The first in a series of Atlantic fronts arrive tonight into tomorrow. How much snow will it produce is near impossible to say… However, high ground locales have a good chance but if your down at lower levels, it’s going to be a close call between rain, sleet and snow.

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These systems are fickle. It’s very dependant upon how much warm air can penetrate the cold dome in place. If the caold winds out, well we could see one of two things. Either the moisture along the front completely evaporates in the dry, arctic air or we see a ‘surprise’ heavy snow and to low levels, even sea level.

Both ECM and GFS aren’t seeing a big deal but that doesn’t mean we won’t see a coating to an inch even at low levels. As it stands currently, I think your best chance at seeing LOW LEVEL snowfall is in the N of England, Scotland and Northern Ireland. As I made mention in the video. Folks living in the SW are probably least likely to see the snow, given this pattern.

Once the midweek system pushes through, more ridging builds in and so we see colder nights return if we get enough clear skies that is.

Another frontal system associated with the next Icelandic low looks somewhat more penetrable and this may push out the cold dome. In saying that, models struggle to see low level cold air and that’s why this system coming in tomorrow is difficult to project potential snowfall. There are ALWAYS surprises.

While the current cold dome will weaken and eventually get pushes out, it’s UNLIKELY that we return to truly a milder pattern because the air behind this front is rather cold (maritime-arctic) air and so a brief recovery in temps is replaced quickly by colder air which raises the threat for snow once again. We’re basically reverting back to the colder, unsettled theme we had prior to the last big storm.

Latest ECMWF surface charts through the next 144 hrs.

Mind what was shown in yesterday’s post… Despite the shift towards more ‘Atlantic weather’, we should wind up below normal temp wise as January ends. Remember what we’ve seen so far… unsettled yes, stormy yes but it’s been chilly too despite that WESTERLY flow with NW component compared to SW like we had much of last winter.

I like the 70mb temp projections as we head for the final 10 days of January. MORE warming is forecasted and this supports another ‘cold outbreak’, potentially stronger than this current one, during February.

The NAO has been disappointingly positive but these strong east QBO/weak central Pacific based ninos tend to see more blocking LATE in winter.

The new run of the JMA shows this for Feb.

See video for today’s discussion.

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