Turning Colder Thursday - Wintry Showers/Snow to High Ground

mcburns07

daydorunrun wrote: »

Never understood that expression. You always know what your going to get with a box of chocolates if you can read....there's a little menu, either in the box or printed on it.

rundaydorun

circadian

snowstorm445 wrote: »

Had a lot of fun in December 2000, plenty of snow in Cork around then if I remember, made a few snowmen. One of my earliest memories actually.

Christmas Day 1995 I was just three weeks old. But I remember my Mum saying it was a very chilly month overall.

Thanks for making me feel old. Christmas day 1995 was a particularly good one, winter 2000 was a long bout of cold if I remember correctly.

sryanbruen

Slashermcguirk wrote: »

This thread tends to be full of negativity, it’s par for the course. It’s the 1st December and technically first day of winter and moaning already begins‚ In fact it started in Autumn!

Not moaning, stating facts here for my backyard which is all that matters on the internet.

For real though, standard cold zonality we see every single winter with marginal slush away from the north and any sign of something that deviates from that i.e. easterlies, the continent is far too mild and the air that would be drawn would cause constant cold rain showers on east coasts. Talking foreseeable future here, not the whole of the season. If the pattern were to sustain long enough, proper cold air would eventually be drawn in that way ("short term pain, long term gain") but that is always highly unlikely.

The more I get older, the more I hate winter anyway.

Nqp15hhu

Hmmm from memory last February and March had a few events of snow especially on the hills.

I believe Christmas Day 2004 was also snowy in some places too.

sryanbruen

Nqp15hhu wrote: »

Hmmm from memory last February.

Yes, Storm Ciara cheap Atlantic muck polar maritime northwesterly that you kept getting confused over as late January was better than it for snow despite the former being colder.

Graces7

daydorunrun wrote: »

Never understood that expression. You always know what your going to get with a box of chocolates if you can read....there's a little menu, either in the box or printed on it.

Maybe a better one " Like a Lucky Dip."

sparrowcar

daydorunrun wrote: »

Never understood that expression. You always know what your going to get with a box of chocolates if you can read....there's a little menu, either in the box or printed on it.

In the era Forest Gump was set chocolates generally didn't have a flavour card. You bought a box of chocolates and were surprised by each one... hence the saying makes sense if you lived in that era.

CountNjord

Graces7 wrote: »

Hastily mentally checking to see if there is anything I absolutely need this week from over the water.... the ferry will be fine but the roads may not be...

Already stocked, and everything by the dwelling.... Let it rip! Maybe that last snowman I have been hankering for for years will get built..

I took this either last year or the one before... Hoping we do better than this

And there will be great delight here....

snowstorm445 wrote: »

Had a lot of fun in December 2000, plenty of snow in Cork around then if I remember, made a few snowmen. One of my earliest memories actually.

Christmas Day 1995 I was just three weeks old. But I remember my Mum saying it was a very chilly month overall.

I remember that month well lol I was standing outside Sir Henry's Saturday night's off Barrack Street, freezing cold and the music pumping outside, doors shuddering and what an atmosphere in Cork back then.

The lights etc memories huh

Slashermcguirk

Who cares if some of it was in March, how is that relevant? Snow events are snow events. That’s like saying a heat wave in late May happened but it doesn’t count as summer weather. I couldn’t care less if it snowed at Easter.

Also 2018 was much more than a few days, there was a load of snow in both February and March.

John O.Groats wrote: »

Yes but as has been pointed out already that biblical snowfall in 2018 happened in early March which is technically spring not winter and disruptive and all as it was it only lasted a handful of days before the vast majority of it had melted away. Unlike what happened in the depths of winter in 2010 and to a lesser extent in 2009 and for those of us who can remember it back in Jan 1982 as well.

BLIZZARD7

Whether or not some locations get lucky at the end of the week/weekend may be irrelevant if this is part of a broader transition into a colder pattern.

Re lack of cold air: yes the continent to our east has a lack of cold upper air at the moment, but quite a few models are showing a greeny high and a North/North easterly being the route to real cold. I can't help but feel positive at the moment though as the outlook is far better than we have seen in recent Decembers. Lots of chances for ninja snow and the longer range picture developing is certainly promising. No real mild weather on the horizon.

Oneiric 3

This is a bog standard NW'ly on offer, and not even a potent one at that. Fail to see what all the excitement is about to be honest. Bog standard miserable chilly polar maritime air that serves no purpose but to kill everything that it touches.

sdanseo

Oneiric 3 wrote: »

This is a bog standard NW'ly on offer, and not even a potent one at that. Fail to see what all the excitement is about to be honest. Bog standard miserable chilly polar maritime air that serves no purpose but to kill everything that it touches.

It's because it's the first one of the year, novelty about it.

Happens annually. Then followed by 6 or 7 weeks straight of snow on Kippure or Mount Leinster or Errigal above 500m visible to all and none of it ever makes it to ground.

But don't begrudge anyone the discussion or the hopefulness etc. Sure that's why we're here on this forum. Hopefully this year will be a bit different. Some encouraging signs.

Oneiric 3

BLIZZARD7 wrote: »

Whether or not some locations get lucky at the end of the week/weekend may be irrelevant if this is part of a broader transition into a colder pattern.

Re lack of cold air: yes the continent to our east has a lack of cold upper air at the moment, but quite a few models are showing a greeny high and a North/North easterly being the route to real cold. I can't help but feel positive at the moment though as the outlook is far better than we have seen in recent Decembers. Lots of chances for ninja snow and the longer range picture developing is certainly promising. No real mild weather on the horizon.

Regardless of uppers, the east of the continent in particular can, under the right conditions, cool down very rapidly at this time of year. An infiltration of cold Arctic uppers later would only enhance that cold further. These things take time.

What.Now

Graces7 wrote: »

Pessimism is not allowed.

2020

sryanbruen

BLIZZARD7 wrote: »

Whether or not some locations get lucky at the end of the week/weekend may be irrelevant if this is part of a broader transition into a colder pattern.

Re lack of cold air: yes the continent to our east has a lack of cold upper air at the moment, but quite a few models are showing a greeny high and a North/North easterly being the route to real cold. I can't help but feel positive at the moment though as the outlook is far better than we have seen in recent Decembers. Lots of chances for ninja snow and the longer range picture developing is certainly promising. No real mild weather on the horizon.

The lack of cold air matters if we draw in a direct easterly akin to the GFS 18z of last night, again speaking IMBYism with the whole cold rain showers scenario like how Nov 2018 was. The only worse thing than that in my opinion is a mild and dry Bartlett high drawing in damp southwesterlies.

A northeasterly is better than a direct easterly this time of year I find as a northeasterly will bring in colder air quicker. GFS 06z was a good scenario, half decent cold air drawn in from the northeast as compared to the pathetic easterly on the 18z I mentioned.

No real mild weather as you say but not especially too cold either...

Nqp15hhu

Hmmm, it’s hard to know what will happen. Again the ICON has freezing levels of 400-500m on Thursday, so would that not suggest snow to relatively low levels? I mean the snow will not turn to rain that quickly.

Met Office for NI:

“ Wednesday:

A bright day with a mixture of sunny intervals and showers most frequent in west. The showers turning to snow on hills, perhaps lower ground in the evening. Maximum temperature 8 °C.”

Slashermcguirk

Its just great to see Met Eireann with the mention of wintry showers already in the 1st week of December. Good way to start the winter. I see way out east the temperatures are starting to drop. Moscow up until a week ago was still showing +3 and + 4 degrees, suddenly over the coming week they are seeing day time highs of -6 and night time temps below -10.

The cold has to start somewhere. Oslo also starting to see its first snowfall of the winter. Poland looking very mild but parts of Germany like Munich starting to push down towards 0.

I really think December could be an interesting month.

Meteorite58

Cold air mass just off the NW to follow the weak cold front and spread down over Ireland.

Meteorite58

The title might need to be amended as flooding would not appear to be an issue, unless we get a fast big melt from tons of snow on the mountains :pac:

A good seasonal opener indeed and continuing cold into next week. I was thinking best chance of wintry precipitation Weds night in the NW, N and increasingly so into Thurs. Further down the country early Thurs probably quite wet with sleet in places and bit of snow on higher ground, maybe a decent amount of snow in the NW, N by morning. Munster might hold some promise on higher ground for something settling for a time early Thurs. Wintry showers on the coasts, more so the N, NW, W, SW for the rest of the day as most of the country has good clear cold spells. Hail showers look to be a feature around the coast, more so the W of the country, might get some local sudden white outs with tricky driving conditions. Windy along the coasts feeling bitter.

Fair Windchill over the coming days. Wintry precipitation looks a lot less if any over the weekend being less cold with less precipitation. Looks like a v cold night Sun into Mon.

CAPE levels will produce big convective showers around the coast, should have some big hail showers, remains to be seen if some showers briefly become electrified, more chance of this over water or just on the coasts I reckon.











https://twitter.com/metoffice/status/1333825692186894336?s=20

Captain Snow

Thursday Night/Morning seems to be when we will see some white stuff...

Higher ground will do well.

JanuarySnowstor

Prolonged sleet and hill snow across Munster early Thursday. It could well catch many out particularly as most are expecting anything further North!

Nqp15hhu

I wouldn’t be surprised if the hills in the North and NW have a covering on Thursday morning down to 300m.

Gaoth Laidir

Looking upstream, some intense dry cold is in place over southern Greenland, as shown by the Narsarsuaq sounding from 12Z today. 850 hPa temperature of -14 C there, with surface dewpoint lower again. It's >2000 km from Ireland, so it's all down to how much modification will occur.

Meteorite58

ICON holding firm on some very windy weather Friday night into Saturday morning , windy but less so from ARPEGE ,ECM and UKMO.

Gaoth Laidir

Met Éireann's aviation chart for midnight shows a sharp temperature gradient along the cold front, which is shown moving southeastwards at 20 knots. The freezing level varies from 9000 ft in Limerick to 4000 ft just offshore Belmullet. It's 2000 ft out at 60N 15W.

SleetAndSnow

First driving lesson since lockdown at 9am.on Thursday here in Cork City, guessing we can just expect a cold and possibly wet morning but won't be snowy? Judging off the charts anyway.

Nqp15hhu

The WRF is quite a bit colder than the ICON. With Ulster being one of the coldest places in the isles.

850pHa <-6c
500-1000 = <520dam
Freezing level <300metres

Not sure what model to believe but that would surely bring snow right down to sea level, maybe even lying snow.

An Ri rua

White Clover wrote: »

Is this event moreso for the Northern part of the Country?

Snow doesn't respect borders (except near Cork boy). #We'reallinthistogether.

Graces7

Roused by sudden wind hurling heavy wet missiles at the windows.

IT IS SO COLD! Breathing in is a chilly adventure.

The tide is incoming, and crashing rocks about below me.

Gone are the long, peaceful days and silent nights.. Westerly winds, and the risk of hail... Winter reigns.

West Mayo offshore

M.T. Cranium

Lots of cold air coming south but much of it wasted over the central portions of the Atlantic, only indirect hits of this cold air can be expected in coming days although it will certainly feel raw and cold -- we are going to be in that narrow zone between mild winter conditions and true winter as in Dec 2010.

Some more promising charts towards end of current GFS run (around 17th Dec), still on the milder side of a boundary at that point but a lot of very cold air available over regions just north of Ireland. With the GFS it's always a wait and see on their spectacular cold depictions, of course if it shows extraordinary warmth you can lock it in.

Big geomagnetic storm underway, luckily the CME pointed straight left from the Sun when it happened the other day so no big impacts on the grid likely, but next night or two could have auroral displays. I was just out for a look, not happening here yet (forecast to begin very soon though), full moon high overhead almost (25 deg declination now, higher than the mid-June sun).