I do think alot of people have overestimated their CETs. I see very little chance February will be as mild as january, most of the time we will be in a returning polar airmass which means average or only slightly above average temps, and the potential for some cold days. 

And the last half of the month is still up for grabs; none of us should give up hope of a cold spell until february has passed. 

All in  the 5's today..

Met Office Hadley  5.5c.    Anomaly   1.2c.   provisional to 3rd.

Metcheck              5.59c.  Anomaly    1.39c.

N-W                     5.96c   Anomaly    1.76c

Mount Sorrel         5.50c   Anomaly    1.30c.

My  Mean              5.4c.

Met Office Hadley       5.4c.     Anomaly    1.1c.    provisional  to  4th.

Metcheck                   5.73c.   Anomaly    1.53c.  

N-W                          6.15c.   Anomaly    1.95c.

Mount  Sorrel             5.6c.     Anomaly    1.40c.

My  Mean                   5.2c.

Met Office Hadley     5.6c     Anomaly   1.2c.    provisional  to 5th.

Metcheck                6.03c.   Anomaly  1.83c. 

N-W                       7.12c    Anomaly  2.92c

My  Mean               5.4c.

Met Office Hadley      5.8c.     Anomaly    1.4c.    provisional    to   6th.

Metcheck                  5.94c.   Anomaly    1.74c.

N-W                         6.87c.   Anomaly    2.67c.

My  Mean                  5.5c.

Another mild wet month should help create the mildest winter for a good number of years.

Met Office Hadley      NOT IN YET...................

Metcheck                   6.04c.    Anomaly     1.84c.

N-W                          6.91c.    Anomaly     2.71c.

My    Mean                 5.4c. 

Met Office Hadley still not put a figure on their site..

Met office Hadley has 5.8c  on the Met Office t mean..

Met Office Hadley     Still not updated.

Mount Sorrel            5.74c.     Anomaly      1.54c.

Metcheck                 5.87c.     Anomaly      1.67c.

N-W                        6.56c      Anomaly      2.43c.

My    Mean               5.4c..

Met Office Hadley...     5.9c.   Anomaly   1.5c.    Provisional    to the  9th..

Met Office Hadley  5.6c.     Anomaly      1.3c.   provisional  to  10th.

Metcheck             5.70c.   Anomaly       1.50c

N-W                    6.44c.   Anomaly       2.24c.

Mont Sorrel         5.5c.     Anomaly       1.36c.

My    Mean          5.2c.

I think its downhill from here. If it stays zonal there is still little mild air about. 

Not a lot of change from Yesterday ...

Met Office Hadley  5.4c.    Anomaly    1.2c.   Provisional  to  11th.

 Metcheck             5.70c.  Anomaly    1.50c.

N-W                     6.25c.   Anomaly    2.05c.

Mount Sorrel         5.38c.    Anomaly   1.18c.

My  Mean             5.1c. 

MetO is 5.4 up to 12th

http://hadobs.metoffice.com/hadcet/cet_info_mean.html

Met Office Hadley .. The same for TWO days.  5.4c.  Anomaly  1.2c. provisional to 12th.

Metcheck             5.72c.     Anomaly    1.52c.

N-W                    6.19c.     Anomaly    1.99c.

Mount Sorrel       5.36c.     Anomaly    1.16c.

My  Mean            5.1c. 

Met Office Hadley        5.3c.   Anomaly     1.3.  provisional to 13th.

Metcheck                   5.74c.  Anomaly     1.54c.

N-W                          6.06c.   Anomaly    1.86c.

Mount Sorrel              5.27c.  Anomaly     1.07c.

My     Mean                4.9c.     

Can that anomaly be right? It was 5.4C to the 12th with an anomaly of 1.2C, and now the CET figure has gone down 0.1C but the anomaly is 0.7C higher? 

OK I have just checked and the anomaly is 1.3C (I thinbk you read from the January column!)

Still odd though that the CET goes DOWN 0.1C but the anomaly goes UP 0.1C! That implies that the average for Feb 1-12th is 0.2C higher than the average for Feb 1-13th!

If you look at the yearly moving CET on the right of that Met page, it does show a quite steep dip in yearly CET around this time. It might be enough to answer your query

The Feb dip roughly coincides with the Buchan cold spell 7-14th Feb.

The difference is in fact only 0.1C but yes the average goes down significantly in mid Feb. Bear in mind this data is the 1961-1990 mean.

Using the 1961-1990 data the period from 13 to 18 Feb is easily the coldest of the winter and the only period when the 30 year mean falls below 3C. The data for each day are as follows:

13 Feb 3.1C
14 Feb 2.5C
15 Feb 2.2C
16 Feb 2.4C
17 Feb 2.8C
18 Feb 2.9C

So that anomaly will keep shifting quite a bit in the next few days.

The dip in temperature is less pronounced in the 1971-2000 mean but the period from 14-16 Feb is still easily the coldest of the winter.

Even the 1981-2010 data shows 14-18 Feb as generally the coldest period of the winter although there is one outlier as the 7th January is the second coldest day in that series.

Great post - Any idea of the rest of the month Simon. What do you think - mild or colder.

Very much on the mild side Gavin. Latest output this morning supports a CET for the second half of February of 7C. That would push the overall mean for the month to just above 6C.

If that verifies the CET for the winter as a whole would finish at just about exactly 6C which is 1.5C above the 1971-2000 mean.

Odds on now for the warmest winter since 2006/7.

The winter CET has only exceeded 6C on six occasions since 1900 with all bar one of them since 1975.

Prior to 1900 the winter CET exceeded 6C on five occasions.

So this winter could be the 12th warmest on record in the CET series.