hours of clear skies. It's probably why there's no inversion... you'd expect one to set up very quickly at this time of year under a high with clear skies!

EDIT: And I see the MetO raw has a remarkable 15 here on Wednesday.

Just chance I think really. There are basically 6 months when snow could fall somewhere in the UK at any time. I could argue why haven't we had any significant lying snow in any month for several years here in the S.E. corner, formerly being one of the snowiest areas. I think when we are talking about a 1.5C increase, maybe more now, the sea temperature plays a big part and it is still coldest in the Spring which may be just enough to compensate the marginal situations enough.

See "the death of the midwinter easterly " as I collated a few years back (actually more than a few- I'm getting old)! 2018 was the closest we've come in recent years and was in fact record breakingly cold for the time of year - it was just very, very shortlived. Still, it shows that when the stars align we can still be snowy!

The last proper easterly in winter (not midwinter) was all the way back in 2005, when there was a 2-week easterly spell... 14 days in a row of snow falling here, and over 2 weeks of snow on the ground. The late Philip Eden said at the time it could well be the last such prolonged easterly spell we'd see, and he's been right so far.

It would certainly make a good PhD research topic as to why we just don't get proper Scandinavian Highs any more, i.e. extensions from the Siberian high. I would suggest it's to do with the gradual migration north of high pressure in general in our latitudes, presumably going over a tipping point that we didn't even know existed!

Well we see it year after year - cold spells are more potent in Spring or as we recently discovered in November 2022, 2023 and November just gone as proved. What also bugs me is that the high pressure we get do NOT produce the very crisp mornings with sharp frosts that we use to see such as frost. They all seem to be dirty highs with cloud and temperatures of 6c by night and 7c by day. YUCK!

So that goes back to want someone else was saying about the continuation of above normal SST's in the N, Atlantic which has been going on for years and years now and warmer water means more moisture with high pressure so our high pressure systems are cloudy damp mucky highs... from the Atlantic? Correct me if I am wrong but it could be due to the SST's in North Atlantic although doesn't explain why we continue to see potent colder spells in spring months and autumn months...hmmm interesting eh?

The snow that fell from that 2018 easterly here was finer than dust. It began with short lived 'squalls', that reduced the visibility down to almost zero and peaked with an overnight blizzard that was akin to a sand storm in Saudi Arabia! Curious thing about the laying snow  afterwards is that it didn't melt away in the usual grotesque, slushy fashion, but just disappeared. 

Statistically (based on reanalysis means) the end of Feb and early March is a period when Tm airmasses are least likely to reach this far north. You are nearly always guaranteed a frost around this period.