Not many posts on Bjorli recently as the weather has been fairly settled and often very cold. That said, we have had several episodes of snow too, for example, 20cm fell last weekend, another 3cm on Monday and 2cm yesterday morning. It was -24c yesterday evening but it has risen to -10c now with overcast skies again and with light outbreaks of snow. The snow is extremely dry and powdery. No need to clear the car.... just open the driver door and slam it shut and bingo; the snow has dropped off the entire car. A white sand.
This pattern of light snow, followed by -20 something under clearer breaks has persisted for a while, arguably deemed to be perfect and stabile winter conditions with fantastic ski conditions.
With a UK High now in place, things become more interesting and whilst heavy snow is on the cards as troughs dig into Scandinavia, as you can see from the charts yourselves, plumes of mild air will also play its role. With the HP a tad further N on some runs, we are under more of its influence and the 850s become less significant with inversions maintaining the sub-zero temperatures throughout. Move the HP a tad S and we lose the inversion with temperatures subsequently edging above freezing, possibly up to 3-4c! Not good.... grrr. If HP exerts enough influence across my part during the Tuesday-Thurday period next week, then temperatures will be mild but will generally hover close to freezing and with essentially dry weather, things will hold up quite okay. The end of next week could see another potent trough dig in. Too early to take seriously at the moment but one to watch. Another point to make is in the transitional stage as the fronts approach from the NW. The inversion is lost as the different air masses mix, with a strengthening wind and thus resulting in a brief temperature rise.
This weekend will see the above scenario play out. We are under HP now and it is cold. Snow flurries today, followed by variable cloud cover and rising temperatures through Friday as the wind backs W'ly. Temperatures will remain below freezing, probably maxing at between -3c and -1c by evening time on Friday. As the fronts and trough begin to dig in (Friday night/early hours of Saturday), temperatures may rise to freezing, before they quickly fall as the colder air floods back in.
As it stands this morning, Saturday could see very heavy snowfall, drifting and blizzards across our region. Shown consistently in the output now but even so, it wouldn't take much of a shift to alter things. That said, confidence is quite high and this coming weekend looks good for one of our 'specials'. The sad thing is that it might end on Sunday night with a spell of light/patchy freezing rain or drizzle.... before petering out and to be followed by mist/fog/murk as the mild 850s begin to kick in. Monday looks mild with 3-4c seemingly inevitable in my opinion and so some damage to the snow condition is likely - quite a seldom event this winter as it has largely remained below freezing for much of the season, culminating in the deep cold of December when we reached -36c.
A couple of snaps from the last few days:
Edited by user
05 February 2015 07:06:08
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