For a 3rd straight winter, cold has been focused away from Europe with storms fast, frequent and at time furious. This spell of ‘less cold, more wet & windy’ winters is common and the UK can go several winters without any harsh snow and cold. There was plenty of mild, wet and windy back in the 90s then the period between 2005 and 2007 there was very little winter to speak of.

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There’s no question that this winter overall has been mild and in all honesty milder than I had forecasted. We’ve had two cold spells this winter of which both have been run of the mill and nothing exceptional. Intensity and duration of cold and snow this year was less than last year but more than 2013-14.

I had thought, given several factors that we would see one or two significant spells of snow and cold and up till now anyway, that’s not happened.

I strongly believe the early season (Nov-Dec) warmth throughout much of the hemisphere with strong polar vortex was down to the peaking of the Super El Nino which brought record rainfall as well as mild air.

December anomaly

At the turn of the New Year, we saw this exceptionally warm pattern snap following a record warm December both sides of the Atlantic with a mid latitude depression tracking straight north and penetrating the cold bubble within the arctic. Think essentially laid to winter’s first cold spell mid January over both eastern North America and Western Europe.

January anomaly

This was following by strong stratospheric warming late January which resulted in the late January cold over the US but not so much Europe.

With a cooling of the polar stratosphere once again early February, the +AO returned and so did the warmth but since then, we’ve seen another strong stratospheric warming event which has pushed arctic air south again into the mid-latitudes.

February anomaly so far

Infrared image captures UK snow cover yesterday thanks to clear skies for most.

There’s no disputing that mid and late winter has been more typical and a lot colder than Nov-Dec. Wouldn’t be hard right enough.

The February cold spell we’re seeing is different to January’s as the January cold was caused by the storm pumping warmth into the arctic, forcing the NAO to go negative (only time it has this winter) whereas this month’s chill is weaker because there’s no blocking high as such. The NAO remains positive but it’s the tanking AO which has led to a colder but still unsettled pattern…

For the first time in two years, the cold has not been focused on eastern North America despite the past weekend’s historic arctic outbreak. Overall Dec-Feb will wind up warmer than normal in BOTH North America as well as Europe and west/central Asia.

The cold this winter has been largely focused on eastern Asia.

As the title states, for a 3rd straight winter, the stratospheric warming has been unfavourable for Europe hence the lack of -NAO once again.

Through the next 10 days, warming remains strong from Asia over the pole into North America and this is likely to sustain the +NAO but -AO.

The +AO and NAO supports mild and unsettled but a -AO and +NAO like we’ve seen over the past week, supports stormy but colder conditions as arctic air is somewhat displaced into the mid latitudes and lows pick this cold up.

The remainder of February looks to remain much the same with spells of cold, typical of any winter season with the continuation of a strong jet and storm track.

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