07/02/2018 Weather for the Week Ahead

Hello, there. The wintry story continues -

and not just here in the UK,

also across much of Europe and north-west Africa.

In fact, these scenes from Tuesday

weren't from the tops of the Pennines,

but were instead from Morocco,

where we saw extensive

and, in places, quite heavy snowfall.

If I show you the air mass

across Europe and north-west Africa,

you can see the extent of cold air at the moment -

the blue colour's all the way

as far south as the Canaries.

Warmest are the areas

down towards the east of the Mediterranean -

and the reason we've got this extent of cold air

is because, if I show you the jet stream, now,

we see the jet stream double back on itself,

feeding in easterly winds

and that cold air to many places.

Push ourselves out towards the west, though,

there's a strengthening Atlantic jet stream, now,

and that is edging our way,

set to bring changes over the coming days,

and introducing some Atlantic weather fronts.

Now, before that arrives on Wednesday,

we've got this ridge of high pressure,

which means we'll start dry, with some ice,

and also, of course, a widespread frost.

Plenty of sunshine, too,

Early showers, wintry in nature,

towards East Anglia and the south-east

clearing away,

but notice how the cloud increases

across Scotland and Northern Ireland.

We'll see some snow on the Scottish mountains,

maybe as much as 10cm,

but it will turn back to rain as temperatures rise.

Stornoway 8 degrees by the end of the day.

Elsewhere, even with the sunshine, another chilly day,

and a little bit more breeze around than we saw on Tuesday.

Frost quickly developing towards the south and east

under largely clear skies to take us into Wednesday night,

but this weather front

will work its way southwards and eastwards

slowly through Wednesday night and into Thursday,

with colder air trying to push back in once again

from the north-west.

Now, the weather front into the start of Thursday

will be somewhere across the Borders,

northern England into north-west Wales,

outbreaks of, maybe, rain on this, this time.

Not everywhere -

it's going to be fairly scattered across this zone,

with some heavier bursts into the west of Wales later on.

Bright start, but cold start in the south-east,

struggling to lift up, here.

Temperatures in Plymouth 10 degrees by the end of the day,

Scotland, Northern Ireland stay largely dry

with some hazy sunshine - but a wetter night

come Thursday night to Friday,

as that weather front reinvigorates

as it passes its way eastwards.

A ridge of high pressure builds, there,

but not a particularly strong one.

Now, there could be some ice around,

frost here and there for Friday,

the weather front clearing away

from the south-east corner. Mainly rain,

but what follows will be a scattering of showers,

rain, hail, sleet and snow -

although mainly snow,

west of Scotland, Northern Ireland,

as temperatures again drop back

to about 4 or 5 degrees -

and the breeze will make it feel colder than that.

Brief ridge of high pressure to start Friday night,

take us into Saturday,

so, frost and ice risk across England and Wales,

and then the next Atlantic weather fronts

start to push away.

These will have a little bit more about them.

There'll be some heavy bursts of snow

on its forward edge,

particularly across the mountains of Scotland,

northern England, North Wales -

but it will turn back to rain

as mild air briefly tries to push its way in.

Rain reaching the south-east corner later in the day,

turning brighter later on

across Scotland and Northern Ireland

but here, then, temperatures drop,

and, whilst we've got the wind coming off the Atlantic,

they're coming all the way from Canada

by the end of the weekend,

and it's a source of pretty cold air at the moment.

So, we're going to see wintry showers across the board,

mainly across northern and western areas,

primarily of snow, giving it further covering in places.

That's really going to mount up this week

across the mountains of Scotland.

Temperatures in single figures, of course,

but, with added wind-chill,

it will probably feel close to freezing,

particularly the further north and west you are -

and even as we go into the following week,

half term, of course,

we've still got that vigorous Atlantic jet stream

pushing its way in, and where we've got that,

it means, to the north, we get low pressure,

to the south we get high pressure,

and they're both going to have varying goes at us

through much of half term week.

The dominant one is more likely to be the low-pressure system,

so, overall, it will stay cold

with winds in the west and north-west.

There will be some milder spells coming in -

with it, some outbreaks of rain preceded by snow,

and, next week, always that bit windier.