Sadly the concerns I raised last weekend into early this week have been confirmed. Serbia and Bosnia have experienced their worst flooding in 120 years with a women and firefighter drowning.

Here was the scene in the devastated village of Topcic Polje near Zenica, 120 kms north of Sarajevo, following a major landslide following the heavy rainfall.

Here’s a video explaining the dire situation across the Balkans in some detail.

http://youtu.be/cOljPiFYZH4

The thing that caught my eye on this unfolding situation in the Southeast was not so much the surface charts but the precipitation amounts that were shown. 5-9 inches of rain within 2-4 days looked ominous for the region and sure enough the modelling was spot on nearly a week out.

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The next big weather story looks to be the heatwave building over the east next week. Yes, flooding, now heat. If you’ll remember back, I showed you the Moscow GFS meteogram which had temps reaching the low to mid-30s in the 7-14 day. In yesterday’s post I showed you the temperature charts for next week and while the trough dives south into Iberia, the ridge blossoms over Russia.

Let’s not forget the warmth on this side of the continent. Warm today and into the weekend for the UK and near continent, we should see 21-22 in eastern Scotland this afternoon and or Saturday but with a front sinking south over Scotland, the flow increase out of the SW which should help raise temps Saturday, Sunday for points south over England and Wales, 24-25C is possible in southeast and east England while it’s even warmer on the other side of the North Sea with highs close to 30 likely over inland parts of northern France, Belgium and the Netherlands. Even, typically cooler Denmark and southern Sweden could see the mid-20s. Helped by warmer than normal surrounding waters. Typically colder waters in this area would substantially cool down any major warmth trying to push northward from Spain and France.

Here are the 2-metre temperature charts through the next few days. Excellent weekend coming up for BBQ lovers!

This afternoon

Saturday

Sunday

Notice how warm it gets across much of Scandinavia. Could see close to 30 in a few inland southern areas believe it or not.

Here’s the latest ECMWF 500mb height anomalies through the next several days and note the southward descent of a major trough which drops out of Greenland and ends up off Portugal. That forces the ridge currently over the UK and near continent to shift east where it becomes very strong over Northwest Russia. Scandinavia never really cools but in fact heats further. Looks like Finland could see the hottest weather as it is closely to the centre of high pressure.

This setup looks highly favourable for some significant thunderstorms and downpours over parts of Portugal, Spain, Morocco and perhaps France as well as the UK but I am watching closely, the westward progression of the heat again next week. We could see warm, increasingly muggy air spread back into the UK and thunderstorms thanks to colder air and energy aloft. Interesting but complex scenario.

06 hrs

48 hrs

96 hrs

120 hrs

The ECMWF 500mb height anomaly 7-day mean shows the trough in the SW, ridge in the NE with the UK in the fight. A thundery time coming up for Iberia, hot times from central parts north and east..

0-7 day

3-10 day

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Tags: balkans flooding, europe flooding, serbia flood