Weatherlawyer wrote:

I snipped the link as it will have changed by now I imagine and anyway
it's another one that doesn't open properly in my version of Firefox.

What I'm asking about is this Bartlett High.

The FAQ tells me this:

"Q. What is a "Bartlett High"?

A. As the nights draw in, and the yellowing leaves are blown hither &
yon in the autumn gales & rain, thoughts of many on this newsgroup turn
to ... the "Scandinavian High"! Reason?

Well, for those of us living in the 'maritime' region of NW Europe, to
get any sort of prolonged cold, wintry weather, we really need a large
(in horizontal extent), slow-moving, intense anticyclone - primary
centre northern/arctic Russia (probably in excess of 1045 mbar central
pressure) - with a strong and persistent ridge extending westwards over
Scandinavia - spawning occasional discrete but reasonably 'solid'
individual high cells around the periphery; these cells from
time-to-time taking over as the primary focus of high pressure.

The air at low levels should be bitterly cold, with low thickness
values (indicative of cold air in depth: see Q/A 2A.5). In addition, to
produce the required snow, Atlantic depressions / fronts will approach
this 'block' (see Q/A 2A.19) along latitudes south of 50 degN,
attempting to displace the beast and in the process we end up with snow
.. or sleet .. or freezing rain .. or blizzards, or any combination of
same. Some good examples occurred in the winters of: 1946/47, 1962/63 &
1978/79 as well as January 1940 and December 1981 (not meant to be
exhaustive).

However, in recent years (this written in autumn, 2005), these
situations have been notable by their absence.

What 'high' blocks there have been stay teasingly just too far east and
more often than not, a broad band of high pressure extends from the
Azores area, east-north-eastwards towards the Biscay / English Channel
region - perhaps now & then displaced towards the Alps, as storm upon
storm sweeps in from the North Atlantic, hurried along by an often
powerful upper jet (see Q/A 2A.1).

Rain, gales and above average temperatures prevail, with any 'wintry'
weather confined to brief incursions of Polar Maritime west or
WNW'lies, or perhaps a temporary Arctic Maritime blast from the north -
which is shunted away as the next surge of mild air hurries in from the
west.

The apparently semi-permanent belt of high pressure in the 'wrong'
place has been christened ... "The Bartlett High", in honour of Paul
Bartlett, a luminary of this ng, who used to put his experience of
forecasting to the test by publishing a reasoned winter forecast for
all to see.

As Les Crossan has noted (also a stalwart of this ng), this has come to
be regarded as a 'slug' - nothing moves it, not even extracting a pair
of dividers and skewering the said beast as it sits dominating any
particular synoptic chart! "

I may be a little dense or the point beng made here is confusing me.
Probably both. But the term "in the wrong place" isn't something to do
with the normal course of events perchance?

As in:
"This sort of thing is just abnormal meteorological behaviour"?
Or:
"As opposed to "a little too far east" for snow?"

I noticed there are some 700 references to it in Google's search of
this newsgroup. How many of them are likely to give me an idea when
such phenomena took place?

Only the reason I ask is that I noticed that this last spell had an
anticyclone covering virtually all Europe reaching to Portugal in the
last days before the ridge split.

I want to look up what else was going on when these myftical beaftief
appeared in daief of yore.

FFS doesn't anyone want to discuss this most interesting phenomenon at
this most auspicious occasion for it?

Posted to less succulent climes for their desertication.

Let me have another stab at it. With no offense intended to the present
FAQs holder (who has done a stalwart job of keeping this encyclopaedia
open to all) edited:

2C.1
Q. What is a "Bartlett High"?

For the 'maritime' region of NW Europe, to get any sort of prolonged
cold, wintry weather, we really need a large, slow-moving, intense
anticyclone - primary centred over northern/Arctic Russia (probably in
excess of 1045 millibars central pressure) - with a strong and
persistent ridge extending westwards over Scandinavia - spawning
occasional discrete but reasonably 'solid' individual high cells around
the periphery; these cells from time-to-time taking over as the primary
focus of high pressure.

[As per today 1st January 2007.]

The air at low levels should be bitterly cold, with low thickness
values.

To produce snow, Atlantic depressions / fronts have approach this
'block' along latitudes south of 50 degN,

[looks good sofa]

Some good examples occurred in the winters of: 1946/47, 1962/63 &
1978/79 as well as January 1940 and December 1981.

[OK; I think I got the gist of it now. Back to sleep everybody.]

Such 'high' blocks may stay too far east and more often than not, a
broad band of high pressure extends from the Azores area,
east-north-eastwards towards the Biscay / English Channel region -
perhaps now & then displaced towards the Alps, as storm upon storm
sweeps in from the North Atlantic, hurried along by an often powerful
upper jet.

Rain, gales and above average temperatures prevail in such
circumstances, with any 'wintry' weather confined to brief incursions
of Polar Maritime west or WNW'lies,

Or perhaps a temporary Arctic Maritime blast from the north - which is
shunted away as the next surge of mild air hurries in from the west.

The apparently semi-permanent belt of high pressure in the 'wrong'
place has been christened ... "The Bartlett High", in honour of Paul
Bartlett, a luminary of the uk.sci.weather newsgroup

"This has come to be regarded as a 'slug' - nothing moves it, not even
extracting a pair of dividers and skewering the said beast as it sits
dominating any particular synoptic chart!"

And damn me if (without prior checking for any proof) it doesn't also
herald severe earthquake activity. No wonder I have been ignored. I
aught to post this on to sge for the trolls and the churls to take a
bite out of me (and suffer the worst for it.)