One for Jim/Nobby. Seeing as all the press has gone with the Day After Tomorrow scenario and we're getting the beast from the east, 500ft snowdrifts and all going to freeze in our beds, whats the actual outlook for the next few days?
It's unlikely that the snowmageddon scenarios in some of the print media will come off for the vast majority of people.
Initially colder with snow showers possible anywhere from Monday night. Likely heavy and prolonged in much of Scotland.
There's some consistent modelling of a low pressure moving west to east across the southern half of the UK on Wed/Thur. This looks probable to have a very active front ahead of it. If that happens, areas just to the north of the centre of the low will see a period of heavy snow, as the cold flow from the north interacts with the front. The latest output chart puts the heaviest snow across the Midlands/Wales:
The exact path of the low is still not clear, though, and different models/runs are showing differences. Even 50 or 100 miles (nothing in a global meteorological sense) will make a major difference locally (100 miles could cover dry/light snow to snow to sleet/rain). Subsequent model output might lessen the feature to very little. Or it may push the low further north and allow the milder air to get further north.
After that, another feature is being modelled to move more on a WSW to ENE line, and on a path tracking further north over the UK. This again forecast to have snow on its leading/northern boundary as it runs into the colder air.
But it does pull even milder air in behind, so any frontal snow would fairly quickly turn to rain:
After that low, the flow becomes rather slack with neither high nor low pressure covering us. Scotland continues in the cold air, though, so all the snow showers and more frontal snow will continue to accumulate. Some of the depths being modelled are impressive:
That's just one run from one model, and there's a lot of uncertainty.
I think most places will see some snow falling. Where gets the heaviest is still undecided. We should know more detail by the end of the weekend.
