This is an in-depth Met Office UK Weather forecast for the next week and beyond. Taking a look at the battle between cold southeasterlies and mild, wet southwesterlies. Bringing you this deep dive is Met Office meteorologist Honor Criswick.
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00:00Hello there and welcome to this week's Deep Dive. We've been under the influence
00:05of a Scandinavian high for about a week now, it's felt like quite a bit of time,
00:09lots of cloud and some quite chilly feeling temperatures moving their way in
00:14from the east, but we haven't quite had what is known as beasts from the east so
00:19we're going to look at why that is. We are also eventually going to start to
00:23see a bit of a change, a return back to the Atlantic mobility, something milder
00:28but probably a bit wetter moving in, but there is just a little bit of a
00:32question mark as to when that's going to happen and also what it's going to look
00:37like, so we'll take a look at that too. Also is there a chance of seeing the
00:42aurora? A little bit misleading because there's still plenty of cloud around but
00:46we do have some clearer skies in some spots so a chance that some of us could
00:50see it too. So we're going to look at all those things so make sure you stay
00:54tuned, like and subscribe if you haven't already and if you enjoy this video and
00:59that means we can keep making them. So let's start off as always by taking a
01:03look at the bigger picture. So here's the high pressure I was talking about, make
01:08sure I put my hands the right way, high pressure across Scandinavia. We can see
01:13just out to the west though, low pressure waiting in the wings trying to bring us
01:17that return of the Atlantic mobility but as we head through the week, just lean
01:23over and drag this forward. I'm just going to move my way over to Thursday. You can see
01:28high pressure is still largely dominating across parts of the
01:33east, moving more now towards Russia and that just starts to allow just some
01:37frontal systems edging into the far southwest. So by the time we reach
01:41Thursday, probably more so on Friday if I just drag this through, we are going to
01:48start to see some thicker cloud moving to the southwest, also some outbreaks of
01:53rain, particularly for parts of Cornwall. Now earlier in the week we did have this
01:58frontal system, well some models had it slightly shifted further eastwards and
02:02we were looking at a potential low risk of some snow across the south but now
02:07slightly more agreement that this frontal system will stay put to the
02:11southwest, falling largely as rain though we could just start to see a little bit
02:15perhaps across Dartmoor, places like that confined to high ground if we do
02:20see any snow. But what this is doing is bringing in some slightly milder air but
02:24it's still pushing up against the high pressure dominating across the northeast
02:29so it tries to move its way in but it doesn't move its way very fast. That
02:33means on Thursday and Friday most of that rain, as it can't really move
02:38anywhere, it remains largely confined to parts of Devon, Cornwall, perhaps just the
02:43far southwest of Wales, possibly edging into western parts of Northern Ireland
02:48too and that's where it's largely going to stay, particularly as we head into
02:53this week. But we can see this area of low pressure here waiting in the wings
02:59into the Atlantic, fuelled still just moving into that left jet exit of
03:03the jet stream here. And so what this is trying to do is move its way in but
03:09still once again budging into that area of high pressure and it does mean that
03:13we end up as we head, just press the right one, as we head towards the
03:20weekend that we end up with a little bit of a split with that slightly milder air
03:25trying to move its way in from the southwest but we've still got that
03:29rather chilly feel across the northeast and eastern areas. So here conditions not
03:35changing too much, still probably plenty of cloud around, could see some showers
03:39move through at times, perhaps a bit of drizzle. If we do see any snow, once again
03:43largely confined to high ground but largely feeling chilly here. Now
03:47temperatures are largely around about average, just a touch below at times
03:51through most of the weekend as we head into the weekend but it's the wind chill,
03:55it's that easterly wind making things feel much cooler. But a start to see a
03:59change to something slightly milder, we can see that milder air mass starting to
04:03move in. Now there's just a little bit of a question mark as to when, when will
04:08that milder air from the southwest eventually move its way across most of
04:12the country. We see a return from the west, we see a return of that mild wet
04:16and sometimes windy weather and it's also a bit of a question mark as to what
04:21it's going to look like. At the moment it looks a bit like a slow change and
04:24sometimes when we see this change from east to west and we've got that milder
04:28air moving into the colder air, we can see risk of snow but actually a lot of
04:32modern ones aren't really showing a lot of snow which in some some cases is good
04:37and we could still see a chance of snow but as I'll show in a sec any snow
04:41probably going to be over hills and high ground so I've mentioned snow but don't
04:46get too excited. So what does that look like then in terms of the kind of
04:51weather picture? Let's take a look, click the right button, so well actually it
05:00doesn't look that that too dissimilar through the week. We can still see the
05:04best of any sunshine as we've seen over the last couple of the days is largely
05:09confined to the northwest and northern parts of Scotland. That's where it's
05:13going to be largely fine, bright, probably seeing a decent amount of
05:17sunshine but once again still feeling chilly and it's particularly around
05:21these North Sea coasts still through as we head into Thursday and towards the
05:26end of the week still getting that easterly flow, that southeasterly flow so
05:30feeling chilly in the wind, still fair amount of cloud, grey days, probably
05:35seeing a bit of fog to start with as well, drizzle, some showers so not totally
05:41pleasant conditions but not totally dissimilar for the time of year and we
05:46could start to see some brighter spells at times, Wednesday and Thursday you know
05:50Wales parts of the south could see some brighter weather but you can see
05:53there's still plenty of cloud around as we head through the week and there's
05:57that frontal system as we head into Friday moving into parts of the
06:01southwest, southern parts of Wales where it's probably going to sit there through
06:04much of the day, hopefully flizzling out by the time we reach the afternoon but
06:08likely to see a decent amount of rain as that moves through and then probably
06:13drizzly grey conditions by the time we reach the afternoon. And then it's as we
06:18head, just move that back, as we head into the weekend so Saturday and Sunday you
06:25can see once again still fairly similar conditions but on Sunday we can see that
06:31frontal system and that milder air behind it still trying to slowly edge
06:35its way into the country so bringing us a return of that westerly regime but
06:40still the northeast largely largely being influenced by that easterly and
06:45that high pressure and by this point slowly moving its way slightly more
06:50towards Russia. So taking a look quickly then just to just to prove my point at
06:57the freezing level just just to counteract any kind of risk of snow so
07:02we can see this is for Tuesday actually so if I head this over to tomorrow so we
07:08can see for the large bulk of the country a lot of these blue colors so
07:12freezing level around I mean 400 to 600 meters slightly higher where we see the
07:19green colors just moving into parts of Northern Ireland, southern parts of Wales
07:23the southwest where we see that frontal system moving through and hence the
07:26milder air so the higher freezing level. So if we do see any snow for example any
07:32snow showers moving their way in from the east, any snow largely confined to high
07:36ground. That's shown quite nicely here, here we have the rolling snow
07:40totals through the week and if I just drag this through into Friday what do
07:46you notice? Any of the snow totals or any of the accumulating snow largely
07:51across high ground so across the Highlands parts of the Pennines the
07:56Welsh Hills for example that's where we're likely to see any snow but any
07:59impactful snow unlikely more likely kind of a sprinkling of snow perhaps a
08:04centimeter or two but any of it confined to hills and higher ground. And now just
08:11to finish off with this week's weather before I go into it in a bit more depth
08:15as to where the uncertainty lies I'll just take a quick look at temperatures
08:19as well. Now average for this time of year across the UK is around about 7
08:24degrees so you can see starting off today on Tuesday widely below average
08:28but with that easterly flow of air I think I've got it here actually more
08:34what it's going to kind of feel like actually closer to freezing particularly
08:38around those North Sea coasts and any exposed spots where you really feel that
08:42breeze it's not necessarily that strong and even through the week it's not that
08:47strong but it's just that added wind chill on to all that ready those below
08:50average temperatures just making things feel that little bit colder. So widely
08:55below average to start the week but we do start to see a slight increase as we
09:00head through there towards the end of the week across the southwest southern
09:04parts of Wales. Just move that forward so we head into the weekend so
09:09temperatures more across Devon and Cornwall parts of Wales more towards
09:13eight to nine Celsius as I say obviously we've got that rain moving in so
09:17slightly milder but it's still not going to be the most pleasant of days but
09:21still we can see temperatures not changing too much along those eastern
09:25coasts and it's really by the weekend where we do start to see that northeast
09:29southwest split so milder conditions yes in the southwest but a bit cloudy wet
09:34and drizzly and then to the northeast there's still gonna be plenty of cloud
09:38here but once again gonna be feeling chilly particularly still in those
09:41brisk winds. So a change is on its way yes but it's just a case of knowing when
09:49that change will move its way through across the country and we see more
09:53frontal systems moving though in from the Atlantic and we say goodbye to that
09:56easterly flow. So as it looks like as we head into the weekend we're still going
10:00to be slightly under the influence of that easterly but it's not going to be
10:04as much of a widespread influence as we've seen over the last week or so. So
10:11the next thing I promised to show you I'll just have a quick look is we're
10:18gonna just take a look at the aurora forecast because we have seen last year
10:24and beginning of this year we have had some some some CME so a chance that we
10:31could see the aurora forecast but as we do know there's there's a fair amount
10:35of cloud around so it's unlikely that the majority of us will see it but as we
10:39head into tomorrow night you can see this is the kind of probability of
10:44seeing the aurora and it's largely confined to the far north so the far
10:48north of Scotland particularly in the northwest where we see those clearer
10:52skies it's a good chance as we head into tonight and tomorrow night that you
10:57could actually start to see something oh it shows it nice quite quite clearly
11:01here actually where we see those gaps in the cloud where we could potentially see
11:05the aurora I think it's slightly yeah so particularly as we head into tonight
11:10where we see those clearer skies to the northwest a chance we could see it even
11:15into tomorrow night we've still got quite a strong gradient here third night
11:19not so much so tonight and as we head into tomorrow if you're in the northwest
11:25of Scotland make sure you keep an eye out under those clearer skies there's a
11:28good chance you could see some very pretty lights in the sky so as I've
11:34already mentioned there is a little bit of uncertainty in the forecast as we
11:39move our way from the easterly to the southwesterly so I just wanted to delve
11:43into that into a little bit more detail so you can kind of understand a little
11:46bit why sometimes us as forecasters we can struggle a little bit we try to tell
11:50you when we're a little bit uncertain about the forecast I'm going to kind of
11:54show you why it's important to look at a range of models rather than just one
11:59and a range of model runs rather than just one as sometimes they can show
12:04something completely different or if we look at one model compared to and
12:09compared to a few model runs we can see some quite different scenarios and some
12:13quite different pictures so that's why it's important not to just look at the
12:16one which I'm sure you already know if you are and if you are avid watchers of
12:21our YouTube channel so I'm going to start off taking a look at this so this
12:26is all the model runs the oldest ones closer to the bottom this is the next
12:32two-week period so moving further in time and what we can see is these red
12:37colors largely dominating the beginning of the period so these red colors
12:42indicate high pressure sort of around the UK or dominating the UK's weather
12:47and then we have the blue colors and that's where the patterns associated
12:51with low pressure so more likely frontal systems moving in from the west
12:55bringing us that milder but wet and windier weather and what we can see is
13:00as we head towards sort of early next week early to middle part next week we
13:05start to see a change from the red colors to the blue colors so a change
13:09from high pressure to low pressure and this is also shown so this is kind of
13:14showing early early next week we can also show this by taking a look at the
13:20zonal trend so whether our weather patterns are coming from an easterly or
13:24westerly direction so the red colors you may have guessed are showing the easterly
13:29direction and then the blue colors showing a more westerly pattern and kind
13:34of any colors in between kind of not really showing much of a zonal basis so
13:39once again we've started off with the easterly regime as a result of the
13:42Scandinavian high and then it's once again sort of early to middle part of
13:46next week where we start to see a bit of a change towards a more westerly type
13:51but at these sort of percentages here don't really start to increase until we
13:56get towards the end of the period so in two weeks time and even here sort of
14:00looking at 68% 66% of a more westerly type so there are indications there
14:08already that we're changing from high pressure to low pressure dominating our
14:14weather patterns and also a change or a good indication of a change that we're
14:18going to be moving away from an easterly pattern and moving more towards a
14:22westerly pattern. Now here this is something that we often look at here at
14:29the Met Office is this is a raw model output so no modifications from our chief
14:34meteorologists have been made and this is just one one model this is actually
14:40the Met Office global model and it's just one model run and what we can see
14:45is its keenness to move in that frontal system from the southwest I've spoken
14:50about and thus that milder air moving through so it's by the time we start to
14:56reach on Friday so that's largely the story we're going for or the that's the
15:01story that all the models are agreeing that's going to happen we'll start to
15:04see this frontal system move through but the difference between this model
15:08run as you can see by the time we start to reach kind of Sunday or midday on
15:14Sunday that frontal system is actually crossing eastern parts of the country
15:20also bringing in a little bit of snow shown by the pink colors across parts of
15:24Scotland. Now this is just one model as I say the global model and all the other
15:29models actually have that frontal system nowhere near the eastern part of the
15:33country by the time we reach the weekend so that's the global model still
15:39once again on the far left or my far right and in the middle here we've got a
15:44European model and you can see once again it's kept that frontal system
15:49right far out to the west so that milder air out to the west and we've still got
15:53that easterly component those chillier conditions to eastern parts of the
15:58country so already here we can see some model differences so which one do we go
16:05for well it's not just the European model it's other models that we use here
16:08at the Met Office which tell a fairly similar story they keep that weather
16:12front out to the southwest also that milder air and keep those colder
16:16conditions to the eastern part of the country so what our chief meteorologists
16:21here do at the Met Office they create something called the modified output so
16:27this is a kind of in-between version if you like of the global model and the EC
16:32and also what other models are saying so once again keeping that frontal system
16:36once again kind of slightly further east compared to what the raw European model
16:41is is outputting but it still shows this kind of southwest northeast split
16:47excuse me between the kind of colder air across the north around North Sea coasts
16:52and also across the southwest so it's kind of an indication once again where
16:57we see that uncertainty obviously a very low chance that the global model as
17:01it's a bit of an outlier compared to other models could be right but there's
17:05also that low chance that it could be correct moving its way in bringing some
17:08snow across the Scottish Highlands and also bringing that milder air to quite a
17:13widespread part of the country so we look at a few other things as well so
17:21for example our global model we take a look at this is a temperature 850
17:28hectopascal so kind of your air mass temperatures and this just slightly
17:33darker blue color here this is the controls the kind of the most likely
17:37starter conditions if you will and then we run that model a few times and this
17:42is where we get all these different lines and all these different colors and
17:45it shows us the spread the spread in the the spread in the outcomes that we could
17:50potentially see now this is a kind of temperature spread air mass temperature
17:55spread for Plymouth so kind of the southwestern region and we can see here
17:59this is zero degrees so we can see a gradual increase in temperatures as we
18:04head towards the 19th of February so as we head into next week so a gradual rise
18:10in temperatures there are going to be some dips at times that's relatively
18:12normal but on the whole the trend even with all the other model runs that we've
18:17put through a gradual trend towards something slightly milder however if we
18:24take a look at the same thing but for Aberdeen so if you notice this is now
18:28where zero degrees is so a lot of the model runs are actually below zero so
18:32colder colder than average temperatures still with that dark blue line showing a
18:37large showing the kind of main trend and so largely staying below zero and a few
18:43a slight kind of increase to something slightly milder another dip and then
18:48eventually something milder moving through again so it's largely showing a
18:51slower transition to something milder or perhaps something a bit more towards
18:56average for the time of year so that's another indication this is for Aberdeen
19:02that the northeast eastern parts of the country are going to hold on to that
19:06slightly colder air mass and they disagree with our Met Office global
19:10model which implies that by the weekend we're going to see something milder
19:14across the country. Now another reason why we tend to get a little bit of
19:21uncertainty in our forecasts particularly in this forecast over the
19:25next week or so is that so for example here if I explain this through this is
19:32the probability of seeing temperatures two degrees less below average so average
19:40for the time of year so two degrees below this and so the darker the colors
19:43basically the higher the probability. Now we can see once again as we start to get
19:49towards the weekend so here we have Saturday and also Sunday we can see
19:54those darker colors largely confined to say northeastern parts of Scotland parts
20:01of Yorkshire, Lancashire even central parts of central parts of the UK even
20:06across the southeast quite a high probability that we could see
20:10temperatures two degrees below average and then across parts of the south we
20:16don't really see apart from earlier in the week we start to see those kind of
20:21colors lightening up as we head through the period and then from next week
20:25onwards we see a bit more of a blend of those colors which as usual as with
20:28longer lead times there's a bit more uncertainty. So that was temperatures
20:32below average and then we can take a look at temperatures just above average
20:37so these are the probability of seeing temperatures two degrees above average
20:41for the time of year. So for the beginning of the week across much of the
20:46country round about average and then it's as we head towards the weekend once
20:50again that we start to see these slightly darker colors here for example
20:53on Saturday and also here for example on Sunday and then more into sort of early
20:59next week that we start to see those darker colors so there's higher
21:02probabilities of seeing something two degrees above average largely confined
21:07kind of the southwest and central parts of the UK. Now already we've seen we've
21:13spotted across central parts of the UK there's some higher probabilities of it
21:17being two degrees below average or so two degrees above average so that leads
21:21into uncertainty in itself obviously that's kind of the the borderline
21:25between where we start to see that milder air and the colder air across the
21:28southeast but you can see in particular by the time we get to the middle part of
21:32next week there's actually some darker colors across northern parts as well so
21:37there's a question is it going to be higher than average or just below
21:42average and when we start to see model outputs like this which isn't unusual
21:45further as we head and look further into the forecast we tend to see more of a
21:50split between what the models are going for but this really emphasizes the
21:55uncertainty in the forecast that we see over the next couple of weeks so as I
21:59mentioned yes there is going to be a change from something milder moving in
22:03from the southwest and eventually we will start to see that crossing across
22:08much of the country and we'll see a return of the Atlantic mobility so some
22:11mild wet and windy weather starting to move through but this is why we kind of
22:15have those question marks as to what that's going to look like and also when
22:18it's going to happen. So that's why it's really important to look as I've already
22:23mentioned a few different models and also a few different model runs. Now I
22:29mentioned this because earlier in the on the weekend we actually had we had our
22:35European model one of the model runs on Saturday showing real beast from the
22:39east conditions and I want to just go through why once again just to emphasize
22:44my point why it's important not to just take that model run and run with it
22:48which is why we see lots of lots of headlines around snow and also why
22:53why we're not seeing those conditions why we're not seeing those beast from
22:56the east conditions so I'm going to run through that with you now. So I just want
23:00to go back once again and take a look at the bigger picture so let's take a look
23:05at that area of high pressure across Scandinavia and looking at high pressure
23:11it moves in a clockwise direction so let's follow where this where this air
23:15actually comes from so starting off across eastern parts of the UK moving
23:20southeastwards towards Europe we then move our way upwards across parts of
23:24Russia and then we move our way back westwards again originating from parts
23:29of parts of Scandinavia so parts of Finland for example but what we notice
23:33is as that as that air moves its way towards Russia moves its way southwards
23:38it's moving into something that's not quite as cold there's not much of snow
23:42not much snow in these regions so by the time it reaches us into the UK yes it's
23:48bringing an easterly flow yes it's bringing in something that feels a
23:52little bit chillier but any kind of beast from the east conditions well
23:56obviously we haven't we haven't seen so taking a look at this this is from NOAA
24:02showing the northern hemisphere in terms of snow cover so sorry you might just
24:08have to tilt your head a little bit here's here's the UK here yeah here's
24:14the UK here and we can see Russia further further northward so the white
24:20color is kind of indicating snow yellow indicating ice but then green is nothing
24:25really snowy or particularly cold so as that air has moved into those colder
24:31conditions as it's moved its way back southwards and westwards towards the UK
24:35it's not moved through any areas with particularly heavy snow or particularly
24:39cold conditions that's one of the reasons why we haven't seen those beast
24:43from the east conditions also we can take a look at it looking at it this way
24:47once again sorry I'll just have to tilt you head a little bit the UK here and
24:51this is showing the snow anomalies so anything with the red colors that's less
24:56than average snow conditions for the time of year so once again where we saw
25:01that area of high pressure where we saw that air move and originated from once
25:05again not moving through any areas that are particularly snowy shown here this
25:09is a webcam that I took earlier this is in Finland Helsinki I think it's
25:14pronounced and we can see here we're ready not a lot of snow and that's true
25:18if you take a look at other places in Europe even Moscow itself not really
25:23show showing much snow so that's part of the reason why we haven't actually seen
25:26beast from these conditions since we've saw that easterly flow established
25:31across parts of the country so there we go we've had a look an in-depth look at
25:37the weather this week also why we see a little bit of uncertainty I'll just show
25:42you this quickly to end as well I mentioned this earlier this is the kind
25:46of model run that we looked looked at as this is this 12 Z on Saturday this is
25:51from our European model you can just faintly make out it's a little bit dark
25:56sorry but this is the UK here so it really showed a cold plume of
26:00temperatures moving its way from moving its way from the east so this is kind of
26:05typical beast from these conditions but as we mentioned this was just more one
26:09model run one model the bulk of the models were obviously showing the kind
26:13of conditions that we have actually seen something cold not that snowy but quite
26:17cloudy instead so this is just kind of one model running after a model runs
26:22after this actually changed back to the kind of where the story that we're
26:26looking at over the next week or so so just to just to prove my point as we
26:31can sometimes see a lot of these weather charts in the headlines that just
26:35because we get an easterly from Scandinavia doesn't necessarily mean
26:38we're going to get 10 tons of snow and another beast from the east event so I
26:43hope you've enjoyed today we've had a good we've had a good dive into the
26:46weather and if you do have any further questions about anything I've spoken
26:50about today or anything around life about the Met Office leave them in the
26:54comment section I'll be sure to take a look and we have our live on Friday here
26:58on YouTube at 1215 so we can answer some of your questions then it will be
27:03me and the Alex Burke Hill on Friday so make sure if you do have any questions
27:07drop them in the comments box and also like and if you haven't already I know
27:11most of you have but make sure you subscribe as well so you don't miss any
27:15of your future deep dives or any videos that we do in the future otherwise I
27:20hope you have a great weekend hopefully see you on Friday bye bye