Yes ...that's it  - get it out your system Rich.,!

At least your saw some snow  - we only had light ice pellets and soft hail with sleety flakes for a few seconds but the temperature rose as these showers approached last night and it never got below +2c it was +3c last night in Exeter - The northerly wind made it feel cold today but still we had a high of 7c....which is average. Like now for instance we are still at +2.5c in Exeter. It was a non - event for the SW especially lowland areas too. Actually it was more of a north westerly wind for the SW. This is a deja vu of NYD in fact. Also the break down to milder weather...doesn't look like it will produce anything wintry or snow except for higher grounds of Scotland and next week looks rubbish for snow.

The south needs an easterly for sustained cold spell and to last. - Ironic how Heathrow cancelled 80 flights due to a bit of sleet!! haha! 

Wrong thread Doc!!

This is the moaning thread not the gloating thread

Sorry 

As a professional forecaster, I don't think it is M.H place to be analysing each model run publically like this because 1. they rarely show consistency at that range and 2. people listen to him and pin their hopes on his musings. At least the UK Met Office stick to their guns despite what the models show with each run. M.H just seems to make an ass of himself.

The problem is we're in a polar maritime air mass. More often than not Pm air means that dew points are either just about cold enough, or just slightly too mild for snow, hence the marginality we've seen. Furthermore, those dew points also mean that during the day snow will often melt fairly quickly. It's actually not because of the sun like a lot of people think.

To get proper long lasting snow that lies for days, you need a proper Arctic air mass or a cold continental air mass in place. Those air masses have much lower dew points. That's why during December 2010, snow lay on the ground for days, even though it was extremely sunny.

Yes, that is the issue (polar maritime air mass!) - The ground was not cold enough before and it never got that cold.

Unlike in December 2010 for instance when the snow fell and stayed for several weeks in many parts and almost a month over the moors.

This cold snap/ especially yesterday was a bit of a deja vu of what happened in the south NYD - - again - the SW had more of a North westerly wind than an Arctic blast of northerly wind - which only resulted in temporary coverings of wet snow over Moors whilst rain/hail with soft hail/ice pellets fell at lower levels and as you rightly said it never got that cold either - It was only the wind that made it feel cold - not even a frost - in fact now as I type it's still 1.5c above freezing. Also when we did have showers last night, the temperature rose by 0.5 of a degree to above +2c to give rain/sleet or soft hail. It's only a 2 day event for many and the south west never really got cold. Today's high was 7c - Which is average.

I saw some webcam's in Aviemore - doesn't look like a lot of snow fell there either - Can't tell the depth but perhaps 5cm or 2 inches"? 

Now we have milder weather coming on Saturday night pushing in from the NW bringing rain instead of a wintry breakdown of snow first is frustratingly annoying. I saw photos and the cold in eastern and south eastern Europe and the amount of snow Italy and Greece had - which puts out slushy deposit of wet snow and +1c to shame.

I use to remember some classic wintry breakdowns to milder weather with precipitation starting off as snow back in 90's and early 00's but with this utterly crap cold snap we have had - it never really got that cold enough anyway to start off with.

What was very interesting - John Hammond compared this cold snap with January 1987 when daytime temperatures never rose above -6c in many parts and we were talking over a foot of snow with blizzards. 

What's even more sad and embarrassing was that Heathrow had to cancel over 80 flights because there was sleet. Ok, it's better to be safe than sorry, I get that! But come on!? The rain turned to sleet at Heathrow and the temperature fell to +2c? I mean really? in mid-winter!?  Yet we had the news reporters there as if there's no tomorrow.

Apart from the storm surge for N. AND Eastern coast - this cold spell was too over hyped. - I can go on for ever but I think I have contributed to this winter rant thread enough for now.

We can only hope that this SSW will deliver a proper block to bring us a deeper and more prolonged spell of colder weather (more than a couple days) where it snows and lasts all day and temperatures actually fall below freezing for once.

Yesterday morning I posted that we hadn't had a flake of snow but my sister tells me we did!  She looked out at 2am and it had been snowing. But there was no sign of it at 5am.  I think she'd been dreaming. 

But just as I set off for work at 7.15am we had some squally heavy sleet, the stuff that sticks to your windscreen and makes driving difficult. It lasted the whole 20 minute drive, then turned to rain!  An hour later, the sun was out with a bitterly cold wind blowing.  

Re. your second point, I have already shown that not to be true. A large swathe of the UK was below freezing last night!

http://www.weatheronline.co.uk/weather/maps/current?LANG=en&CONT=euro&LAND=UK&REGION=0003&SORT=3&UD=1&INT=06&TYP=tmin&ART=kartealle&RUBRIK=akt&DATE=1484382600&CEL=C&SI=mph 

Disappointing spell really considering the oompah over in the model thread

I got a bit of snow (about 1cm), but not as much as the metoffice reckoned wed night and not as much as xcweather (gfs forecast) on thursday night, got the lower end of both forecasts 😛 - plus it came at night, I saw more actual falling snow on boxing day

As for cold it was colder at the end of november by a good margin (-4 to -5 at night then, last night just about pipped below freezing)

The next few days the met office has plumped for maxes of 10c and mins of 7c - 7 is edinburgh's normal january max. As we know, after that we might as well inspect chicken guts for the weather.

Very Poor as Vic Reeves was wont to say

It has many rivals for that dubious accolade!

After the most dire and inadequate cold spell it's back to the mild, grey and depressing dross which have characterised this hideous winter. Snow completely washed away now which isn't surprising as there wasn't much to begin with.

Can't emphasise just how useless it was. I didn't get any more snow than I already had seen this winter (on Boxing Day) and temperatures barely got below average. Again there had been much lower readings earlier in the winter. In fact I've seen more snow and lower temperatures in May before 

Did enjoy yesterday though which was the first sunny weekend day in almost two months  Had to go out to Aboyne though, where there was not that much snow but enough (5-6cm or so) to give decent wintry scenes and the loch was completely frozen over, which was really surprising given that the temperature only managed to get down to about -3C/-4C. Truly woeful for an area where a January cold spell should be giving minus double digits without too much difficulty.

A beyond lamentable total of five air frosts here this non-winter which is the second worst in my records, at this point, with last year the only worse winter. Even 2013/14 had managed nine by now  However last winter saw a change in fortunes at this point with a frosty week of weather and the second half turning out colder than average. With more absolutely disgusting, frost free muck lying ahead, by the end of this week this car crash of a winter will be sitting in its rightful place at the bottom of the pile 

Right, that's me done for now. Not saying we won't get any cold spell, but I have lost interest in following every run trying to search for one.

Incidentally, it's 9c here & raining. It's the worst conceivable sort of weather in winter. Because of that stubborn block to the SE, the rain band can't move through so it's sliding N-S, giving us a period of sh*teness today that's longer in duration than we otherwise would have had.

Aye. If it happens, it happens. 

Should had been heavy snow all day today while NE America is mild.  At least when it mild there it doesn't rain always so there some nice sunshine days.