I'm moderately hopeful of seeing snow this weekend TBH. Last Saturday's "event" was a complete bake (the extent of the excitement was opening the patio doors so I could take a few snaps before the snow disappeared) but I'm estimating a 30% to 40% chance of doing better this time.

This could be coming to a place near you. Be careful what you wish for.

https://modeles16.meteociel.fr/modeles/gens/runs/2021011912/gensnh-6-0-384.png

If only....

Look like heading to Greece and Cyprus from the position of the extreme deep cold.  I know the -10C uppers had crossed over Cyprus in 4th Feb 1950 that give 1 and half foot of snow in Nicosia and outskirts.  If I was in there i would be more confidence of the deep cold heading there but for UK no confident until it landed in front of my house of -5C day max when you open the door to inspect the coldness and severe snow storm viewing from the windows.

That that way forward since all models had been very poor and never right on the day. Was going to have all day rain here yesterday afternoon, over night and today but did not happened only few hours in between.  

Well the 16C 850's are closer than the sub -20C lol

Mild weather looks like it’s being “squeezed out” tonight on the NWP. This is very apparent on the 12z ECM but it also turns cold again quite quickly on the 18z GFS.

https://www.wetterzentrale.de/maps/GFSOPEU18_258_2.png

Will be interesting to see if this trend continues tomorrow. 

Yes, both GFS 18z op and para go cold again in mid FI after a short milder incursion, with the Azores/Iberian high losing a bit of it's gusto.

All miles out of course but it will be interesting to see if this is a trend. In the short term all going to plan.

Highly unlikely though it is I'd take that passing snow shower IMBY on my birthday!!

The Southern contingent should be looking closer to home. 18z mean 850 hPa's(London) now bottom out at -6.5C on the 24th. DP's look lower than last weekend and max around 3C for a couple of days give good prospects of a bit of snow if there is any precipitation.

After that I would say the South has next to know chance of decent cold weather before February.

Yes Para goes for an easterly - hope is a trend setter but after so much flip flopping a change wouldn't surprise me.

Perfect HP block over Scandinavia brining in winds from eastern Europe/Russia where it has been cold of course.

Para GFS run still showing eye candy Scandi high and deep cold, with lots of snowy opportunity its at the colder end of the runs, so JFF but possible.

Start of February looking more interesting on the GEFS this morning.  Temps also lower for this weekend about-7c for awhile 

Fascinating ECM at day 10 this morning.  +15c 850s to our SW and -15c to our NE. The UK right in the middle. Hard to know where it goes from there but slider lows and copious snow is an option.

https://www.wetterzentrale.de/topkarten.php?map=1&model=ecm&var=2&run=0&time=240&lid=OP&h=0&mv=1&tr=24#mapref

http://www.wxmaps.org/pix/temp4 shows cooler weather being confined to N Europe but not really deep cold. The most sriking map of the suite is the soli moisture - the UK is absolutely sodden already compared to the rest of europe, and that's before this week's rain.

GFS - Storm Christoph featuring until Mon 25th but by then filling and moving off to the E then a period of W-lies before LP crosses the UK 970mb Sat 30th bringing down cold N-lies by Mon 1st - they don't last and there's a brief ridge of HP from the S before another LP moves in from the Atlantic 995mb NI Fri 5th.

GEFS - see Ally's post above - cool to Tue 26th, mild to Fri 30th, with quite good agreement to that point; then cool again but with quite a few very cold runs. Similat pattern for Scotland though less mild in the middle period and agreement between runs breaking up earlier, Rain quite general in the S (but note the snow row hitting 18 in Ally's post, for one day only!), Scotland gets a brief respite around Sat 23rd.

ECM handles the departure of Christoph differently - the main centre moving off but leaving a trail of shallow LPs running across S England to Sat 30th. FAX also likes the idea of weak Channel Lows as Christoph decays but brings them in earlier i.e. from Fri 22nd

Well, if this winter tells us anything, it is that the sort of synoptics we believe will deliver winter heaven to the UK, don't have to.

The PV can be polaxed and we can have genuine height rises over Greenland, but the weather gods just laugh their jolly little socks off and can still machine gun fire Atlantic LPs across the UK and NW Europe.

I give up, I really do. If we were in a zonal winter and saw FI charts like the synoptics we currently have, we would be drooling with anticipation, but because the Azores HP won't sod off, we still get the LPs and mild incursions, they just travel more slowly than usual causing flooding problems.

God I hate the Atlantic - if I could, I would drain it completely and pour the salty water down the throats of all those media weather presenters who utter the most horrible phrase in the English language: "at least it will be mild".

Looking at the GFS today and over the last few runs the trend at present has been to nudge the 850s down slightly in the upcoming chilly/cold spell and to slightly lengthen the duration so we're now approaching 27th Jan before warmer air moves in down South. The milder hump is being eroded so that 'mild' is more likely than 'exceptionally mild' although the twin peaks of mild are still there, more notably the second one as the next LP moves through.

Thereafter there's signs of the jet moving back south and LPs taking a southerly track through North France rather than through the Midlands and a reoccurring theme on some of the Op runs/members in deep FI is for heights to rise over Scandinavia and the Atlantic to get stopped. There's decent agreement of temps being lower than average at the end, which is unusual at that kind of range. Be interesting if that signal is maintained and starts to move towards the vaguely reliable.

ECM is similar and if anything has shown a slightly greater reduction in 850s down here from what it was showing for quite a few days. The ECM ens have been showing the same milder bump as GFS for a while and a reduction in 850s towards the end of the run too, albeit with the usual mix of mild/avg/cool. 

Near term and the GFS op has less extensive snowfall from the current LP than it had shown at range IMO but there's still a decent area that's projected to get heavy snow from the system. Parts of Scotland look set for further snowfall and over the next few days presumably from showers once the LP moves off somewhat. Even down here there's still the chance of some snow falling at least over the weekend, with that slight nudge down in 850s hopefully verifying and making this a touch more likely.

Leaving aside the snow potential interest the next 10 days are still looking wet for many, with a lot of rain for parts of Wales and generally between 40-80mm across the whole of the UK (bit less for some in the East as you'd expect given the direction the LPs are coming from).. Certainly enough for some more flooding problems and if nothing else even the smaller amounts further East will mean the ground remains saturated and streams high, so any one off heavier rain events will quickly lead to problems.

Certainly an interesting outlook with the potential for a chilly start to February just to confound the LRFs