Strong Winds for Munster, Connacht and Leinster : PM 17th/AM 18th, Jan 2018

Meteorite58 · 14-01-2018 12:14pm #1

This seems to be shaping up to being potentially quite stormy for Ireland Weds evening/ Thurs morning. A bit off yet but worth opening a thread to watch it's development over the coming days and to gather peoples views and insight . The title can be changed in due course.

So coming into a period of time where we are under the influence of a very strong W / NW airflow over the coming days and under a very strong jet stream.

The models have been showing an area of LP developing and deepening very quickly as it passes close to Ireland around Weds evening /early Thursday and the models although showing different tracks and intensity as you would expect this far out all show some impact on Ireland.

This was first being shown further S so will it continue to drift further N ?

850 hPa winds

GFS showing a similar track

squarecircles · 14-01-2018 12:35pm

The ICON model was showing damaging & disruptive winds across Ireland last night.

Elmer Blooker · 14-01-2018 1:05pm

MetE issued at 1130.

Wednesday night: There is some uncertainty regarding the details at present, but a potentially disruptive period of weather is possible on Wednesday night as a deepening Atlantic depression tracks near to or perhaps even over some parts of Ireland bringing spells of rain and very strong winds.

Still uncertain so the forecast on RTE in an hour isn't really going to tell us anything. It might be Tuesday before we will know the path of this storm.

I can only describe that forecast by Siobhan Ryan as very odd! She showed a chart with the storm brewing in mid Atlantic and the next chart showed it near Denmark and barely mentioned what will happen in between?

malinheader · 14-01-2018 1:23pm

Large sea swell predicted too. Swell of 9 metres plus forecast for the NW coast. A good few years since this has happened here.

malinheader · 14-01-2018 2:46pm

Nearly touching 10 metres now.Going to be a bad one.

JCX BXC · 14-01-2018 2:49pm

Twud be just like it for a storm to creep up on us in such a fashion.

Gaoth Laidir · 14-01-2018 2:59pm

ECM not good for the west. 14-metre significant wave heights (so double that possible for individual waves) and winds gusting 120-130 kph. Cameras out and all off to Lahinch again...

munsterlegend · 14-01-2018 3:03pm

Gaoth Laidir wrote: »

ECM not good for the west. 14-metre significant wave heights (so double that possible for individual waves) and winds gusting 120-130 kph. Cameras out and all off to Lahinch again..

Is this storm more a northern half of the country event? Or has ecm it further south?

Gaoth Laidir · 14-01-2018 3:11pm

munsterlegend wrote: »

Is this storm more a northern half of the country event? Or has ecm it further south?

It's really the tight gradient between the low well north of Scotland and the Azores high that has strong winds across the whole of Ireland.

amandstu · 14-01-2018 3:26pm

Does this look like it can also cause a big surge in the English Channel? Bristol Channel?

Meteorite58 · 14-01-2018 5:02pm

The latest GFS has intensified the storm and kept it's track more or less.

More runs needed , time for change one way or the other.

Meteorite58 · 14-01-2018 5:08pm

The ICON 12Z for comparison.

sdanseo · 14-01-2018 5:09pm

amandstu wrote: »

Does this look like it can also cause a big surge in the English Channel? Bristol Channel?

Luckily for them, Ireland takes the brunt and shelters England a good bit. However depending on wind direction South Wales / Devon & Cornwall would be very much in the firing line (this is illustrated well by GFS chart posted above).

scooby77 · 14-01-2018 5:10pm

Early days I know, but what level of alert do those more informed than I think may be called by Met Eireann?
(This amateur thinking Amber, hoping not red!)

sdanseo · 14-01-2018 5:16pm

Meteorite58 wrote: »

The ICON 12Z for comparison.

scooby77 wrote: »

Early days I know, but what level of alert do those more informed than I think may be called by Met Eireann?
(This amateur thinking Amber, hoping not red!)

ICON does seem to overdo winds a bit, but if that came off it would be a red warning for Donegal, Sligo, Mayo, Galway.

Meteorite58 · 14-01-2018 5:17pm

scooby77 wrote: »

Early days I know, but what level of alert do those more informed than I think may be called by Met Eireann?
(This amateur thinking Amber, hoping not red!)

Really too early to call. This could drift more North or hold it's track more or less. It could intensify or lesson . It is looking potentially dangerous to say the least coupled with very high seas.

nacho libre · 14-01-2018 7:41pm

I wonder will we have another sting jet scenario with this system if it deepens as projected to?

Gaoth Laidir · 14-01-2018 8:17pm

nacho libre wrote: »

I wonder will we have another sting jet scenario with this system if it deepens as projected to?

Most likely yes. Dangerously so. The ECM 12Z shows it up now. Donegal Airport will be interesting to monitor if this happens.

Meteorite58 · 14-01-2018 8:23pm

The ECM 12Z has deepened the storm more and sooner then previous runs. Moving fast, I see it is down to about 955 hPa after the center passes Scotland. Similar track to the last run if a bit further North. At this stage showing some damaging winds especially in the NW and N. Looking like the most potent storm yet this winter.

The 12Z ECM has intensified this since the last run.

sdanseo · 14-01-2018 8:31pm

Nasty little kink in the isobars here over the Donegal Bay at +63 on the GEM. I'm not advanced enough to know what this signifies (sting jet etc) other than the tightening of gradient and therefore stronger winds.

airpressure.063.png

Meteorite58 · 14-01-2018 8:32pm

Meteorite58 · 14-01-2018 8:37pm

https://twitter.com/metoffice/status/952610270463037441

nacho libre · 14-01-2018 9:08pm

So a red warning might well be issued for the north west. The gust recorded at Knock recently could well be exceeded by this storm.

Donegal Storm · 14-01-2018 9:09pm

Really wish I was back in Donegal for the next few days, storm force winds, huge swells, thunderstorms, violent hail squalls, maybe some snow, plenty of interesting weather to look forward to in the west between tomorrow and Friday.

This one looks like more of a traditional storm with a large and prolonged windfield, not like the recent events that passed in a couple of hours and only affected small areas. As mentioned, they usually end up further north on the day but even if it does it's still looking very windy pretty much everywhere

Tuesday night is looking really windy as well with gusts up to 130kph on the coast

Meteorite58 · 14-01-2018 9:23pm

Yes we wont be able to keep up with the warnings over the next few days

scooby77 · 14-01-2018 9:40pm

Meteorite58 wrote: »

Yes we wont be able to keep up with the warnings over the next few days

Really don't want Red for wind in Northwest....that would mean closing the school-too much disruption already this academic year!

sdanseo · 14-01-2018 9:46pm

scooby77 wrote: »

Really don't want Red for wind in Northwest....that would mean closing the school-too much disruption already this academic year!

It's significantly more preferable than the danger of trees landing on people. 3 or 4 missed days over the course of a full year should be easily made up.

malinheader · 14-01-2018 9:50pm

sdanseo wrote: »

It's significantly more preferable than the danger of trees landing on people. 3 or 4 missed days over the course of a full year should be easily made up.

Theres not many trees left where i am:D:D:D

Oneiric 3 · 14-01-2018 10:54pm

It's interesting that before the 'the big wind' back in 1839, that there was a fall of snow over much of the country, most likely from a cold zonal westerly. If I remember correctly, there was also cold zonality with snow shortly before 'storm Darwin' hit back in Feb '14, which suggests that explosive depressions coming up against a cold air mass over the vicinity of Ireland have a greater chance of becoming potentially serious 'bombs'.

M.T. Cranium · 14-01-2018 10:54pm

There is still quite a spread in model guidance when you look at the lesser lights, more support for GFS than ECM on track, but two out of the seven that I consulted have no real development at all. The NAVGEM looked most intense and produces a track through northern portions of Ireland. The GEM is least intense.

Given that the Arpege has drifted more in line with GFS, and that UKMO and JMA are similar, this seems to be the more favoured track but ECM has the best reputation.

Lone wolf victories for GEM are about an annual occurrence in this battle of the models.

I just had a close look at the start of 18z model runs and satellite imagery maps available for western Atlantic and found that the wave in question appears to be the complex southwest of Bermuda on this imagery:

https://weather.gc.ca/data/satellite/goes_eusa_1070_100.jpg

but you can see that it has two distinct centres and not much of a pressure gradient yet which is presumably the source of the model guidance spread.

Just watching the 18z GFS rolling out to nearly 72h, track looks unchanged so far.

M.T. Cranium · 14-01-2018 11:00pm

In terms of disruption, won't most of the strong winds occur at night if the timing is correct? Not sure why school closings would be needed if the guidance looks the same on Tuesday night as it does now. The strongest winds in Donegal would be around midnight 17th-18th.

Strong Winds for Munster, Connacht and Leinster : PM 17th/AM 18th, Jan 2018

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