21/01/2017 Weather for the Week Ahead

Hello. It's been a very settled week of weather with very little rain,

and the outlook for the next five or six days is very similar.

But eventually, by the end of the period,

we may start to see a change.

So, yes, for this weekend, in the short term,

it looks set to stay mainly dry and cold, but there should be

some good sunshine, as we saw through the day on Friday.

This was Dolwyddelan, in Conwy, in the foothills of Snowdonia.

But although the sunshine was more abundant, there was still a zone

of cloudy weather, and here in East Lothian, we had that cloud.

But the cloud is gradually continuing to break, so it

looks as if the frost will be much more widespread on Saturday morning.

These countryside figures, you can see, denote quite a harsh frost.

There could also be some fog in eastern England,

parts of Northern Ireland and northern Scotland.

That'll be a continuing trend, more fog through the coming few nights.

Otherwise, it looks much sunnier for the likes of southern Scotland,

more sunshine for Northern Ireland.

A bit more cloud coming into the south and west

and for eastern parts of England, where there could be the odd

drizzly shower, a little bit of snow for the Pennines. So it's not warm.

Temperatures, in fact, will be lower than those we've seen this week.

That trend continues into Sunday,

which on balance looks a little cloudier than Saturday because,

again, you've got this weak weather front near to eastern areas,

so a few wintry flurries here.

And also, a bit of cloud just pestering western parts of

England and Wales to bring the odd drizzly shower.

But it's still dry and, for most, still bright. But just cold.

Little changes on Monday.

If anything, Monday and Tuesday morning will suffer more with

some thick fog - patches of thick fog, that is.

So, again, it'll be cold and that fog will be slow to clear.

But just the sign of a bit more breeze towards the north and west,

and on Tuesday this weather front does make an attempt to come

into the north-west of the UK, the first one, if you like,

to try and break down our static high pressure.

So, yes, we could see some patchy rain, stronger winds,

milder air into the north and west, but of course it's coming

into the cold air so still expect some snow over the hills.

And then that really fizzles out as we go into Wednesday and

we're back to the high pressure, still, but just more isobars, so

that means more wind, more tightly packed isobars.

So probably from midweek on not as many fog problems for most.

But still cold in central and eastern areas,

particularly if we have the cloud,

and always the threat of stronger winds,

gales or severe gales into the north-west, and rain,

because again those weather fronts are advancing in on Thursday, too.

So we're always going to have to have that risk, I think,

for the west of Scotland and Northern Ireland,

of some rain as the week progresses.

But temperatures are recovering - a little! -

at seven or eight degrees Celsius.

So throughout this week, we've had the static high pressure,

that harsh Continental air. We've felt the effect a little bit.

Nowhere near as cold as it has been across Continental Europe,

but gradually this weekend it does dip down, the temperature.

Now, that high pressure has got a lot of inertia.

It doesn't want to move away,

so it's going to take a succession of low pressures through the

coming week to start to move it eastwards and allow those

weather fronts to cross the UK.

As I say, it's going to take time,

because that high pressure's quite established, and it will stay

established through most of next week,

particularly in the south and the east.

But as eventually the Atlantic winds start to push in one after

the other, just nibbling away at that area of high pressure,

temperatures, as we saw, will start to recover, so that by next weekend,

that's when it looks as if it may well be windier for all of us,

with some rain pushing its way southwards and eastwards.

But again, there's still a question mark.

The south and east may stay

under high pressure and may stay quite dry and settled.