MILD weather on the way next week by the look of it, as the high pressure build to our south the anomaly charts first hinted at looks pretty certain into next week.

if, however, the high is centered further north, over the uk it might well be cold with fog and frost. however its unlikely to last, and the mean upper flow doesnt allow for a high to sit over us for longer then 24-48 hours. the mean upper flow sourced over the azores means some very mild weather likely next week. and the good news is that although not settled, the wettest and windiest weather looks like itll be confined to the northwest, with the southeast being rather dry and very mild.

Cold, Wet, Very Gloomy and Windy here today. Got to be the worst day for weather of this December so far. Need the lights on just to see in the house.

Wrong thread..

http://forums.digitalspy.co.uk/showthread.php?t=2119447

Sunrise 8:25am Sunset 3:49pm here. Streetlights still on at 8am. I live further north and west than you though so that is the reason for the darker days here (and colder and wetter weather).

…but it’s getting lighter now.

Winter solstice was at 10.44am this morning;….the Sun is heading north again,…praise the lord.

Well it's certainly not good news for us folk here in the north west though is it?? Don't think many Cumbrian's or Lancastrains would take kindly to you saying that....

We get enough rain throughout the year as it is. We don't need any more!

It seems as though as soon as a mild spell begins we get all the rain then when it gets colder again, guess what, it still rains...

Throughout the Summer we get loads of rain as well, especially in July and August.

My treeman is currently working through heavy rain, hailstones and cold blustery winds at the moment, but he's happy to continue, bless him. Also had a re-roofing done in November and had roofers who have worked relentlessly throughout for 3 weeks despite heavy rain, sleet, and biting cold.

If I was in charge I'd happily use some of our already depleted council budget to build a giant airship, fill it with water from our over-flowing reservoirs and rivers and pay people to take it over to some well-to-do places in the South East, such as Cambridge, and have it slowly hover sprinkling water over a town or two all day, before going back for more. Maybe give Africa a bit too or help out our European neighbours if they're experiencing a drought. Sunny Spain could also get a small dousing as well.

You lot then wouldn't be sat quite so smug boasting about your warm and dry weather in the Sunny South East while laughing at the North's weather then would you?

Whatever happened to the early predictions of a White Christmas this year? These generally build up late November/early December but this year very few mentions of any snow forecast for Christmas.

move then... im only the messenger not god.

Stop panicking! It could well be dry or mainly dry almost everywhere next week for several days. The High Pressure is (probably) back, for a few days anyway and after that, nobody knows. Just be glad that the Christmas Day storm is now much less likely and it may just be windy (i.e. gales at sea rather than storm force winds) on that day albeit with some rain around, even up your way. The storm centres may now pass well to the north of Scotland.

Well it had been very dull and gloomy up until about 2pm when the strong westerly wind managed to blow all the clouds away. Now the sky is almost completely clear. It's just gone 4pm and still no street lights on yet. Strange. I remember even on a clear afternoon around the shortest day in December the streetlights would come on by 4pm. Maybe it's just sneaky council cutbacks as they've installed new lights in places and often it feels like they don't come on early enough. It can get very dark and they still don't come on.

If it was up to me I would make it so that all street lights came on no later than the sunset time and about 30-60 mins before on overcast/gloomy days.

Today it has been cloudy and a strong westerly wind, and heavy rain at times, it felt much COLDER than the 5 degrees my car was suggesting.

Todays forcast was a 6+ hour deluge of rain for the Southeast this evening, but we didn't get a drop. At least their still fairly accurate when telling viewers what the weathers been like before they attempt to do the main forcast.

Well here's an interesting thing. On Tuesday night's long range 9.55pm forecast with Schafernacker he was saying there was a slight possibility of some white stuff falling on Christmas Day in the higher parts of the country from the passing storm system if it is in the right place and it delivers a blast from the leading bottom edge as it goes by with an easterly, or something to that effect! He wasn't ruling some snowflakes out to cut it short. But the oddity is that tonight we are hearing that Christmas Day is looking to turn exceptionally mild, possibly record breakingly so, with temperatures hitting 16c and maybe, just maybe even a touch more than that, which is incredible. Such contrasts.

Considering Christmas Day 2015 was one of the mildest ever it really is notable that 2016 is also shaping up to do something similar if not even milder still.

Then immediately after Christmas Day it's all change into a settled spell as High pressure feeds in from the south west and temperatures fall again and skies clear so next week from Boxing Day onwards we can expect frost and crisp days ahead with reasonable amounts of sunshine in many places and mostly dry. What a shame we couldn't have that for the big day itself. An interesting selection of weather this festive season for weather watchers.

There is actually quite a bit of snow falling in the Scottish Highlands as I write and for much of Thursday.

I think they just like to hedge their bets.

Or more likely forecasting the worst possible conditions just in case....

No one wants to do a repeat of Micheal Fish especially with a big storm looming..

If it chucks it down but none or just a "light shower" is forecast they'll likely get far more complaints than if they predict torrential rain all day and then it just out to be a bit of drizzle, people will be much happier: "oh, it's not been so bad after all, they were predicting monsoon conditions on the telly this morning"....

Listening to Ben Rich on BBC News earlier, who said that the Christmas Day record could be broken. The record apparently being (I thought he said) 16.8C "set a long time ago". Yet according to Torro, the record was set just last year at exactly 16 degrees in Teignmouth, Devon.

carole kirkwood on breakfast this morning said the record was 15.6c....

Did she give a year?

Anyway, if you watch BBC News they'll likely repeat Ben's interview with Anita McVeigh, as they have for the last couple of hours. About quarter past. He also talks about Storm Barbara.

I may have misheard the 16.8, but he definitely said it was a long time ago.

ETA: I must have misheard it. The previous records (assuming Torro's 2015 is inaccurate) was indeed 15.6 set jointly in 1896 and 1920.

All ferries to the Hebrides cancelled tomorrow morning , expecting a proper gale with up to 90mph winds. Exciting.

I like stormy weather, hence my little rant.

You heard correctly - but Teignmouth's 16.0 isn't official at the moment so there must be some concerns about it. The highest elsewhere was 14.9 deg C last Christmas day at Bude (provisional) with a 14.8 at Chivenor, and Teignmouth's excess of 1.1 degrees C over any other station in the region seems a bit excessive. From The Guardian a week or so back, who asked the question:


Therefore, 15.6 remains the record but could be exceeded retrospectively at some time in the future. Or not. Life would be simpler if somewhere would just break both of them on Sunday, though the highest I can see predicted on the 12 noon GFS for Sunday is 14. Somewhere will likely beat that though.

The storms over England seem to have largely gone further north now, seem to be more of a northern Scotland and N.I. event apart from some strong gusts as the fronts and rain bands pass over in England and Wales especially the West..

THIS is the one!!...Ever since the Fish fiasco, whenever there's been even a slight chance of some really bad weather, the cretinous forecasters go totally over the top and predict things are going to be so horrendous that people shouldn't dare even venture out of their houses!!....9/10 they are proved to be wrong but no-one seems to care as everyone is just relieved that it wasn't as bad as they predicted. I'd rather have some HONEST and REALISTIC forecasts and forecasters still though rather than this modern day trend of over the top presentation and predictions.

It recently started snowing here -

A few evenings ago I said to my husband You know what I would really like a hurricane to be named after me.
Well we have hurricane or storm Barbara about to create havoc for us this weekend.
Sorry folks.

My auntie is called Barbara and she's coming up to visit Southport this weekend. :O :O :O