Those living at the East Coast can put away the worry beads for now as yesterday's bombing low for the 23rd is being replaced by a ridging high on the latest GFS run. Although ECM's easterly would make it feel particularly bleak even without the snow. 

These changes from GFS are comical in 6hrs we've gone from a hurricane style low over Iceland to relatively calm

ECM 850s in the ENS are -5c or below right out to the end (29th Jan)

I remember in 2013 we had very similar charts that were seemingly close to a snowy situation, with marginal uppers, then within 48 hrs the cold air dug its heels in and the charts would look very snowy, with the LPs sliding south.  This ECM chart screams of that setup.

We will see

It isn't. Not if you look at the ensembles and ignore the far reaches that only it shows. If you stick to T+240 and the ensembles it has been quite consistent and no more inconsistent than the other models in the same time frame and if we do not get decent snow and cold next week it will have been the model that hinted at the problem with the ridging of the Azores HP first. With GFS coming out every 6 hours and quoting in the distant unreliable frame it always appears that way. It just comes under more scrutiny when people are looking at possible cold. It is a case of if you say it enough people will believe it and there is too much of that going on these days!

It could be that alerts are being generated for manual investigation and there is no-one on duty to investigate and correct them, or even to let anyone know that such alerts are being generated.  As Doc's original quote reported:

I guess that the most we can say about this situation is that we don't know how bad the situation is.

Just when you think there is the start of a potentially fantastic set up it all goes Tong:

Signs of blocking in the 06z run toward the end of 0P run but look where all the cold air is going yet again?

Which is why I feel confident that this particular run has a high probability of verifying. 

This Article in the Washington post on the 07/01/2019 goes someway to explain why the gfs model should be ignored until the shutdown is over.

http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2019/jan/07/the-national-weather-service-is-open-but-your-fore/

Yes Ian, quite a change and welcome. With such wildly different runs, who knows what will happen come the period. ECM's run would be "interesting" if that's the word for places in the Thames estuary. Sure the north Kent crew can comment for their area, but a set up like that around the 23rd/24th coupled with very high tides (higher than those which caused some coastal flooding in East Anglia) would lead to coastal flooding along the coast at Southend and some inland creeks in Essex. That easterly would create a surge of its own for the Thames.

Move away from the 'black hole low' today in the models. Seems like there is a desire to keep HP lingering over the UK next week. So below average temperatures definitely on the cards. Snow watchers are going to be disappointed by the outlook though.

Indeed. I still think the best rule for model watching goes something like this.

If GFS and ECM both go for Mild then Mild will happen.

If GFS goes for Mild and ECM goes for cold then a disappointing middle will happen (with no snow).

If GFS goes for cold and ECM goes for Mild then Mild will happen

If GFS goes for cold and ECM goes for cold then whichever model is the least cold will happen.

Even that can be bad for your mental state when the UKMO is the only model to go for cold and the FAX charts reflect that and the UKMO is inevitably wrong.

The link I have posted should explain why I think your reasoning is wrong.

Ultra blocking showing up quite widely in the GEFS06z. Looks like a big shift, but don't know whether 850s will reflect it.

So low pressure systems toppling over our HP and going straight into central Europe to give the Alps more snow that they don't need!

Where's the blocking located, though?

To the north generally. 

Here are the GEFS06z (that's the earliest they've ever appeared on TWO).

yesterdays 12z para:

Today's 06z PARA