In article ,
jbm writes:
"Keith (Southend)G" wrote in message news:f32ec099-f001-4152-af
...

On Jan 31, 6:49 pm, "Togless" wrote:
One of the BBC forecasters mentioned the unusual size of the high pressure
system (if that's the correct terminology) extending essentially from the
east coast of Russia all the way across Europe to the UK. He said that he
had never seen high pressure over such a large area before. Could anyone
please explain the significance of this - if there is any! :-)

Cheers...

BBC East also mentioned this, showing the isobar chart on a 'globe'.

I am certainly more impressed with the forcasts now. It's nice not be
treated like a 5 year old.

Keith (Southend)
http://www.southendweather.net
"Weather Home & Abroad"

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I saw that too. But last night's (Monday's) "flat view" on Look East
really showed how big it is. Has there ever been one that large
before?

I recall reading that during February 1947 high pressure persistently
stretched all the way from Scandinavia to northern Canada, completely
reversing the normal wind direction at our latitude all the way across
the Atlantic.

And am I right in thinking that if that doesn't move soon,
preferably eastwards, we could be looking at temperatures down
towards -20C in the east of the country?

It looks as though, although we are going to have very cold conditions
for the next few days, the very coldest air isn't quite going to reach
us because the ENE wind currently over us isn't quite going to be
sustained long enough. It's interesting to look at the 850mb temperature
GFS and ECMWF forecast charts, in conjunction with the surface pressure
charts (the ECMWF conveniently gives both sets of data on one chart),
and see where the "purple air" is forecast to go.

As to extremely low macimum temperature, in January 1987 the coldest day
of the bitter spell saw maxima widely at -8 to -9C over southern
England. They were probably the lowest maxima in that region since at
least the 19th century.

Gordon Manley estimated that the temperature in London would have been
around 15F (so about -9 to -10C) for many hours during the great
easterly gale that introduced the bitter winter of 1740. Temperatures
were measured at somewhere in Holland as being between -2F and 2F at the
time (ie in the region of -18C!), but passing across the southern North
Sea would have warmed the air somewhat.
--
John Hall
"The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicism
by those who have not got it."
George Bernard Shaw