25/03/2016 Weather for the Week Ahead

A very quiet spell of weather really over the past couple of weeks

but things are now changing and we have much more unsettled

conditions on the cards through much of the week ahead.

Starting off with the long Easter weekend,

Good Friday probably the drier day with spells of sunshine,

Saturday potentially pretty wet and windy too.

Then Easter Sunday, sunshine and heavy showers before we see

more wind and more rain in time for Easter Monday.

Let's start with Good Friday then.

For much of the country we are looking at a dry day with

lovely spells of sunshine, light winds in the main. A little

bit of cloud building through the afternoon

and more cloud, some wind and rain

into the far north-west late in the day

but before that gets there, temperatures 14,

possibly 15 degrees, so it will feel pleasant with the light winds

and sunshine on Good Friday.

But heading through the overnight period, this frontal system moves

its away across Northern Ireland and Scotland bringing a spell of wet

and windy weather and then ripples of heavy rain and strong gusty

winds pushing in from the south-west as we start off the day on Saturday.

A mild start to the day, frost-free across the board

but a lot of cloud, wind and heavy rain too.

You can see the proximity of the isobars on the map through

Saturday indicating that spell of potentially windy weather with

this weather front bringing spells of rain.

The rain will be heavy at times as it moves across England and Wales.

Squally, gusty winds in association with that band of rain.

The combination of wind and rain across southern

parts of the country could be causing travel disruption.

Further north-west, a little bit quieter for Northern Ireland

and Scotland with some wintry showers over the hills.

In terms of England and Wales, for Saturday a combination of gales,

heavy rain at times meaning some disruption to travel through the day.

Things do quieten down somewhat as we move through Saturday

night into Easter Day on Sunday.

That front moves out of the way, low pressure in charge

so through Easter Day on Sunday it will be a mix of brighter

intervals but also heavily scattered showers, a chance of hail,

thunder and quite cold as well particularly exposed to the

breeze with those heavy downpours at times.

Not much letup in the weather on into Easter Monday.

This next system, low pressure system,

moves in most likely from the south-west.

Some uncertainty about the timing and detail of the system but it

looks like we're expecting another spell of potentially heavy rain and

strong winds, particularly affecting England

and Wales. Northern Ireland and Scotland could see some strong

winds but a slightly quieter spell of weather further north.

Then, as we move through into Tuesday,

low pressure gradually starting to edge off towards the east,

things are still looking fairly showery through Tuesday

so a day of some sunshine, some dry weather

but also some scattered showers for western areas.

In the east is where we will see more shelter and drier conditions

but temperatures a little below average for the time of year.

Early next week things are still dominated by low-pressure

bringing wind and rain at times.

It looks towards the middle part of the week, Tuesday into Wednesday,

low-pressure tends to edge off into east so a quieter brief

interlude of weather through the middle of the week but late next

week we're likely to see low-pressure returning from the Atlantic,

probably towards the north-west of the UK, could be further south so it

looks like things will turn unsettled later in the week once again.

Through the course of next week,

changeable weather on the cards, often spells of rain and wind.

Some quieter interludes with the chance of chilly nights with

a frost at times.

Lots going on. We will keep you up-to-date right here.