Warmest open to a November in Europe weather history?

The sea of warm air covering our continent may bring joy to some, especially in the sheltered sunnier spots but misery for others as widespread fog causes headaches for thousands trying to fly in and out of many of the worlds busiest airport hubs.

We had an impressive temperature contrast over the UK yesterday. Where fog lingered, it felt like November over Midland England but where sunny,, particularly mid-Wales, it was another September-like day!

This is probably one of the more iconic images captured of the fog that’s plagued our skies and caused widespread headaches.

Sunday of course saw a new UK November benchmark being set with 22.4C recorded at Trawsgoed, yesterday very near matched that with another summer-like 22C. Pretty incredible to see another day surpass that 1946 record which wasn’t touched for so long.

Comparing yesterday’s normal with forecast highs.

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The below graphic illustrates the large difference in temperature fog or sun can make.

The evidence of this strong inversion in clear over Scotland this morning. 8C on top of Cairngorm Summit, freezing at Aboyne. In fact it was 8C at Balmoral while Aboyne less than 20 miles away dropped to -1C.

Why so foggy and why it’s warmer with height?

This huge stable air mass is one thing but it’s drawing on our from the Mediterranean. Not only warm but moist and so by night, the temperature dips under the clear skies and light winds to the dew point and therefore form forms. This is the perfect setup for major fog formation. Trouble is, the early November sun is quite weak and so the lower angle, weaker sun cannot penetrate the thick layers of form which formed during the cool hours of night. Without wind, it makes it ever more difficult to remove and so some remain stuck beneath the white blanket for days while others enjoy crystal clear blue skies.

NASA satellite view of the UK Sunday afternoon.

This air mass is mild with warmest air in the lid levels and when sunny, warmth in the mid levels mixes down to the surface beneath the column of sinking air but where fog remains, acting as a lid, cold air is trapped at the surface, unable to warm up.

I captured this shot a few years back when we had a similar setup.

Below

This fairly typical set up for November when large scale ridging is in control, has caused headaches to air travel stretching from London to Hamburg.

Check-in queues extended outside the terminal.

The scale of this warmth air mass is very impressive, all but covering the majority of the continent from Ireland to Finland and it looks like it’s here to stay through at least mid month.

ECMWF 5-day mean 2m temp anomalies.

Day 0-5

5-10

Sick of this stagnant pattern? Well we finally get some movement in our atmosphere later today into tomorrow. The stormy weather which brought flooding to parts of Iberia during the weekend including Gibraltar where roadways were flooded is now lifting north on the western flank of the high which remains anchored over the heart of Europe.

Winds will increase and pulses of rain, some heavy will push into England and Wales over the next few days clearing out the fog. Once this dissipates, a more pronounced frontal system attached to the large low encompassing much of the N Atlantic will push across Ireland and the UK during Thursday into bonfire night. Strong SW to SE winds will be accompanied by spells of rain, some of which heavy and persistent.

This too eventually clears but a much more active SW storm track kicks in and we may be under the gun of several lows through the next 5-10 days.

The below GFS surface shows the return of more Atlantic influence once again.

Check out this beast the GFS has over us for the weekend. Worth a watching!

Model is printing out 60-70kt wind gusts through the Central Lowlands…

ECMWF shows a strong system too.

See this morning’s video for the discussion.

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Tags: cancelled flights, delays, fog, heathrow airport, london fog, november record, record november warmth, uk fog, weather