Well i've had nothing but a sleety rain shower earlier, can't see how there will be anything of note falling, would rather have a good old frost to make it white outside, but that is probably out of the question as well. Also those automated local forecasts are a joke, tonight there are 12 hours of snow showers expected from 6pm, and on Friday almost 24hrs of them, of which i can't see where the info for those came from, so we'll see.

Funnily enough it is easily cold enough here for a frost but everything is so dry there is none. There are a few random puddles around here and they are all frozen solid...the excitement is killing me. 

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This spell is turning out every bit as dire as predicted. A totally useless cold, windy and unpleasant day with the temperature failing to drop below freezing last night despite the models and BBC forecasts showing a frost. Of course I predicted last week it would generally be too windy for frost. I also stated that if it did drop below freezing there would be no visible frost due to the dry air.

Looks like the winds are not even going to switch to NW now so this will be a truly awful zero-rated write-off pointless cold spell wasting a week of yet another crap winter. Looks increasingly likely that this will be the first snowless January since 2014 and possibly the least frosty January since then as well. Simply dreadful given the trio of dross January's we've had since then.

There's only been two January's since 2005 that have managed more than 5cm snow. It's just unreal. I thought January was a joke between 1988 and 2004 but this takes it to a whole new level. Can't be called a winter month any more in the same way that June is no longer a summer month. Both months are a pile of disgusting garbage year in year out 

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What a load of rubbish. I have given up on the model output and chasing phantom winter weather. NWP output has been mostly junk this winter.

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This spell is turning out every bit as dire as predicted. A totally useless cold, windy and unpleasant day with the temperature failing to drop below freezing last night despite the models and BBC forecasts showing a frost. Of course I predicted last week it would generally be too windy for frost. I also stated that if it did drop below freezing there would be no visible frost due to the dry air.

Looks like the winds are not even going to switch to NW now so this will be a truly awful zero-rated write-off pointless cold spell wasting a week of yet another crap winter. Looks increasingly likely that this will be the first snowless January since 2014 and possibly the least frosty January since then as well. Simply dreadful given the trio of dross January's we've had since then.

There's only been two January's since 2005 that have managed more than 5cm snow. It's just unreal. I thought January was a joke between 1988 and 2004 but this takes it to a whole new level. Can't be called a winter month any more in the same way that June is no longer a summer month. Both months are a pile of disgusting garbage year in year out 

If it's snow that you're after, you are always welcome to come down to the Central Belt where there is plenty of it around just now.

 

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Just went to pick the kids up with my fleece on, and I got turned into a living snowman, dreadful stuff :-(

https://lothianbuses.co.uk/getting-around/live-service-updates 

Can't fault the gritters, I left fresh footprints on my way to pick up, and they'd gone by the time I returned 20 minutes later, covered over with fresh snow

Rule of thumb for possible snow in IMBY.

Northerly - No Snow
NE - No Snow
Easterly - No Snow
SE - No Snow
Southerly - No Snow
SW - No Snow
Westerly - No Snow
NW - No Snow.

 

Well, as of the 3pm update on the Met O site we have between 80 & 90% chance of 'precipitation' for the full period of 7pm to 3am. The symbol for each period says 'heavy snow' (see how careful I'm being after my lesson above?). A normal MetO user would read that as basically an 80% chance of heavy snow for the best part of eight hours.

I wonder....

7pm, clear as a bell.

Oh, and the 'forecast' has changed.

No wonder people have a dim view of forecasts and forecasters on occasions. 

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7pm, clear as a bell.

Oh, and the 'forecast' has changed.

No wonder people have a dim view of forecasts and forecasters on occasions. 

Don't worry. I can't even work out when the 16 / 30 day text forecasts on their web site have been updated. 

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Don't worry. I can't even work out when the 16 / 30 day text forecasts on their web site have been updated. 

When Gavid D posts them. 😜

The constant regurgitation of cliches like ‘but the ENS disagree’ or ‘still a low chance of an Easterly’ is getting boring TBH. There’s only so long one can chase phantom set-ups before the inevitable and it all ends with an hour of graupal in April.
Roll on Spring.

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7pm, clear as a bell.

Oh, and the 'forecast' has changed.

No wonder people have a dim view of forecasts and forecasters on occasions. 

 

MetOffice was predicting a >95% chance of precipitation (as snow) on midnight weds/thurs IMBY, which in my simple way I take as a less than 1 in 20 chance it won't rain/snow, heavy or not

It's now been replaced with 20% cloudy 🙂 - and this happens a lot, not just this time of year

 

I reckon the 95% has to be multiplied by their confidence in their current forecast surely, which changes the numbers a lot

Nothing.

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You can guarantee mid March will have a raw cold spell but no snow just to drag out the winter...
April will be fine but chilly.
May-September we will be chasing the fabled Spanish plumes whilst under nondescript grey cool SC...

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One snow shower all day the rest hail, sleet and rain. Another crap cool spell bites the dust, the countdown to spring begins. 😜

Bone dry all day, despite warnings for heavy blustery showers. I was hoping to see the odd rainbow or two and some impressive cloudscapes.
Just looked at the model output thread,,,, well less than half a page of comment says it all really. This winters going down in infamy,,,, like so many of its predecessors in the last 30 odd years. I’m not chasing the phantom winter wonderland charts anymore, instead I’m looking for hints of spring. Winters not over by any means, but for many folk it hasn’t even started yet.

One hail shower here today. GFS 12 bore precipitation charts were well off the mark. 

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One hail shower here today. GFS 12 bore precipitation charts were well off the mark. 

 

Must be grateful you got some meaningful snow now back on 10th December 2017 or else this would have been a another let down. Interesting how many parts of the south east saw snow twice or 3 times in first 2 weeks of winter then nothing since. First snowfall in London commenced on 30th Nov - as a flurry in central London.

Back to the here and now....!?

It's purely been just rain or hail showers here most of the day! Absolutely vile! Also it's not even cold and there is too much wind for any frost and when we do have a wintry shower the temperature rises above +3c thus being to warm for any snow to fall so we end up with rain followed by hail in heavier bursts then sleet as temps fall back to +2.5c after the shower passes then rise back up to +3c when another blustery shower approaches - So it's a case of rinse and repeat here in Exeter (East Devon).

This was exactly what happened in 2014/15, 2015/16 too! Last year was just as boring too, there was some soft hail/sleet end of January around 9pm and then we had a period of light snow followed by flurries and ice pellets untill 11am on 11th Feb! You would have thought things couldn't get worse than last winter for the south west!?

Tomorrow night it will cloud over with rain! Absolutely vile! Maybe FRIDAY we could see something wintry but who knows!? I bet you it will be the same as today/this evenings and tonight's weather of what was described in above sentence!

Another wintry potential missed for the SW - But not too as the cold snap in December when the midlands and Wales got 6-8" of snow and the SW missed out! We were not forecast to have any snow anyway so what can I complain about I guess!? 

Good to see southern Scotland esp the central belt get more snow too!

N. Ireland are doing very well for snowfall so far this year I heard!? Lucky so and so's!!

 

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Nothing.

Well, nothing much apart from a thaw of what snow there was.

Clear skies and 4C?

Okaaaay...

 

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Well, nothing much apart from a thaw of what snow there was.

Clear skies and 4C?

Okaaaay...

 

 

Met Office forecast was appalling for our area...

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It is snowy above 150m, but it is turning slushy here as well.
Temperature rose above freezing at about 4.30am , currently 2c here with sleet showers, as it is at the airport.

I thought the automated forecasts were OKish for here last night. For days they showed 0C to 1C at Leeds/Bradford Airport with heavy snow showers rising to 1-2C in the morning with more sleety showers, as has happened. My only criticism would be that they showed continuous heavy snow rather than showers.

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