Okay, with the temperature here now rising and the end of the cold spell in sight (as well as the end of the snow), let's see what everyone thinks of our first deep cold easterly in 21 years. Here's my report:

In reviewing a cold spell, the benchmark for me is of course 1987 (which I'd rate 10/10). There are various tests which I apply to ascertain whether it's a "proper easterly", most of which fail in modern cold spells.

* -15C isotherm at 850
Met. -16 or -17 was the low here.

* Powder snow
This test was met, with the first powder snow here since 1997. For good measure, there were also snow grains, graupel and ice pellets.

* Ice days
This was also met, with two ice days, one of which had a high of -2. 1987 had a high of -7. Four days in a row had noon temperatures below zero, which hasn't happened since 1997.

* Extremely cold nights
1987 was the last time we saw negative double-digits here, at -16. 2010 scored -8.6C, whereas this cold spell saw -14.8C (and -17 on the car as I crossed the island).

* Icicles
A late entry here, the freezing rain on Friday provided enough meltwater to generate icicles of several inches in length. More tradidional snow-based icicles were seen at my workplace in Sittingbourne, due to their dodgy guttering. The longest I saw was just over 2 feet in length.

* Days off school
I had 5 days off school in 1987, one whole week. This time around there were 3½ days off (the joys of working in a school!)

* Snow depth
6 inches this time, much less than in 1987 which saw something like 18 inches of level snow but on a par with 2005 and 2010, as well as some easterlies in the past (eg 1997).

* Drifting
Drifts reached 8ft locally in 1987. This time the same area saw 4ft drifts. These are the first drifts since 1997, as they need powder snow and wind to form.

* Sublimation
A lack of drip-drip-drip, with snow vanishing into vapour due to low dewpoints. This happened for the first time since, you guessed it, 1997.

* Being cut-off
We were cut off for days in 1987, culminating in bread and milk being airlifted in. This time around, we were cut off twice, each for a few hours: once due to abandoned vehicles and snow buildup around them, the other due to a bus getting stuck and gridlocking the area (allowing snow to drift and settle).

Only one category wasn't met:

* Snow fences
None around as the stingy council won't pay for them.

There was also a bonus this time:

* Freezing rain
The first time I've been aware of it, anyway. Light freezing rain on Friday, falling at -2, coated all east-facing windows with an attractive "frosted glass" effect.

As the first deep cold easterly in 21 years, this one in many ways exceeded 1997, noteably that exceptionally cold overnight low. It was a joy to drive in the snow, unaffected by the grit that was mixed into it. The mists covering the marshes on that morning were stunning, as were the snow-fringed trees and bushes. In pretty much all measures it kept pace with the spells from the 80s and 90s, meaning that as it's been so damned long it goes down as a classic here, especially so given the lateness in the season in which it occurred. Let's just hope we don't have to wait 21 years for the next appearance!

Overall rating: 9.5/10. A modern classic, on a par with easterlies of old.

 

 

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Sh*te.

 

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It certainly has dumped enough snow in my neck of the woods. Over the past couple of days we have had approaching 2' of snow, very much on a par with what we had here during the January 1987 and February 1991 easterly blasts.

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Modest snow depths of 6.7" here, similar at my parents' house in Dronfield. What has really elevated this easterly is the wind chill and that glorious powder snow!   To experience that again as well as seeing some epic snow drifts and icicles several feet long mean this spell will go down as a classic for me, albeit not in terms of snow depths, more for the 'experience' of a true deep cold easterly.

Also, 3 consecutive work snow days 

9/10 overall with a mark deducted for lack of really deep snow cover.

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Using your template:

Powder snow

I guess so, but I don't really care for it. Far rather have a middle ground between powder and wet

Ice days
Don't think we managed one, but I can't be bothered to check back on my station data. Think we got to around 0.2c on either Tue or Wed which was the lowest max.

Extremely cold nights
Think -5.2c was the lowest. Nothing remarkable

Icicles
I did get icicles from my pergola and they looked funny/nice

Days off school
No reason to take any time off work; my commute this morning was quicker than usual (yesterday's was a PITA because bedwetting drivers were going slow for no reason) 

Snow depth
Approx 3cm fell on Tuesday morning. All that was exposed to the sun melted. It snowed on and off for about 3 days but the only other time we got any accumulation was about 1cm on the Wednesday night, but this had blown away by the following day

Drifting
I saw some drifts max out at around 8cm

Sublimation
Dunno. Probably

Being cut-off
Nowhere near



Overall rating: 3.5/10. Cold and windy but pitiful levels of snow, made all the more infuriating given the amounts others got (even just 30 miles away) and the snow-shield effect affecting this region.

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Three ice days, the coldest March day in a long time, the most amount of snow since December 2010. Also powder snow, itself pretty remarkable. I think schools around here have had two days off. Overall not bad from a weather enthusiast point of view. I'd give it 8/10 for a cold spell.

A video playlist of footage I've taken this week:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLbH-0YtVVF2ZS-aCPYloOuat3j-CoVUZq

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6.7" snow depth sounds remarkable to me!! 

1 or 2 cm depth here. Pretty much none on the ground now. Temperatures hovering around freezing or just above for the past three days. A very brisk easterly wind which nearly splits you in two. Temperatures around -7C during the coldest couple of nights. Roads have been completely deserted as some people are just too soft to leave the house and no one outside of the area can get in. Usually takes me an hour to get home from work. It's been taking me half an hour. Brilliant. No schools shut that I know of or powercuts.

It's difficult to rate it. 1/10 based on snow. About 4/10 as an all round memorable easterly event. 

Temperatures was half way house from the 1991 Feb values and stay below 0C since Tuesday so that was very good effort after getting 2-4C maxes in 2009 and 2010 cold spells.

Uppers temps and gale force winds was really amazing to see especially on Wed afternoon and evening during the streamer time.

Snowfall amount extremely poor and very low for Beast from the East that often bring half foot or more in the past.  Failed to see snow occurring over night on Monday night then yesterday failed to turn up and today was too fast and lasted for 5mins each time.   Only the streamer on Wed night was good but too short lived.   I detest band of snow now because it doesn't deliver at all but streamer is the only way to get proper snow here.

 

Snow depth here reached 12.5cm- beating 3 out of 4 of the last decent snow events here (2010 x2 and 2013)

Icicles abundant- especially at warm vent outlets on houses.

I've had 2 days off school and they're joined to a weekend- a 4 day break! Managed 1 in 2013, 1 in Dec 2010.

Powder and big-flake snow have alternated.

Here's a few of my own grateful thoughts:

snow yesterday preceded and exceeded forecasts so the surprise element;

it happened so late in the season, with -6.4°C an incredible low for relatively short nights;

for most of daylight yesterday the temperature was below -3 (only 1987 and 1991 beat that here);

today two beautiful phenomena: it's currently a Farquarson painting outside - the ethereal light and blueish-white snow make the heart dance;

and my first ever sighting of cornices in this country- like (but smaller than) the one that caused the Lewes avalanche of 1836. Snow on the west roof-edge of a 3-storey Victorian building over a narrow alley had, in about 10 places along the gutter, somehow curled into tsunami-shaped structures that, as I watched, became dislodged and fell. These being about a metre in width and half in protrusion from the edge, a large volume of snow fell with each crash. I was transfixed for a full twenty minutes, predicting which would go next.

The snow is still crumbly-crunchy underfoot and the temperature is falling quickly despite the cloud. Families are sledging down the slopes in the waning daylight and spiculae are blowing around in the easterly chill. 

The only thing that stops me giving a 10 is the duration- two good snowy ice days; unless there's a twist in the tale.

 

 

 

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Up until yesterday late afternoon, I'd have given this spell about 2/10... virtually no snow, albeit some remarkably low temperatures for Chichester, which is about 6 miles or so from the south coast... However, yesterday evening we were able to walk in proper powder snow, blowing around.. I reckon in total we had 3-4 cms...So I would give this spell about 5/10... However, for a south coast location in early March, that is quite impressive. My other difficulty is that I was not living here in either 1987 or 1991.. I was in London at those times.. when there was vastly more snow around.. What I don't know is how much snow fell in this part of the world. Neither Dew or myself were living in Chi then, so I haven't been able to ascertain whether this part of the world could do well in an easterly.. My impression based on the occasional easterly since then, is that we don't do well, compared with say Brighton eastwards.. and certainly nothing like parts of Kent. Howeever, I have enjoyed the banter on here!

I forgot to add the pleasure of seeing the 510dam line over a swathe of the nation. How rare?

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For the SW particularly here in Cornwall I would rate this cold spell at 7/10. There is one reason I would not give it more and that's the longevity of it. We had 3 cool dry days last Friday Saturday and Sunday before the real cold came in on Monday. Our first snow came quickly and hard between 10am and 5pm on Wednesday 28th. On Thursday 01st we had light snow am before 4 hrs of powder brought in by Storm Emma. Our final snow depth was around 4/5 inches drifts up to 3ft on the hills. Unfortunately the warm sector turned powder snow to rain in 30 mins and by this morning we only have the drifts in the fields as a reminder.
I was not down here in 87 but from records and personal accounts that cold spell lasted 10 days and gave the low areas of Cornwall between 12-16 inches from a channel streamer.
What I will say is that this event produced 48hrs with temperatures below -2 lowest I recorded -5.8.
We had thunder snow with a weird snow effect. Imagine clumps of snow falling on the powder like a broken up snow ball.
The sheer cold and blowing snow was a sight I thought I would only see 'up north' on the moors, not by the sea.
If this spell had lasted until Monday I'd of given it a 10. Wednesday and Thursday took me back to 79 and some early 80's winters.
It's for those 36hrs that it gets a 7.

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I've seen a lot of snowy winters in various parts of the country during my 62 years, this episode I would give 5 out of 10, reasons are snow only small and dry, temps not that extreme and storm too short lived, I'm greedy and need more. By the way I'm only commenting on my patch.

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Probably an 8.5 out of 10 for me. Marked down slightly for longevity and a bit for snow depth.

I reckon total falling was circa 18cm and max depth 15cm. This is good and the best since Dec 2010 but not up there with Feb 91 or Jan 87 here. I think we did better out of a couple of the other 90's easterlies too but could be wrong there

The snow (before todays last flurry) was powder all the way and I finally got to see heavy powder snow showers driven in by the wind again. Dec 2010 had some brilliant convective snowfall but mostly of the more wet variety. I think it was January 2010 that had some powder snow on an Easterly but I was mostly occupied with my daughter being born that day and missed it

If the HP had been a little slower at retrogressing and hadn't sagged through Europe this could have gone down as an all time classic but instead it's just a great little cold spell, particularly given how late in the season it arrived.

Edit: Should say I guess that it was a particularly sweet spell given the number of nearly cold enough for snow events down here this year and the model teases. To watch the easterly signal in the GFS ens from a long way out, then to benefit from other peoples knowledge of the ECM ens and watch things gradually getting to the reliable with the signal for at least 4-5 days of cold was great fun, even if the MO thread got a little silly at times

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I was 68 on what was probably my coldest ever birthday, March 1st. So that tells you something. For me it was much like a miniature  edited 1963 in Essex. Everything we had then we got here but scaled down. Clear blue skies, grey skies gale force easterlies, powder snow and so on. Of course it was much shorter and less depth of snow because we missed the several blizzards but other areas got that. But if you took what occurred Country wide (I know a few places missed out, but so did they in '63, probably similar areas like the NW of Scotland) it was like a snapshot of that and a flavour to the younger people of what it was like. Definitely beat 2010 for here but would have been fairly standard fair (but not as cold) in many winters pre-1990.

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5/10
Could do better. Traditionally our heaviest falls of snow come from such a set up. Sadly the shower activity was light and although it snowed regularly it just never seemed to get going. We’ve recorded some ice days and for the first time ever I’ve seen substantial brown snowdrifts where freshly ploughed frozen fields had been scoured by the wind.
I am sure some others will rate this one as epic, good for them, but I can’t help but think what we have to do in our area to experience deep snow like what we used to when I was a youth.

Certainly the best since 2010 (2013 was not particularly special IMBY), but not in the same league as 2010 in terms of longevity and severity. Wednesday was a special day though - wonderful so see the showers lining up and hit with such ferocity.

Snow depths - max recorded was 20cm, but by then it was getting tricky with the drifting. 2010 for comparison saw 40cm here. However if we're judging snow "quality" then 2018 was better, as the powder snow was just brilliant.

Ice days - Tue just didn't get there (0.5c max), Wed did comfortably (-3c max) as did Thursday (-1c max). Today we got to 0.5c once more. So two in a row, again not matching 2010, but it felt a lot colder with this brutal wind we've had up here in the past couple of days.

All in all, 7/10 for me.

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Superb spell - especially as it nudged into meteorological spring.

Noted for  uninterrupted negative temperature over several days and nights and an abundance of powered snow on snow on snow.

Another positive is the lack of "marginality".  Good deep cold spell

Best of all it coincided perfectly with my week off  and looks like buggering off  in time for  work next week.

Looks like my weather control machine is working to perfection  Exxxxccceeeelllnt

 

10/10

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Up until yesterday late afternoon, I'd have given this spell about 2/10... virtually no snow, albeit some remarkably low temperatures for Chichester, which is about 6 miles or so from the south coast... However, yesterday evening we were able to walk in proper powder snow, blowing around.. I reckon in total we had 3-4 cms...So I would give this spell about 5/10... However, for a south coast location in early March, that is quite impressive. My other difficulty is that I was not living here in either 1987 or 1991.. I was in London at those times.. when there was vastly more snow around.. What I don't know is how much snow fell in this part of the world. Neither Dew or myself were living in Chi then, so I haven't been able to ascertain whether this part of the world could do well in an easterly.. My impression based on the occasional easterly since then, is that we don't do well, compared with say Brighton eastwards.. and certainly nothing like parts of Kent. Howeever, I have enjoyed the banter on here!

I'd generally agree with this, while adding a touch of frustration that Brighton (30 miles east) and Southampton (30 miles west) both got decent snowfalls.

I was in Kent in 1987 and 1991, and either on the Hampshire coast or in Cambridge in 1963. This year in Chichester is insignificant in both amount and duration compared to either of those years. 3.5/10 judged strictly on this location.

 

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Three ice days, the coldest March day in a long time, the most amount of snow since December 2010. Also powder snow, itself pretty remarkable. I think schools around here have had two days off. Overall not bad from a weather enthusiast point of view. I'd give it 8/10 for a cold spell.

A video playlist of footage I've taken this week:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLbH-0YtVVF2ZS-aCPYloOuat3j-CoVUZq

On a South Manchester basis (my specific location) I would also rate it 8/10.

I feel very strongly about this entire spell, and I want to write a decent report and document it all as a reflection. (What a weirdo). 

I’d even go as far as saying that I feel quite emotional that the UK has managed to achieve such an amazingly cold spell, against all the odds. Maybe there’s hope after all. 

Sounds melodramatic, but hey, its how I feel! 😉  

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