Hurricane-Force Wind Gusts Set To Blast Scotland While Blizzard Conditions Possible In Iceland

Written by on September 12, 2013 in Rest of Europe, United Kingdom & Ireland with 0 Comments

We’ve entered a far more active weather pattern over Northwest Europe in recent days and it’s about to get a whole lot more active through the later half of the upcoming weekend.

While a series of frontal systems cross the UK yesterday, today and tomorrow, a more interesting feature is currently crossing the North Atlantic and this is a feature which initially look harmless, may bring us the first autumn storm and even disruption. It’s as this circulation riding the jet stream begins to interact and pull in warm, moist air from the south and cold, dry air out of Greenland where the storm will begin to intensify as baroclinic contrast grows. As warm and cold meet with upper level divergence out ahead and with stronger heights over Europe, all the fine ingredients are coming together for powerful Atlantic low pressure development. The region between Scotland and Iceland will hoist the perfect environment within both the atmosphere and ocean where waters are considerably above normal, for a large and powerful storm.

Notice by Saturday, there’s seemingly nothing visible at 500mb crossing the N Atlantic but there is a lot of heat to the south and cold over Greenland which is tightening the jet and upper flow while isobars spread out over the UK. The spreading or fanning out of the upper flow ahead of a sharpening thermal contrast zone, creates an area primed for low pressure formation and rapid deepening.

ECMWF 500mb/850mb temps

48 hrs (Saturday)

ECM1-48

72 hrs (Saturday)

ECM1-72

At 48 hrs, the ECMWF surface chart (below) shows a heavy band of rain over the southern half of England which will clear into the North Sea and near continent. Notice even by later in the day Saturday, though lowering, they remain high between Scotland and Iceland while warm and cold merge, forcing the jet to excellerate. This increase in mid and upper energy will help form a surface low fast and the feedback of warm waters below will help in the rapid deepening process. Look out for bitterly cold temperatures Sunday morning over Greenland as the rapidly forming low draws cold air down over Greenland.

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

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After a wet, breezy day across Iceland and largely dry and bright with cool temperatures over the British Isles and Ireland, Saturday will make way to a calm start to Sunday but by the end of the day, it’s a very different story.

78 hrs (Sunday)

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

Monday shows a tightly wound 968mb gale centre north of Scotland and east of Iceland, bringing gales or severe gales and pulses of heavy rain. While it’s windswept rain at low levels, areas above 500ft may see snow and even blizzard conditions across central and northern Iceland. Local flooding is likely over Scotland, possibly Northern Ireland, northern England and north Wales

96 hrs (Monday)

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

102 hrs (Monday)

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

The model remains persistent with it’s bitterly cold 5,000ft temperatures over Iceland with 0C temperatures dropping down over the northern half of Britain on the backside of the low.

5,000ft temps at 96 hrs

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

Latest snow forecast through Tuesday.

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

Next week may see the NAO flip negative but not necessarily hold there as the monster gale centre carves out a deep trough which drives colder air southwards from Iceland all the way to France. This flow on the backside of the 968mb low will bring down the coldest air since May when it was considerably colder than normal. Expect biting northwest blowing all the way from the arctic with temperatures struggling to even reach 10C in London through the day Tuesday.

The GFS NAO/AO ensembles below show a sharp dip towards negative and it’s a storm like this one that can snap a certain type of pattern. We’re currently in a ‘positive side of neutral’ type pattern with a largely fast flowing west to east, progression setup with one front after the next sweeping through but get a convergence of baroclinic confliction ahead of higher pressure and energy converging and bundling, forced into a squeezed area of the atmosphere and you get a tightening low which has the ability of re-amplify an upper level pattern.

This setup early next week will have the ability to tap the much colder air situated over the far north.

NAO

nao_fcst

AO

ao_fcst

As you know, I am forecasting a below normal October temperature wise with the possibility early season snowfall with the initial onset of a high latitude blocking pattern. Though it’s unlikely to be cold throughout October, I do think we’ll see a spell of late autumn/early winter level cold with hill snow but a break comes in November but that break comes at the price of very wet conditions.

Here’s tonight’s run of the CFS. Note it has blocking but too far south. I think this is the right idea but it’s too far south with the blocking high.

cfs-3-10-2013

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