Seems a repeating pattern is that the new year always brings drab
weather, and that any "exciting" winter weather will occur in either
December or April(!)

Interesting that the second week of January has only been anything
close to "exciting" since 1987 in 1997 and 2003, and since 1992, mid
January has only been anything close to seasonal in 2001 (no snow, but
cold).

Should we be thinking "oh well, only two months to spring"? and "March
is almost always a dry, pleasant spring like month"?

Nick

wrote in news:1135858563.132154.155240
@z14g2000cwz.googlegroups.com:

Seems a repeating pattern is that the new year always brings drab
weather, and that any "exciting" winter weather will occur in either
December or April(!)

Interesting that the second week of January has only been anything
close to "exciting" since 1987 in 1997 and 2003, and since 1992, mid
January has only been anything close to seasonal in 2001 (no snow, but
cold).

Nick - my birthday is 20th Jan, which is apparently "Midwinter's Day" in
England and Wales and I cannot ever remember snow falling on my birthday.
I'm 30...

Richard

Nick - my birthday is 20th Jan, which is apparently "Midwinter's Day" in
England and Wales and I cannot ever remember snow falling on my birthday.
I'm 30...

Richard

Snow here on 20 Jan 1985. All right, maybe 10 is a bit young.:-)

Tudor Hughes, Warlingham, Surrey.

Richard Dixon wrote:
wrote in news:1135858563.132154.155240
@z14g2000cwz.googlegroups.com:

Seems a repeating pattern is that the new year always brings drab
weather, and that any "exciting" winter weather will occur in either
December or April(!)

Interesting that the second week of January has only been anything
close to "exciting" since 1987 in 1997 and 2003, and since 1992, mid
January has only been anything close to seasonal in 2001 (no snow, but
cold).

Nick - my birthday is 20th Jan, which is apparently "Midwinter's Day" in
England and Wales and I cannot ever remember snow falling on my birthday.
I'm 30...

It is remarkable how the supposedly coldest month of the year never
brings any snow.... January is definitely the least snowy of the three
true winter months, and probably behind April too as I said....
unfortunately it is also too early for spring-like weather (even in the
south) - the best we can hope for in January, it seems, is a 10 day
spell of frosty, coldish by day, anticyclonic weather which sometimes
happens at the end of the month. But the first three weeks seem to be
drab three years out of four on average....

Nick

Yes.. it's much much milder out there now. it's been raining all night

Normally this would happen on New Year's Eve itself, so it's a bit
early this year.

Amazing pattern in recent years.

Always the short cold snap sometime during xmas week, followed by
return of mild, wet, muck in time for New Year's Day

A long time ago, sometime in the 1970's, there was a big New Year's Eve
snowstorm over the south-west

We need a person of large proportions to sit on that Azores high for
us, and sink it back south, then maybe allow for that wonderful
situation of the Channel Low to occur again

In article .com,
BlueLightning writes:
Amazing pattern in recent years.

Always the short cold snap sometime during xmas week, followed by
return of mild, wet, muck in time for New Year's Day

A long time ago, sometime in the 1970's, there was a big New Year's Eve
snowstorm over the south-west

1978-9. Though it was actually overnight on the 30th-31st, IIRC. The
south-west had by far the worst of it, but in my part of Surrey we
managed about 2 inches, with considerable drifting.
--
John Hall

"I am not young enough to know everything."
Oscar Wilde (1854-1900)

New Year 1995 was one of the coldest and snowiest on record here with
15cm of snow and a max of -2C. However since then the only snow during
the first ten days of January has been in 2001 and 2002 (both remnants
of falls at the end of the previous year), 2003 (light dusting on 3rd
and 4th) and 2005 (2cm on 2nd).

The only heavy January snowfalls (over 10cm) there have been here,
since 1987, have been in 1993 (11th), 1995 (1st) and 2004 (28th). There
was just a single snow covered January morning from 1988 to 1992 (in
1991) compared with a total of 66 for the five years from 1959 to 1963.

The last time the mean max was below 5C, in January, was in 1987
whereas this happened in each year from 1977 to 1987 with the exception
of 1981 and 1983. So a cold January is certainly long overdue.

February, on the other hand, has brought plenty of wintry weather in
recent years with the average of 6.6 snow-covered mornings for 2001-05
being the most for a five year period since 1969-73. The average for
1952 to 1956 was, however, as high as 12.6. Lowest 5-year average
(since 1946) was 2.4 for 1981-85.

Richard Slessor,
Aberdeen.