05/03/2018 Weather for the Week Ahead

Hello. The aftermath of the wintry weather

still lingers across the British Isles,

but the thaw is now in progress,

and will extend further north as the days go by,

many of us returning to average temperatures in the days ahead -

but it will still stay unsettled,

and there is still some snow in the forecast for Scotland.

The reason for the change in type of our weather -

instead of the high pressure and the Beast from the East,

we now have a low pressure towards the south-west.

Still pulling quite chilly air in on its northern flank,

but that area is now being re-circulated around the low,

pulled across warmer waters of the Atlantic, and modified,

so, by the time it comes in to the south of the British Isles,

it's just, oh, so much kinder.

That cold nothing like what we had in the week just gone,

and, in fact, as I said,

the temperatures gradually getting close to average values.

On Monday, though, the low will push some quite heavy rain

into the south-west of England, Wales

and eventually towards the Midlands.

That could give some quite rapid thawing,

and result in some flooding issues.

Sunshine for many -

still, though, some wintry showers across Scotland,

but much milder here.

5 degrees for Edinburgh.

Then, overnight, Monday into Tuesday,

we continue with our area of low pressure.

Quite a flabby low -

that means nothing too significant in the way of wind,

and that could mean some mist and fog developing

across the southern half of the British Isles.

Meanwhile, it will push this front further north into Scotland,

perhaps bringing some rain for Northern Ireland briefly on Tuesday,

but, with a bit of intensity,

we could again see some significant snow,

particularly for the higher ground of Scotland.

At lower levels,

it should mostly be a case of rain -

but, of course, rain landing on all of that snow,

again, could cause an issue with the rapid melt.

For Wednesday, quite a decent day for much of England and Wales,

but there will be some showers developing in the forecast,

and some of those could be pretty punchy.

We could see some hail and thunder

and, locally, some intense falls of rain.

Finally, though, a breather in the weather for Scotland -

rain to the north and west, but, for many, some spells of sunshine,

and 7 degrees is our forecast high, there, for Edinburgh.

Here we are looking at Wednesday into Thursday.

Still that same area of low pressure -

just cast your eye a bit further south, though.

By Thursday, it looks like it could get something just developing

on its tail end to the south,

a weather front that could bring some heavier rain on Thursday

into southernmost reaches of the British Isles.

We could also see some showers across Northern Ireland

and the north-west of England,

and they could still be a little bit wintry.

We still have that cold air close by,

so it could, with a bit of intensity,

turn those showers somewhat wintry.

So, that's Thursday.

Then, for Friday,

it looks like the low will throw another front our way,

with a risk of some snow across the higher ground of Wales

and perhaps the Midlands -

some heavy rain pushing in further south.

By the time we get later on in the period, though,

that's when our uncertainty starts to come into our forecast.

It certainly looks like it will stay unsettled,

but it's all down to the jet stream, and, later on in the week,

it looks like we're going to get

quite a big buckle in the jet stream.

It looks like the axis of the jet stream, in fact,

will push right the way across the British Isles,

and, if it does that,

it could actually feed some pretty mild air in to us from the south -

but that, I'm afraid, is only one solution.

That's possibly the more favoured one, of the two, at the moment,

but we may just see that that dip in the jet stream

isn't quite so extreme, so it may be that it's south-western Europe

that benefits from the milder air later on next week.

As I said, some uncertainty in that element of the forecast,

so it will be worth staying tuned as we get closer to the time.

Further ahead, though, the outlook relatively similar.

Staying unsettled, more wind and rain to come,

and still that risk of some snow for Scotland.

Worth staying tuned.