I have never been one to put a huge amount of faith in the GFS 06z runs, any more than I trust their 18z "pub run" counterparts.

AFAIK, the GFS op runs that normally verify the best are the 00z and 12z runs, with the 00z slightly ahead of the 12z when it comes to accuracy.

Indeed shocking ecm tonight . It's all very frustrating as there is so much heat to our near south we just need the Azores high to build in but it seems incapable of doing so at the moment. 

I guess, that's just standard fayre for a typical British summer, esecially at this end of the UK.

Indeed and my fear is the poor weather the north has suffered recently is only heading one way and that's south. Just hoping the ecm is very wrong tonight. It's been a good summer here so far. A few more days of heat then the outlook looks decidedly iffy.

Ecm Means look pretty ordinary quite poor really especially for the north. 

http://old.wetterzentrale.de/pics/Reem1681.html

http://old.wetterzentrale.de/pics/Reem2162.html

The worst thing about that as well is that it is then during the winter that the Azores High seems to show its hand these days, thereby ruining our chances of a cold winter by doing so.

564 thickness remains just to the north of the south and south east til Saturday.

Should be quite warm.

Finally the ecm allows the Azores high to build in its day 8 so still huge doubt . But if it does happen we will get one hell of a heatwave as the heat to our south is insane. 

http://old.wetterzentrale.de/pics/Recm1921.html

http://old.wetterzentrale.de/pics/Recm2401.html

Yes half decent this morning from the ecm not as good as last night but still ok especially for the south less so for the north.

http://old.wetterzentrale.de/pics/Recm1681.html

http://old.wetterzentrale.de/pics/Recm2161.html

Next week looks mixed but there are already signs of high pressure building back from the southwest. May be not too bad at all in the south. This is turning into a very good summer in the south.

With summers tending to get into repeating fashions I fully expect this one to turn out to be if not a classic, certainly a very good one with a real prospect of some proper heat in the next 2 months or so.

Summers also in recent years have continued into early October so in my view we are looking good for the rest of summer 2017.

Yup - I noticed this in late March when we were hitting high teens etc and someone mentioned that Tenerfife hit 34.5C in the first week of March.

To me those were signs that the Azores High was strong then.

As you say - all we need is for it to build over us and give us 6 weeks of uniterrupted  warm weather and sunshine and I hope I am not disappointed.

Hear hear, Gavin.

As I commented in the media thread earlier today, the MetO have been consistently talking about a more general improvement in the weather over much of the UK as we head into the second half of July and have been saying this since around the time of the mid-June hot spell. So hopefully they are onto something with this.

TBH GEFS12z doesn't look great but that's been the case a few times this in the last month or so. I don't know what the stats say but around here it feels like the best start to summer since 2003 or 2007(?).

The hotter spells have appeared at fairly short notice this summer and GFS hasn't always been at the party til quite late. The presence and consistency of the Azores ridge is doubtless affecting GFS usually default westerly summer pattern!

Agreed Dave like this week hot spell I think there will be another one at mid-July.  Got 32.6C on Thurs and 31.1C on Friday so a good results in a short notice hot spell.

quoting myself from the 26th june

The heatwave just passed was picked up by the emc to start with and I even mentioned it in here. But nobody took notice until the gfs started hinting at a few days later!

Summer continues unabated here in the southeast. Despite the 'cooler' feel now temperatures can still be expected to reach 26c (79f) today and 28c (82f) tomorrow. The heat this year since March has been effortless down here.

Nothing too troubling for the foreseeable. 

Continued short notice waves of heat can be expected in the largely slack regime. 

Ecm builds in the Azores high very nicely end of next week . High 20s again in the South.

http://old.wetterzentrale.de/pics/Recm1681.html

http://old.wetterzentrale.de/pics/Recm2161.html