Little has changed within the troposphere with the continued westerly pattern and wet, windy systems of which 2/3 will impact the UK this week alone. While there’s seemingly truly noticeable difference between this winter and last, although a tad colder and yes we’ve seen some chillier spells, there’s a world of difference high above our heads. We should see something quite different come the final 10 days of January.

TOP IMAGE: Credit of Will Smith.

[s2If current_user_can(access_s2member_level1)]

This was the INITIAL 10mb temps over the pole from just 3 days ago.

Here’s what it looks like now!

Here’s what it should look like 6 days from now.

10 days

Note in the GFS operational 7-day mean 500mb height anomalies that the negative becomes a positive over Greenland!

Yes, the much anticipated polar vortex split has occurred but more importantly, it’s where it’s occurred and where the warm pools are going.

All the cold last winter was focused primarily on North America with the warm stratosphere ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE POLE linking Asia with Alaska. Notice in the above, it’s OPPOSITE this year. This heralds a -NAO/AO pattern through the second half of winter.

The response INTO THE TROSPHERE (atmosphere nearest the ground) following the strong warming that’s occurring now should occur around the 15th and so I expect the models to catch on and show a colder trend towards the 20th with the development of a Greenland blocking high. Europe should turn frigid and as the warm pool at 10mb shifts into Eurasia or Scandinavia, this SIBERIAN origin air should retrograde westward.

BIG TEST coming up.

See video for today’s discussion!

[/s2If][s2If current_user_cannot(access_s2member_level1)][magicactionbox id=”18716″][/s2If]