Walking in a Winter Wonderland

There have been many rumours flying around that this winter (2011 - 2012) will be one of the coldest in recorded British history. I doubt that it could be worse than the winter of 1947, one of the most famously snowiest and coldest winters most of us have heard about from grandparents. There was some snow in the South in December 1946, but then there was a very mild spell with temperatures reaching 14C. It began on January 22nd when there was snow cover from this date until the 17th of March. Late January saw significant snowfalls for the Scilly Isles (Rare) and South western England. In early March there was a blizzard across England and Wales with 1 ft falling widely and 5ft falling on the hills. So could 2011 - 2012 see significant snowfalls like those seen in 1947? James Madden, a long range forecaster believes that this winter could be bitterly cold and snowy. Here are some of the reasons    that suggest that this winter could be cold and snowy.

Bus buried in snowdrift during 1947 cold snap.
 Could this winter be similar?

The Gulf Stream


The main reason to show that this winter will be cold is the fact that the Gulf Stream is decreasing rapidly in temperature.

On the NOAA website we cans see that the speed of the gulf stream is hardly noticeable. The current should come up past the West coast of England so there should be orange near the West coast on the NOAA map, but it is only a slighter blue.

If you look at the youtube video by James Madden, there is a comparison of two pictures from NOAA of the velocity of the surface current. We can see that in 2009 there was an orange-yellow colour coming up past the West of England. In June that was not noticeable.

The Gulf stream is vital for making our winters more mild then other countries on the same latitude as us: Calgary, Alberta and Regina in Saskatchewan. Both of these places are in Canada and have severely cold winters.

On average, in Calgary there are an average of 5 days a year when the temperature  drops below -30C and the average daily temperature in January is -9C compared to a balmy 6C in London.

Without the Gulf Stream our temperatures would not be quite this severe because Calgary has a continental climate, therefore it is mild in the summer and bitterly cold in the winter. Brighton is by the coast, so it would be more mild but temperatures in winter would be much lower than in the past.

Solar Activity

Scientists have found a link between fewer sunspots and atmospheric conditions that block warm westerly winds.

Mike Lockwood, professor of environment physics at the university of Reading, compared past levels of solar activity with the CET (Central England Temperature record). He and his team of researchers used the CET because it's record went as far back as the Maunder minimum in the 17th century. 

The Maunder Minimum was a period of low solar activity that lasted around fifty years in the 17th Century. During this period of time Europe experienced a series  of very harsh winters and the maunder Minimum is often referred to as the "Little Ice Age".

Lack of solar activity causes the meteorological phenomenon known as blocking in which the Jet Stream is diverted and folds back on itself. This causes it to move northwards thus causing a dramatic fall in temperature in the British isles and Europe. The Jet stream would normally bring mild temperatures and moist air from the west but without it we would experience bitterly cold and dry winters as we have seen in the past two years.

La Niña

La Nina in the Pacific Ocean

La Niña is the oceanic phenomenon of the cooling of the central east Pacific Ocean, temperatures in the centralist equatorial area can be 3-5C below normal. This can have dramatic effects across the globe, for example the drought in Eastern Africa and the floods in Pakistan. Although the affects experienced in Britain are somewhat less dramatic, La Niña brings a very cold start to the winter in Britain and a mild end. this scenario is exactly what we saw last year when we had extremely cold and snowy days in November and December but one of the mildest February's on record. It was the coldest December with a mean UK temperature of -1C which beat the previous record of 0.1C in December 1981.

So how can la nina affect us over such a huge distance? La Niña in general brings down global temperatures and it just contributes to the cocktail of other meteorological reasons that give us cold winters.

The weather seems very mild at the moment, but could La Niña affect us over the next few months? It's still possible although it is half as strong as last year so the effect won't be as harsh.

Conclusion

So there are many reasons to show that this winter will be a cold one and they seem to be quite strong reasons too, however it is the same case every winter, there are always people that say that every winter is going to be cold. James Madden is a long range forecaster and his prediction for this winter has been talked about in a few news papers The Mirror, The Daily Mail and the Sun all with apocalyptical titles to articles about the coming winter. All of the newspapers talking about a cold winter use James Maddens' website, Exacta weather, as their main source.

The newspapers use "Big freeze to start with snow in October" and "Britain to be hit by snow in October".  Although there wasn't much snow in October across the Uk there was some snow showers across Northern Ireland and Scotland. However snow on the Scottish Highlands in october is quite normal so the first big snowfall is yet to arrive, and as we progress further into November we edge slowly further into the cold, harsh British winter and we come closer to the possibility of snow.

Sources: BBC News, Exacta weather, Weatheronline. 

Next Time: James Madden, the meteorologist all the papers are talking about.

The phrases in red are links.