Turning Colder Thursday - Wintry Showers/Snow to High Ground

catrat12 wrote: »

Dublin mountains likely to see any snow today

It looks like something might be happening up there now. View from Blackrock just now.

IMG_3446[1].JPG

catrat12 wrote: »

Dublin mountains likely to see any snow today

I couldn't tell if that was a question or a statement.
Icey rain throughout the morning here.

cold miserable rain in North Dublin

Was gonna take the kids out but that rain has turned it from tolerable to unbearable.

Fire on. Stay warm everyone.

That was some frost this morning too.

4c cold rain

Snowing near the Wicklow gap for the last hour or more. Not sticking though yet. I'm about 270m. Mountain tops have been white since yesterday from about 500m and higher.

sryanbruen wrote: »

Snow sticking around Sally Gap. Roads quite icy.

Great shots of the white gold. Be careful up there. Not jealous at all

Graces7 wrote: »

Reading the met ie page as darkness falls, makes for wondering what we will find at dawn tomorrow.

Wet ground and certainly not snow unless you're fairly high up a mountain.

Sea surface temperatures showing how the Irish Sea is likely to warm any onshore flow rather substantially, colder pockets in North Sea allowed for similar setup to produce some settling snow in northern parts of East Anglia as well as on higher ground south of London.

http://www.meteociel.fr/observations-meteo/temperature-de-la-mer.php?region=uk

Recent reports of gusts to 109 km/hr at Malin Head and 95 at Donegal airport, similar Belmullet and Valentia.

Low has moved up the east coast of England to near Newcastle and will now head west and southwest across Pennines into north Wales, central pressure already a bit below 970 mbs.

That Euro chart from 8-9 days ago showing a hurricane over the Irish Sea wasn't all that far off considering what other guidance was then showing. It was a 950 mb monster with 140 km/hr winds but still, just somewhat overdone (as well as no hint of its taking a cyclonic loop south, it was supposed to be moving into north Leinster after map time -- think it was a depiction for tomorrow night also, so a bit late on the timing).

Your recent snow pictures look pretty similar to what I've been seeing here for the past 2-3 weeks.

Pretzill wrote: »

Anyone else experiencing far worse wind than forecast - our shed roof is doing one, one sheet of corrugated iron at a time? We are miles from the coast - Sligo 90m asl

I don't recall a northerly wind this strong in recent years, it would be a different exposure to strong winds for most as compared to typical windy weather.

Malin Head gusting to 111 km/hr last hour.

There could be some surprisingly strong gusts for the Wicklow coast later when the low gets a bit closer and the gradient over the Irish Sea tightens up. Direction will be NNE.

A rough night ahead for many.

Dead calm here with freezing fog slowly lifting, rather odd to be thinking about a windstorm when there is zero air movement outside your house.

Gone to the dogs altogether in north Dublin. Cold rain with a hard wind.

M.T. Cranium wrote: »

I don't recall a northerly wind this strong in recent years, it would be a different exposure to strong winds for most as compared to typical windy weather.

Malin Head gusting to 111 km/hr last hour.

There could be some surprisingly strong gusts for the Wicklow coast later when the low gets a bit closer and the gradient over the Irish Sea tightens up. Direction will be NNE.

A rough night ahead for many.

Dead calm here with freezing fog slowly lifting, rather odd to be thinking about a windstorm when there is zero air movement outside your house.

If I remember correctly you're in the Interior. I always enjoyed the winter trips up into the Okanagan, a much drier cold compared to the damp muck often found in Vancouver/lower mainland, which was an improvement over the regular weather I experienced growing up in Derry.

Moving to Canada and getting warmer winters. Whoda thunkit?

Kermit.de.frog wrote: »

The only signal I see out my window is this one.



Not sure if connected.

Your funny

Rebelbrowser wrote: »

MT, I've just posted in other threads about signals for an epic christmas period easterly appearing now on the (coughs) CFS. Do you see any signals at all that might support that?

There's blocking high pressure appearing near the end of the GFS run (20th) but it's over Britain and Ireland, so easterly would be further south into parts of southern France and Iberia.

I think in general there will be alternating zonal and blocked intervals for much of the winter with best chances of a good wintry spell coming later, after mid-January and into February.

It's not a closed case against that CFS scenario working out by any means, a blocking pattern at 16 days can certainly evolve in terms of location and overall shape, a few days ago the GFS was showing the first stages of what you're describing around day 16 (which would now be around day 9-10) but that was pulled back and out of view in later model runs.

The jet stream around the hemisphere seems a bit prone to buckling (favoring blocking) and for this time of year it seems a bit sluggish, all good signs for long-range prospects. Another factor that I think is positive would be the rapid momentum of the freeze-up across the western arctic including Hudson Bay, momentum is a good sign as it tends to be a conservative feature. This could favor development of a blocking high near Greenland over time.

This current episode is also a good thing because seasonal patterns tend to repeat at intervals, and next time we get something like this, with colder seas and more potent arctic air masses, it could be quite wintry (at lower elevations too).

It has certainly locked into winter earlier than some years hereabouts, we have had snow cover and freezing temperatures more or less continuously since about the 10th of November. Under a mild upper inversion lid and clear skies, getting a lot of ice fog as a result, with some clear intervals mainly around early afternoons.