This is the Met Office UK Weather forecast for the next 10 days 29/11/2023.
With cold air in place across the UK, there’s a chance of some snow in some places during the next few days. For most, however, it’ll be dry, bright and chilly. Into next week, Atlantic weather attempts to return. But its return will be erratic and how quickly it arrives is very uncertain. Bringing you this 10 Day Trend is Aidan McGivern.
With cold air in place across the UK, there’s a chance of some snow in some places during the next few days. For most, however, it’ll be dry, bright and chilly. Into next week, Atlantic weather attempts to return. But its return will be erratic and how quickly it arrives is very uncertain. Bringing you this 10 Day Trend is Aidan McGivern.
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NewsTranscript
00:00 Hi there, welcome to the Met Office 10-day trend.
00:02 Friday is the first day of meteorological winter,
00:05 although you may be forgiven for thinking winter has already
00:08 arrived.
00:09 The blues are here, and northeasterly winds
00:11 have brought arctic air across the whole of the UK.
00:15 The milder but more unsettled weather
00:17 we saw so much of during the last few months
00:21 has quietened down for the time being.
00:22 In fact, it's been shifted south by these northeasterly winds,
00:25 more specifically by a large area of high pressure
00:29 across the Arctic.
00:30 And that's been blocking the jet stream to the south,
00:33 shifting areas of low pressure, and indeed,
00:36 with that cold air in place.
00:37 Over the next 24 hours or so, Wednesday night into Thursday,
00:41 we're going to see these south shifted lows start
00:45 to influence the weather in some parts of southern UK,
00:49 bringing outbreaks of rain.
00:50 But as that rain bumps into the cold air, in some places,
00:55 there'll be snow.
00:56 So by the time we start Thursday,
00:58 and really, it's into Wednesday evening
01:00 that those outbreaks of rain push
01:02 into the far south of England and the southwest.
01:05 But this is, by this stage, the early hours of Thursday.
01:08 Waking up Thursday, we've got outbreaks
01:10 of rain at lower levels, and especially towards the coast,
01:14 but snow over even relatively modest hills.
01:18 And I wouldn't be surprised if there's some falling sleet
01:21 and snow, even to lower levels.
01:23 But really, as far as snow building on the ground
01:27 is concerned, mostly we're talking about above 100 metres.
01:31 So the Blackdown Hills, for example,
01:33 for perhaps Salisbury Plain, the higher parts
01:36 of central southern England, could see some patchy snow,
01:40 1 to 3 centimetres in places.
01:42 But the most significant snowfall,
01:44 the heavier falls of snow, are expected really over Dartmoor.
01:47 Higher parts of Dartmoor, 5 to 10 centimetres of snow.
01:51 So quite feeble amounts of snow in most places.
01:54 Very little snow right down at sea level, mostly falling rain.
01:59 And really, it's only the higher parts of Dartmoor
02:01 where there would be enough snow, for example,
02:03 to build a snowman.
02:05 Now, elsewhere across the UK, it's mostly dry overnight.
02:08 But there will be further snow showers
02:10 coming into the north and the east of Scotland,
02:12 eastern parts of England as well.
02:13 There's been some snow building up in places here.
02:15 Again, mostly over hills, but not exclusively.
02:19 And these snow showers will continue to feed in
02:21 on Thursday, northern and eastern Scotland,
02:24 eastern England as well.
02:25 We're talking about 2 centimetres of snow.
02:28 Variable amounts here and there at lower levels,
02:30 especially over hills.
02:32 And 5 to 10 centimetres over higher parts,
02:35 say the Grampians, North York Moors, those sorts of places.
02:39 Northern Ireland also subject to showers feeding in,
02:41 mainly rain and sleet.
02:42 But that's, of course, leading to some icy patches
02:45 during the mornings of Thursday morning and Friday morning.
02:48 So some wintry hazards out there.
02:50 But by Friday afternoon, actually,
02:52 many of these outbreaks of rain, sleet, snow have moved away.
02:55 We're still getting a feed of wintry showers
02:58 into the north and the east.
02:59 But for the vast majority elsewhere,
03:01 it's a dry, bright, albeit cold afternoon
03:04 with temperatures in places at the low single figures at best.
03:09 And then a very cold night follows into Friday night.
03:13 These are the kinds of temperatures in urban areas
03:15 as we start off the weekend.
03:16 So several degrees below freezing,
03:19 even lower than that in sheltered rural areas.
03:23 A very cold start to the day.
03:24 But once again, Saturday is a fine day for most.
03:27 Some decent sunny spells after any freezing fog patches
03:31 clear away.
03:32 And a dry, crisp winter's day, because by this stage,
03:36 we're into meteorological winter.
03:38 Now, the best of the sunshine on Friday will be--
03:40 on Saturday will be further east.
03:42 There'll be some cloud and some showers in the west.
03:45 Again, rain, sleet, snow, a mixture
03:49 because of the temperatures being
03:50 relatively close to freezing.
03:53 Then follows another cold night with the widespread frost
03:56 to begin things on Sunday.
03:58 Now, it's not going to be quite as cold in some places
04:00 on Sunday morning.
04:01 As Saturday morning, you'll see the temperatures
04:03 there across western areas not nearly as low.
04:06 And we've got a bit more of a southwesterly breeze.
04:09 And that's because from the Met Office model, at least,
04:13 we've got an area of low pressure approaching
04:15 from the southwest.
04:16 And this is changing the wind direction.
04:18 Again, it's south shifted.
04:20 So normally, these lows go to the northwest of the UK.
04:23 But this is coming in on a south shifted track
04:26 because of the jet stream is directing it
04:28 towards the south of the UK.
04:30 But it is bringing some milder air with it.
04:33 And you can see by the colours, these yellows appearing,
04:36 pushing the blues out of the way.
04:38 And if we were to believe the Met Office version of events
04:42 later Sunday and into Monday, this area of low pressure
04:45 brings a wide swathe of rain and some hills,
04:47 snow mainly over the hills of northern and western UK,
04:51 but mostly rain at lower levels, increasing winds
04:54 and increasing temperatures with the cold air confined
04:57 to the far north by the middle of the afternoon on Monday.
05:01 But we shouldn't necessarily believe the Met Office model
05:05 version of events because other models are saying
05:09 slightly different things.
05:11 Not that different, actually.
05:12 Now, let's take a look at the American model, GFS.
05:15 And again, here's the UK in the middle.
05:18 Now, this sends that same area of low pressure
05:21 into northern France, an even more south shifted track.
05:24 And as a result, most of the UK keeps the cold easterly winds,
05:28 still some wintry showers into the east,
05:30 otherwise mostly dry and bright, some flakes of snow
05:33 on the northern flank of the weather system
05:35 as it tracks to the south.
05:37 But otherwise, it stays cold on Monday in the American model
05:41 with very little wind and rain across the UK.
05:45 Now, the European model, very similar once again,
05:50 but has that low just slightly further north
05:52 in between the Met Office track and the American track.
05:56 And this has quite a wide swathe of rain and hill snow,
06:00 most of the snow affecting central Scotland, for example,
06:03 in this version of events.
06:05 But it's rain, wind, and mild elsewhere across the UK.
06:10 So which to believe?
06:12 Well, it gets even more complicated
06:13 when you consider the fact that each of these main computer
06:16 models are run lots of times.
06:19 Here's the Met Office ensemble, the many different model
06:24 runs from the Met Office for Monday afternoon.
06:27 And I know it's difficult to see each of these.
06:30 They are called postage stamps for a reason.
06:32 But they're basically all showing
06:35 slightly different tracks for that area of low pressure.
06:37 But there's roughly 50/50 split in terms
06:42 of whether the lows get sent to northern France
06:45 or whether it's trundles across much of the UK,
06:47 bringing a return to milder but more unsettled weather.
06:52 However, if you look at the same model
06:54 and the same bunch of different runs
06:57 and look at the temperatures--
07:00 and this shows temperature.
07:01 Well, technically, it shows the wet bulb potential temperature
07:04 at 850 hectopascals.
07:07 But let's just keep it simple and say
07:09 the greens represent milder air and the blues
07:12 represent colder air.
07:13 And if you were to count them up,
07:15 there's a green one across the UK.
07:17 There's blue across the UK, greeny blue, green.
07:20 There are generally more greens.
07:22 And that just indicates that when the Met Office model is
07:26 run lots of times, there are more outcomes
07:29 that suggest the milder air taking over on Monday afternoon.
07:32 So that's why that solution is slightly favoured,
07:35 i.e. low pressure moving across the UK early next week,
07:39 bringing rain and some hill snow,
07:41 but eventually marking a return to milder and more unsettled
07:45 weather.
07:46 Slightly less likely, but still possible,
07:49 is that the cold, largely dry weather
07:51 holds on for the first few days of next week.
07:55 And these uncertainties are also evident
07:57 when you look at the temperature trend graph here.
08:00 The red line for Southampton shows the average temperature
08:05 for the time of year.
08:06 And these little boxes show the forecast temperature.
08:08 The bigger the boxes, the more uncertainty.
08:11 The bigger the potential range of temperatures.
08:13 And by the time we get to Monday,
08:15 look at the size of those boxes.
08:17 Really quite a range, quite a lot of uncertainty
08:19 about how quickly it gets milder.
08:21 But there is a clear upward trend
08:23 as these boxes return closer to average.
08:26 Although still, by the end of next week,
08:28 a lot of uncertainty about how mild and how cold
08:30 it will be in Southampton.
08:32 Similar trend for Kirkwall, but it just
08:35 indicates here looking at Orkney.
08:37 Should say Kirkwall, by the way, there.
08:39 But a similar trend there for Orkney.
08:41 It's just a little bit delayed as the colder air takes longer
08:45 to reach northern parts of Scotland through next week.
08:49 And that's because we've got this large area
08:51 of high pressure sitting over Scandinavia.
08:52 And when we've got this kind of set up,
08:54 it can be stubborn to clear.
08:56 We've got a lot of cold air sitting over Scandinavia
08:58 as well.
08:58 That's dense.
08:59 It can be difficult to shift it.
09:02 But we've also got the return of the Atlantic strengthening
09:05 jet stream trying to send areas of low pressure in.
09:08 And eventually, later next week, it's
09:10 likely that those areas of low pressure, the milder,
09:13 the wetter, the windier weather, will win out.
09:16 Now, this is the most likely weather pattern
09:18 for the middle of next week.
09:19 And as you can see, no matter what
09:20 happens with that first low, we've
09:22 got a bigger low coming in from the west.
09:26 And it's squeezing up against that high strengthening wind,
09:29 bringing some rain into the far west.
09:31 Slightly less likely, second most likely weather pattern
09:35 for next week is that that low is quicker to move in,
09:38 turning things wetter, windier, and milder.
09:41 But not much difference in it.
09:42 It's really about timings.
09:44 And the most likely pattern for the end of next week
09:47 is that we've got low pressure in charge.
09:49 Southwesterly winds.
09:51 It's milder.
09:52 It's wetter.
09:52 It's windier.
09:53 That high pressure finally relents its grip across the UK.
09:58 So the progression of events through next week
10:00 is fairly clear.
10:02 A little bit of uncertainty about whether the Atlantic
10:04 takes over immediately from Monday,
10:07 or whether it stays cold and dry for a few days.
10:10 But eventually, there's an upward trend
10:11 in temperatures and an increasing likelihood
10:14 through next week of low pressure, wind, and rain
10:18 making a return.
10:19 Of course, we'll keep you updated on that
10:21 when we get more of the specifics sorted.
10:23 But for the time being, a wintry couple of days ahead.
10:26 Lots of cold weather still with us.