Will Hand wrote:
This maybe a tad premature given the present situation but I will admit
now that my prediction for "widespread lowland snow" this week has
turned out to be a poor one.

I've looked back, and at the time there was great potential and the
models had been consistent and the synoptics indeed were not far out.
But what happened was that the temperature was one degree higher raising
the wet-bulb freezing level by 200m or so and many places got cold
rain/sleet instead of snow. The trouble is that when you go for snow and
this happens there is no place to hide!

But why was it warmer than many runs were initially showing? I think the
answer lies in our old friend SST. The air feeding into the low complex,
which was perhaps a shade further west than I thought might happen,
spent more time over the ocean going west over the top and warmed up in
the lowest layers. It is only now as the deep cold polar air behind the
upper trough comes east that we will get the widespread sub 200m
wet-bulb freezing levels that I expected Tuesday/Wednesday.

Ah well, I have a thick skin and I have been wrong many times before and
I will be wrong again, but I won't stop trying in very difficult
situations. Fortunately at least for me locally I won't be quite as
wrong but then it is easier forecasting for upland areas - sometimes.

Will

Nothing to be ashamed of. I thought last week that anywhere from the
midlands northward would have had widespread snow. It was always very
borderline in the SE though.

The GFS seems to have this cold low sticking around for the next few
days with the 522dm line near or south of the south coast so there is
still potential for a decent snowfall anywhere. Having said that the Met
Office seem to be forecasting surface temperatures of 6C by day which
would rule out any snowfall settling - surprised that temps would be
that high with such a low thickness.

I think what you should take into account in your forecasts is that in
the middle of January I ordered a pair of studded winter tyres for my
mountain bike in preparation for any further cold snaps; this probably
has knackered the chances of any lying snow for the rest of the winter :-)