It was yet another weekend with wind and rain a dominant feature across the UK and Ireland. There is good and bad new through the upcoming 7 days. The bad news is that we will continue to see fronts sweep wind and rain across Ireland and the UK and with sunshine returning to many areas that have been swamped the last 2-3 days, these same areas get another soaking over a 3 or 4 hour period tonight and overnight. What’s the good news you ask? Well the worst hit areas of the UK catch a break relatively speaking. By that I mean, we don’t get anywhere near the same rains seen recently but it will rain.
See today’s video
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This pattern is a less extreme version as before. We continue to see an active Atlantic storm track thanks to the positive NAO but rather than a neutral one which directs these system straight into us, they appear to be taking a glancing blow approach with the focus of rainfall now over western Ireland and Scotland. The Southeast and East looks to stay driest and sunniest.
Here’s the latest visible satellite imagery via weatheronline.co.uk. Note the latest rain bearing front exiting out into the North Sea and the next approaching from the west. Note the nice swirl associated with the low. Also note the lack of clouds over western and central Europe thanks to high pressure. That feature will keep the centre of the low offshore but unfortunately it doesn’t with the front.
Here’s the current NAO status and 15 day forecast from the GFS ensemble. Firmly positive.
That supports scenes like this over Greenland. That clear blue sky is a COLD one thanks to a strong upper trough and surface high, supports a current air temp of -50C.
It also supports those clear skies and great views of the Alpine snowpack over Europe.
In just the next 3 days, we get two more fronts sweeping in bringing wet and windy weather but unlike this past weekend, these fronts move more quickly east with blustery showers packing hail and thunder following in behind. Also look for a cooler feel once the front passes despite sunshine returning. Ahead of this evening’s front, the temperature may spike to 15C around Greater London thanks to southwest winds and sunshine.
Here’s a glance at the ECMWF surface charts over the next few days.
Here’s today, note the area of green shifting east while the next low lurks off Ireland.
Wind and rain crossing the country overnight with the sub-970 low staying offshore but expect a stuff southerly along the eastbound front then winds turn westerly and cooler tomorrow.
By later Wednesday into Thursday, here comes the next in line. Note the main centre hangs back up near Greenland but the elongated low has pretty low pressure extending from the centre to just off the Outer Hebrides.
Once that front clears another low spinning off the conveyor belt takes a more southerly track across southern Ireland into the UK but this should clear out by the weekend leaving most cool but much more settled.
While there remains a series of fronts crossing Ireland and the UK this week, the focus of heavy rain will actually be over the northern coast of Iberia as well as the central Mediterranean as can be seen in the below 7 day total precipitation off the QPF.
Next 10 days shows incredible rainfall across Northern Iberia and across much of the central Med Basin including the North coast of Africa.
As you can see, the worst of the precipitation in the next 10 days stays west and north of the areas which got hit hard with the record rains back last month.
With that much water in the ground and the below SST profile, I don’t believe this summer will be anything like last year unfortunately. This setup and ocean-atmosphere feedback supports lower than normal heights over the same areas into spring and eventually the upcoming summer. Hopefully I’m wrong.
The GFS ensemble 500mb height anomaly shows continued lower than normal heights extending from the Atlantic into the UK while high pressure remains dominant over much of mainland Europe.
Interesting the 7-14 shows height rises which may suggest that the Atlantic storm track continues to migrate north. It will be interesting to see just how far north the jet stream gets as this may hint at some drier, milder weather for more of the UK and Ireland. Note the model keeps below normal heights over the Mediterranean.
By day 9-16, the positive heights build further.
The CFSv2 shows the continuation of the Atlantic barrage and with less extremity to what we’ve seen throughout this winter.
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