Just when you thought it couldn’t get much worse this March with just last week the Channel Islands was clobbered by it’s worst snowstorm in 26 years with drifts piled 8 feet high. Northern France was hardest hit with nearly 2 feet of accumulation and disruption was extensive through the Low Countries into Germany.
Just 6 days later and the arctic hound is roaring back yet again in a winter that doesn’t want to let go. While a tongue of cold air gets pulled south on the backside of the low centred over the Irish Sea, a major plunge of arctic air is bringing mid-winter cold now to eastern parts of Europe with major snows affecting life from Russia to Hungary.
Today’s setup over the UK sees warm, moist spread from north over Britain producing a soaker of a day across much of England and Wales but as this streams north, so cold, dry air feeds down from the north where temperatures fell to -6C in Inverness overnight, as the moisture bumps up against the cold air sitting over Northern England and Southern Scotland heavy snow has broken out as a result and it’s causing travel issues and may well dump as much as half a foot of snow in the higher stretches of the Cumbrian Fells and Southern Uplands.
I drove along the A75 between Dumfries and Stranraer this morning and even at sea level, there was about 1-2 inches of lying snow which slowed travel down.
Here are a few photos capturing the heavy snow along the A75 near Creetown which is beside the Solway Firth (around sea level!)
Courtesy of Mark Vogan
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Courtesy of Mark Vogan
This was on the A77 over higher ground between Cairnryan and Ballantrae. (Below)
Courtesy of Mark Vogan
Courtesy of Mark Vogan
This week remains on track for potentially a repeat of the week just gone. Another wave of fresh arctic air will sweep down over Britain and Ireland early to mid week and with a lot of fresh snow today, this may help produce overnight lows back into the -8 to -13C range across Southern Scotland and Northern England through next week. That’s if skies clear and winds are light. The atmosphere looks very similar to early last week when it hit -13C in Aboyne and -12C in East Ayrshire. 850mb temperatures of -10C or colder are once again projected by the models, so prepare for some more very cold nights.
Thankfully days will warm somewhat as the strength of the mid March sun will be noticeable.
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