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Snowy Sunday 2

Posted Sat 9th December 16:10

Heavy snow is expected to bring disruption on Sunday to parts of central and possibly southern Britain. Over high ground accumulations of 20cm are possible and even at low levels snow depths of 10 cm are likely in places.

Latest view on the snow risk

Ssome uncertainty about the northern and southern extents of the snow risk remains. In the south milder air will be pushing in and turning the precipitation back to rain or sleet. In much of northern England it may remain dry with the precipitation not reaching at all.

I've posted some charts below from the Meteo France Arpege 6z model. There's also a link to the Arpege 6z precipitation type loop forecast for 36 hours beginning at 06:00 GMT today. I think this model run will turn out to be reasonably close to the mark although as I said there is scope for adjustments either northwards or southwards.

03:00 GMT

By early tomorrow morning a mix of rain, sleet and snow is shown across southern counties. Remember that if it is snowing in your locality at this time it could turn to rain later as milder air pushes in.

06:00 GMT

By 06:00 GMT the snow is absolutely hammering down in parts of Wales and there's heavy snow in much of central England. In the south it's mainly wet not white. 

09:00 GMT

By 09:00 GMT the snow has is probably approaching its northern limit. That now looks to be a little further south than was looking likely a couple of days ago. An area from the Wash in the east to Northern Wales in the west may be as far north as it gets.

12:00 GMT

By mid-day little has changed. In parts of central England and Wales the snow will probably be piling up, especially over high ground, but even at lower levels significant accumulations are expected.

15:00 GMT

By mid-afternoon the precipitation is becoming more fragmented and is edging back southwards. During this period there could be some accumulations of snow further south, especially over high ground.

 

I've pasted in the Arpege 6z loop I posted on Twitter earlier this afternoon. It shows all of the frames from 06:00 GMT this morning to 18:00 GMT tomorrow.

PS: At the time of writing the 12z GFS model run is showing a similar picture.

 

Edit: 18:50 GMT. Here's the Arpege 12z loop which seems to have shifted things a little southwards.

 

TL;DR

Heavy snow is expected in central parts of England and much of Wales tomorrow. The northern and southern boundaries of the snow are still not entirely certain so don't forget to take a look out of your window! Through the first half of the day the southern extent of the snow is expected to be close to Northampton / Milton Keynes or possibly slightly farther south. The northern extent possibly stretching across from South Yorkshire to northern Wales. During the afternoon the snow could spread southwards but it becomes lighter and patchier.

Live chart viewer


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richarddstarky 7 years ago
As per usual down here in Southampton we had rain and wind :-(

antss1 7 years ago
Local Tv forecasters that is

antss1 7 years ago
Iv'e lost count the number of times forecasters have forecast snow over the last 6 or 7 years in Norfolk but it rains instead ,I think they say snow just to cover them selves ,in the 70s 80s they got it wrong a few times

kieron6791 7 years ago
Does this snow event finally herald the end of a string of very mild and mushy winters? This has been a cracking start to the season.

antss1 7 years ago
Rain in Norfolk

geordiesrgr8 7 years ago
Not a sniff of anything wintry here on the Somerset levels just heavy rain and now blowing hooley,

BarrowiceInfo 7 years ago
Snowing hard in Kent! Laying, but very wet! (8am)

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