Spring Weather Chat

[Mountain Snow]

I do hope we have a very sunny year. With the perpetual cloud cover this winter and recent snow cover, I'm getting a bit bored with the varying shades of white, grey and brown. Oh how I long for the sight of lush green grass, bright colourful flowers and brilliant blue sky!

[hillbilly]

it looks as though the drifted snow will be around for many weeks,probably into late may or even into june in pennine or peak areas.any chance it will take the english record of august 18th on cross fell?

[Summer Sun]

From Matt Hugo on twitter

The opening 5 to 7 days (April) are looking cold, no idea really beyond that...But chance of April being as cold as March are very slim.

Latest EC32 maintains a generally colder than average, but drier than average outlook well into April. Little sign of any warmth.

The EC32 is prone to changing frequently so any thing can happen

[Weather-history]

How depressing dismissing winter already by opening this thread lol

Can you believe that 2 months after that post was made we effectively still talking about "winter" such as the cold has been?

[Weather-history]

I can't see April being as wet as last year's April!

Easter is at the end of March this year, a possible white Easter? Easter colder than the Christmas period of 2012?

Get the feeling we might see a notable wintry spell during the spring.

Looks like my thoughts have come true and it looks likely that Easter will be colder than last Christmas.

[Weather-history]

Geronimo.........

Warmer than average March? Odds may be increasing!

Does beg the question what went wrong?

I am just looking through the thread to see if anyone foresaw this March. Crewecold thought we were overdue a wintry March.

[summer blizzard]

Does beg the question what went wrong?

I am just looking through the thread to see if anyone foresaw this March. Crewecold thought we were overdue a wintry March.

Apparently we had a strong MJO wave whilst in other years we may not have.

Provided we don't get a final warming soon it does make one wonder if we get a big flip at some point.

Are there any instances of very cold March's being followed by hot April/May's?

[Cheshire Freeze]

Does beg the question what went wrong?

I am just looking through the thread to see if anyone foresaw this March. Crewecold thought we were overdue a wintry March.

Yes and it was being consistently mooted by the CFS which was showing astonishing consistency for the pattern we've been seeing throughout March. What was clear was as we progressed through winter, it was becoming more and more blocked. A mix of this and the strong signals from the CFS made me think we would see the cold that we have.

[Gowon]

Yes and it was being consistently mooted by the CFS which was showing astonishing consistency for the pattern we've been seeing throughout March. What was clear was as we progressed through winter, it was becoming more and more blocked. A mix of this and the strong signals from the CFS made me think we would see the cold that we have.

Yeah, I remember snowballz (I think that's the name) kept stressing that point too - that the CFS was going for very cold March.

[Weather-history]

Are there any instances of very cold March's being followed by hot April/May's?

Yes, March and April 1987

March and April 1865 is another.

[Summer Sun]

Yes and it was being consistently mooted by the CFS which was showing astonishing consistency for the pattern we've been seeing throughout March. What was clear was as we progressed through winter, it was becoming more and more blocked. A mix of this and the strong signals from the CFS made me think we would see the cold that we have.

Which CFS where you viewing CC this one? http://translate.google.co.uk/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&layout=2&eotf=1&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.meteociel.fr%2Fmodeles%2Fgfse_cartes.php&act=url - CFS 9 months?

[Summer Sun]

Scientists link frozen spring to dramatic Arctic sea ice loss

http://m.guardian.co.uk/environment/2013/mar/25/frozen-spring-arctic-sea-ice-loss

[Cheshire Freeze]

Which CFS where you viewing CC this one? http://translate.goo...tes.php&act=url - CFS 9 months?

The anomalies here Gavin

http://www.meteociel.fr/modeles/cfsme_cartes.php?ech=0&code=0&carte=0&mode=4&run=10

[Guest pjl20101]

Crewe cold I also recall another forecasting centre predicting the same as the CFS on gavsweathervids.com and it was the BCC. He has indicated to me of an indifferent summer, but we will just have to wait and see. It seems empty and weird without his input on here as his input is second to none.

Seemed by judging the CFS for summer that we would have a cool/average June with average rainfall, July warm and dry just about anywhere and august warm and wet. GP alluded us to the walker circulation on the strats thread for the summer. We need his help here too currently.

[Weather-history]

Sub 5C Easters

23rd-26th March 1883: 0.9 <-----Coldest in this list

3rd-6th April 1885: 4.3

30th March-2nd April 1888: 4.2

27th-30th March 1891: 4.5

15th-18th April 1892: 2.3

6th-9th April 1917: 3.4

26th-29th March 1937: 3.4

4th-7th April 1958: 3.8

27th-30th March 1964: 4.3

28th-31st March 1975: 3.4

8th-11th April 1977: 4.5

1st-4th April 1983: 4.2

10th-13th April 1998: 4.1

21st-24th March 2008: 3.6

Any guesses on the CET for this Easter?

[Bobd29]

Any guesses on the CET for this Easter?

winds turning a bit more s/e so slightly warmer by day but clear frosty nights so I'd go for around 2.8 CET avge Fri-Mon, pretty cool overall.

[Summer Sun]

The anomalies here Gavin

http://www.meteociel...0&mode=4&run=10

Thanks

[UV-RAY]

Scientists link frozen spring to dramatic Arctic sea ice loss

http://m.guardian.co.uk/environment/2013/mar/25/frozen-spring-arctic-sea-ice-loss

What nonsense, what about all those cold springs of the past, still there's lots of money tied up in AGW so any tentative links are a sure way of grabbing some more funding.

[Thundery wintry showers]

There may well be a link with the Arctic sea ice loss- one individual cold snap wouldn't be compelling evidence, but the southward movement of the jet stream since 2007 has been stark and is raising questions about whether or not there is an underlying cause associated with climate change across the globe.

However there is still a considerable amount of research to be done before we can say with much confidence that the trend is mainly due to changes in Arctic sea ice, changes in solar activity, or natural variability in atmospheric circulation patterns- it's probably a combination of all three, but the relative contributions are unknown.

[Summer Sun]

The average uppers for April curtsey of CFS

And for May

2m temperatures for April

And for May

Warms up very nicely for the summer though http://forum.netweat...00#entry2667890 - something good could come from this extended cold spell in the long run

Edited March 27, 2013 by Gavin.

[nodrog]

A good little read... http://www.blackpoolweather.info/1/archives/03-2013/1.html

Thought i'd share.

[reef]

The average temperature for April curtsey of CFS

Warms up very nicely for the summer though http://forum.netweat...00#entry2667890 - something good could come from this extended cold spell in the long run

Those April and May temperatures are actually quite a bit below average Gavin. Taking here for example we'd be looking at an April in the mid-high 5s and a May in the 9s. That would be an exceptionally cold spring when you add on this month too. The three summer month charts in the model thread all show below average too, so not exactly a warm lover's dream.

[Frank Trough]

Those April and May temperatures are actually quite a bit below average Gavin. Taking here for example we'd be looking at an April in the mid-high 5s and a May in the 9s. That would be an exceptionally cold spring when you add on this month too. The three summer month charts in the model thread all show below average too, so not exactly a warm lover's dream.

But they'll be different tommorrow. Actually, they'll be different on the 12z's. They change from run to run - the only remotely consistent feature from the CFS recently has been an above average July for some parts in north west Europe. It can't even decide on April yet - although we perhaps don't need the CFS to tell us that it might need to be a month of two halves if it's going to come out anywhere near average temps wise.

[Geordiesnow]

What nonsense, what about all those cold springs of the past, still there's lots of money tied up in AGW so any tentative links are a sure way of grabbing some more funding.

Whilst they might be some sort of link as the theory seems plausible, its no doubt its the same people who said Britain's winters were going to get milder because of Global Warming therefore less snow events.

It is quite amusing actually that they are linking America's March's record heat that occurred last year down to climate change and now because America has experienced a much colder March this year, this seems to be down to climate change aswell and the lack of Arctic Sea Ice, you can't have it both ways surely? Personally whilst I believe there been some trend of the Jet Stream heading further South in recent years, we need another 10-20 years of data before we can make a true link between lack of sea ice and the Jet Streams positioning at mid-latitudes.

As Sceptical Inquirer pointed out, these blocked patterns have happened well in the past before, its nothing new really.

In terms of spring chat, what will be interesting is how late the trees will be in blossom and full leaf this year? Especially as the first hints for the start of April could start on a chilly and dull one. The cherry blossom is going to be very late this year.

[Thundery wintry showers]

I think it underlines the point that when we're talking global warming, all we can be reasonably sure about is that the globe will, on average, get warmer. There are so many different feedback mechanisms to take into account that, while we can make educated guesses as to what will happen to climates at a more local level across the world, there are bound to be times when the guesses end up wrong. This is part of what makes atmospheric science and climate science such a fascinating subject area.

In the current situation the climate models have done a good job at simulating the change in the Arctic in recent years (if anything it's happened faster than they expected) but the change in NW Europe climate, after remaining in line with model projections up until the early 2000s, has strongly backed away from them since. I was one of those who, along with Stratos Ferric, used to speculate on whether synoptic patterns had moved into a phase where cold synoptics were much harder to achieve, and which would be hard to break out of, though I recall that I did say at the time that trends in atmospheric circulation can suddenly reverse without much warning. I certainly didn't expect the kind of reversal that has been observed over the last decade though.

Edited March 27, 2013 by Thundery wintry showers