Q? Are you replying to Gandalf or is this your signature? 

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"I'm not making excuses for anything, you moronic little child.

I'm going to block you because your approach to wrecking threads is seriously tedious."

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Weird, I hadn’t even noticed that...shows how rather weather obsessed / focussed I am. Presume this was some past spat. It amazes me how the internet posting of forums, emails, blogs and posts, on things as benign as the weather, create such heat and tensions. It’s something to do with the fact as humans, 67% of communication is non verbal: Without the context afforded by body language, facial queues and gestures, the printed word is interpreted as 30% more hostile that it is intended, so a friendly email is read as deadpan, and a deadpan email is read as curt, and a curt email as rude and a rude email as hostile/ aggressive. All strange - but true: Luckily - I am oblivious most of the time, so did not even notice. I love reading the posts on this forum 99% of the time, and there is some really great humour at times: I guess even close knit families fall out occasionally.

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Looking at the GFS, GEM and ECM, at FI - the trend remains for settled high pressure dominance with a hint of the intense cold to our east by then, being advected towards us...for the 10th...butuntil then, we should see some decent spring weather - enough to burst the buds of the elder bush, hawthorn and bring out the blackthorn blossom. Brimstone butterflies will be out (saw one yesterday), and even the peacocks may be tempted out. Crocus and dwarf blue iris already joining the snow-drops. What a contrast from last week.😃

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Not much of a hint - more of a steady withdrawal on this chart http://www.wxmaps.org/pix/temp4 but certainy dry away from NI & NW Scotland (and our irises were out in late January!) 

Quick round-up of the main charts

GFS - HP over Europe with SW-lies to Fri 26th, then HP coming up from S to settle over UK - it moves around a bit but eventually gives way to a weak trough Mon 8th with weak N-lies appearing

GEFS - slight dip in temps Fri 26th but otherwise good agreement on mild through to Fri 5th after which much scatter, mean close to norm but not meaning very much. Op is the one to watch if you want cold at end of period. Very little rain, chance of a bit more in S around Tue 9th, a day or two earlier in Scotland which also has its own wet day this week Wed 24th.

ECM - much as GFS

 

 

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Game on for Quantum's Siberian High again this morning. If it does make it, it could be quite a shock to nature after Spring has sprung now

 

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Bumble bees are active here and the daffs are in bloom.  

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The siberian high is still there, however we are starting to run out of time for favourable corrections to the position to get that cold air in W russia advected towards us.

The problem is that Canadian cold pool, spinning up LPs in the atlantic and southern arctic. Still, over the last 24 hours there have been slow incrimental upgrades which is a good sign.

 

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When I first started posting about the S high, the action was in the 240-270h range. Now its in the 192-222 type range. Still FI but getting to the point where very large synoptic corrections become less likely.

The good news is that we don't need a very large correction and if the upgrades continue we might get there.

But time is starting to run out.

For me personally a regular run of the mill northerly or scandi easterly won't cut it in early March. I want that siberian airsource.

 

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This isn't ideal.

See the black area in W siberia, that's where the really cold air is.

Siberian high has diminished too early so keeps the real cold locked up. Scandi high is forming and does have cold air on its southern side, but ideally we want the scandi high to be an extension of the S high at this stage.

The difference will be -25C uppers getting into Europe vs -35C uppers.

For the UK downstream that's -10C uppers vs -15C uppers.

Its an upgrade on the 0Z though.

 

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You can see the cold pool from siberia being stretched. It will eventually split, and we will get the weaker secondary cold pool. Again a shame, but we could still upgrade.

Regarding the canadian cold pool, its further west on the 6Z which is good but I don't like the fact its sitting over the Baffin. It will spin LPs up which will run across the southern atlantic arctic and weaken any connection between the subtropical high and siberian high.

It was alot worse on the 0Z though.

We are making slow improvements.

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GFSP is interesting. Would you call this a Sciberian high?

Again its not ideal but the more eastward position at this late stage means uppers will be colder.

-32C uppers manage to get into Europe, so 5C+ degrees colder just by a slight change in position.

 

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This is kind of ironic, we are getting close to a spoiler greenland high

We don't want a GH developing at this stage and introducing relatively mild northerlies!

 

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OK neither GFS gets there.

GFS has it collapsing and sending the cold to E europe

GFSP has a spoiler greenland high that gives us a milder northerly.

 

But in terms of the bigger picture, both are upgrades on the 0Z set. Both have weaker Canadian cold pools and further west, both have stronger and better positioned siberian highs.

So we could still get there provided the upgrades continue.

And we are all aware stunning charts can suddenly pop up in the 180-192 hour range.

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Look from the ensembles:

Some key features:

Red over the UK/S scandi: High heights asociated with WAA and a deep developing anticyclone

Blue over most of Russia: Shallow anticyclone and cold core upper trough. Asociated with very cold air

Red over arctic: Extension of anticyclone into the siberian arctic. Wamer air here, deeper anticyclone.

Blue over the Hudson: Spoiler cold pool/ cold core deep LP. We want this to stay over land (or sea ice) and be as far away as possible.

 

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One thing the GFS won't take into account is the effect of the cold air on sea ice in the baffin.

Thicker, more extensive sea ice developing over the Baffin will lessen the impact of the spoiler cold pool and cyclogenesis will be weaker.

Weaker cyclogenesis over E canada means less trough activity over the southern arctic which in turn means better connection between heights over the UK and the siberian high.

Sea ice is currently well below average over the baffin and E canada in particular.

So there is the most potential for sea ice growth here. The more sea ice growth the better for us.

 

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GFS Control. We can do alot better. Again Cold air from siberia pinched off before getting into Europe. A cold pool of -24C is perhaps not to be sniffed at, but we can be 10C colder if the Siberian high aligns right.

 

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It looks like Hamburg is going to smash its all-time February high of 17.2C today. It's already up to 17C and weather.com is predicting a high of 19C. Their forecast highs for the next 3 days:

23rd: 17C
24th: 18C
25th: 16C

Crazy.

Especially given the recent cold.

I see Q just made 10 successive contributions. Very impressive

Hamburg-Neuwiedenthal reporting 20.2C at 1200 UTC!

Wow! The ease in which warm records are broken these days really is quite something. 

 

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06z Op run is odd one out. But will the 12z Op run join the trend the Para and Control are going or will the Para and control back track to follow the Op run? hmm..

06z Para shows cold blocked weather from +282 with HP between Scotland and Iceland:

06z Control: - builds A huge Scandi high

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Yes, the beast is getting closer on the GEFS. Could be a really interesting month. 

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21C at Hamburg-Neuwiedenthal at 1400 UTC. Will it go any higher?

Hope it is though.

I dread the thought of a run of the mill greenland high or scandi high.

It would be miserably cold, but probably not much snow

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Looking at the charts full of Eastern Promise,, starting to fear a April 1989

Scenario.....it really will be like a team throwing all at the death at long last in injury time when they should have played like that during full time, only for the whistle to blow and itll be too late..

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