14/03/2018 Weather for the Week Ahead

Hello, again. Are we still expecting the Beast from the East?

Well, probably, but it's going to be a mini beast -

but a far cry from what we're seeing at the moment.

We've got an area of low pressure spinning to the west of the UK,

bringing some rain to western areas,

but it's drawing up the air from Iberia,

so, it's a milder wind that's picking up on Wednesday.

It will be a breezy day, some gales, actually,

around some of these western hills and coasts,

where we're going to find some outbreaks of rain coming in, too.

For many central and eastern areas, though, it'll stay dry,

and there will still be some sunshine, albeit a little bit hazy -

but those temperatures could get as high as 14 or even 15 degrees.

That's the peak of any warmth over the week ahead.

These weather systems here will tend to migrate

further north and east overnight into Thursday.

The low pressure still stays out to the west of the UK,

so, this is where we end up with this area of rain in the morning,

and it will slip its way slowly northwards and eastwards

to clear away from the south-east.

Sunshine follows on behind,

but there will be some heavy and thundery showers developing

towards the south-west and into Wales.

Here, temperatures 11, maybe 12 degrees,

but to the north of our band of rain

across Scotland and north-east England,

it will be a little bit chillier -

but there's colder air still to come.

That weather front sort of grinds to a halt, really,

as we head towards the end of the week.

Instead, we've got high pressure dominating across Scandinavia.

It's blocking everything off,

so we're going to find some colder air starting to arrive

around that area of high pressure.

So the wet weather in Scotland and north-east England

beginning to turn to sleet and snow.

Still got some heavier showers further south

across England and Wales,

and still potentially some more rain to come in Northern Ireland.

You can see the contrast in those temperatures -

the numbers are dropping in the north-east.

We're going to find that high pressure influencing our weather

as we head into the weekend,

drawing in some colder air from the near continent.

The easterly wind returns

in time for the weekend.

It will be a strong wind,

possibly gale force winds,

and there will be a significant wind chill.

It will feel much, much colder than it does at the moment,

and we're going to find some snow showers almost anywhere -

more, especially, down the eastern side of the UK,

coming in further west across England and Wales,

but largely missing Northern Ireland,

largely missing the north-west of Scotland -

but those temperatures struggling to make 1 or 2 degrees,

and in the wind it will feel quite a bit colder, of course.

Within those showers,

we may well find a cheeky little weather front,

an area of low pressure,

which could organise the showers into some longer spells of snow

across southern parts of England, the Midlands,

perhaps into Wales overnight and into Sunday morning.

That pushes through,

and then the showers become fewer.

Behind that, we've still got an easterly wind, still cold,

still a lot colder than it should be at this time of the year.

So, not a great weekend ahead.

We've still got the cold air in the outlook, as well,

but this time, instead of an easterly wind,

we're going to find an area of high pressure

building down from the north,

and that brings with it more of a northerly wind,

always strongest down the eastern side of the UK.

Look at the upper level wind

and we've got this undulation of the jet stream.

Now, we talked earlier on

about this idea that we could get milder air

longer term into the outlook -

that looks like it's been delayed,

because we don't really get into that stronger jet stream just yet.

So, instead, with high-pressure,

it remains cold.

There'll be some really frosty nights to come,

but we probably won't see an awful lot of snow falling.

It should be largely dry.

The milder conditions, the Atlantic winds,

hold off till the end of the week.