Possibility for a prolonged cold spell looks more favourable with these charts however:

http://www.wetterzentrale.de/pics/Rtavn1801.png

How often have we discounted a wobble in favour of longer term synoptics.  The rollercoaster begins in earnest..........enjoy

Yes you usually find with easterlies that once the models pick up on it they try to bring in a roaring easterly far too quickly, then on subsequent runs the start date gradually gets put back and put back until you wonder whether it will happen at all. (And sometimes it doesn't!) It can be a frustrating process chasing an easterly into the 72-96hr timescale when it keeps slipping back. But the 06Z run certainly looks good in the medium to long term.

First hurdle the GFS 06h still shows Scandi HP developing by Tuesday  14th.

A rather messy slider LP on 15th/16th but by later in the week some very wintry looking charts

http://www.meteociel.fr/modeles/gfse_cartes.php?&ech=228&mode=0

From 20th onwards renewed Atlantic  push with finally the azores HP ridging NE and allowing Atlantic back round the top.

Will shortly see where this evolution sits in theENS

Would like to add that Meto were pretty early on this change too, although I accept they have backtracked a little in the last few days.

Well the latest Met Office text forecast doesn't suggest much of an easterly spell, more like an UK high pressure from the sounds of it.

GEFS showing a wobble at 06h.Compared to 0h, % Anticyclonic drops from 90% to 60%. at 144h and from 80 to 50 at 240h So a shortening of the potential cold spell.

It aint nailed on yet!

Mixed ENS in the mid range, with 8 members (notably including the op and the control) below -5C uppers at T+180 for central/eastern England. 12 above that figure, with 4 members going above freezing. In other words, this cold spell is not nailed just yet - plenty of time for either improvements or backtracks.

Looks like finally there might be an end to all this wet and windy stuff,there seems to be some exitment on here as to perhaps a cold change,will it last, time will tell,will it happen,time will tell, more importantly will i get any snow? Doubt it,but time will tell eh!.

It makes a change reading these posts when there is wind/rain as far as you can see,then all of a sudden there is a different mood in the air,i personally am fed up with our recent weather but have faired better that alot of others.

Lets hope i have copius amounts of snow but highly unlikely,will proper winter begin???

There's obviously a lot of time for this to change (and, of course, any cooler weather isn't even here yet), but what concerns me is that around the 7-10 day mark, both GFS and ECM show the AH ridging NW'wards up toward the NE USA/E Canada region. The effect is direct the resultant low spinning out of Canada in a much more northerly path. This means that as the low moves eastwards, it collapses the block into mainland Europe, putting us back to square one.

Like I say, very far in the distance so may well not happen like this (and the GFS in particular likes to revert to zonal type outside of the high res part) - but both the GFS and ECM showing the basic trend means it should be watched.

Quite simply, the Polar Vortex will try to regroup itself and this winter, it is being aided by the QBO which is in a westerly phase. Therefore, the models will try to bring back zonality in low res, all other things being equal. To counter that, we need more strat warming to take place (what the experts are referring to as "wave 2 activity").

UK Outlook for Monday 13 Jan 2014 to Wednesday 22 Jan 2014:

Although showers and longer spells of rain will continue to affect the UK, conditions are not expected to be as stormy as those of recent weeks. At first, the strongest winds and heaviest rain are most likely in the west of the UK, then perhaps in the south and southwest, whilst the east will hang on to the driest weather. It will become colder, especially in the north where there is an increasing risk of snow, mainly over hills, with nearer normal temperatures at times in the south, and an increasing risk of frost, ice and fog. Later in the month changeable conditions are likely to continue, especially in the northwest, with the best of the drier weather in the east.

Updated: 1156 on Wed 8 Jan 2014

UK Outlook for Thursday 23 Jan 2014 to Thursday 6 Feb 2014:

Whilst current indications point towards changeable conditions persisting late in January, they are not expected to be as stormy as the start of the month. This would mean outbreaks of rain mainly affecting northwestern parts of the UK, spreading further southeast at times but tending to weaken. The best of the dry and brighter weather should remain in the southeast. Some periods of colder weather are likely, particularly inbetween weather systems, but overall temperatures may well remain near normal.

Updated: 1159 on Wed 8 Jan 2014

METO not buying next weeks cold spell except for north.

METO ditching reference  to change to colder weather in Early Feb.

Sorry to be a wet blanket!

Seems strange with colder possibilities as below-

http://www.meteociel.fr/cartes_obs/gens_display.php?ext=1&x=478&y=6

Perhaps things aren't completely lost for milder weather fans? Lets hope MetO know something we don't! 

I wouldn't call it bizarre at all. It reflects the uncertain outlook - one look through the models and ensembles, plus the hints the Pros have given on those we don't get to see, should indicate that confidence is not high enough to be talking in certain terms about much colder weather next week.

Should be for the media thread ..apologies , but that was probably put together before the 6z run

I'm not sure how they would ignore this

http://www.meteociel.fr/ukmo/runs/2014010800/UN144-21.GIF?08-06

I think they are waiting for the 12z's before changing the wording

The problem as I see it is that there is a tendancy to look only for the cold options amongst the data available.

With that in mind, GFS has been dismissed on a number of occasions recently as it was not going with that option.

The ensembles are where we should be looking with GFS, especially as it goes out so far.

Irrespective of where the control goes......and they have a habit of selecting outliers......there has been an increasing trend for genuinely cold members to appear in mid-term as seen on the 6z suite.

There continue to be plenty of mild members around but at least we seem to have lost the counterbalancing zonal sine wave signature where everything was generally between + & - 5'C.

Also encouraging is the lessening of precipitation spikes which surely indicates an increase in HP, likely to be a blocked continental set-up.

Given the above, what doesn't show is surface cold which is a feature of these synoptics in winter. We can only hope for a continuation of this trend and some hardening of the clustering in the ensembles.

At least something's up and it should get drier! 

If you look at the current, above-average sea-surface temperature anomalies in the direction from which an easterly would come, you can see why it wouldn't necessarily produce noteable cold in the UK, even if it did arrive.

http://weather.unisys.com/surface/sst_anom_new.gif

If an easterly were to persist, then that would eventually change, but for the foreseeable period, I can see why forecasters wouldn't shout "cold", even if they did expect the easterly to emerge.

That's exactly what someone else posted last week when Meto suggested a significant cold spell at the end of the month.  The models now finally support this possibility only for Meto to turn turtle. 

The PV dropping into the US has been released by a weakened Jet but perhaps the extent of the PV shift is causing uncertainty with both the models and the subsequent forecasts for the next phase of Euro weather. 

Thats exactly what you want for heavy lake effect snow. It would only be a problem for immediate coasts with 850s at around -8C