Good evening, everyone.

I would like to transfer you some weather observations from Vienna on a
seemingly uninteresting period for central Europe (too). Follow me:

1. What can one see by looking at the SLP analysis for Europe?
http://www.wetterzentrale.de/archive...ka20061216.gif
Correct. An anticyclone centred over the Balkans. The 500 hPa map (analysis
not yet available) shows a ridge over central Europe. One could expect fair
weather, possibly foggy at night and well into the morning with accompanying
low temperatures, especially in the morning due to the distance from the
sea. 850 hPa temperature was +13.2C yesterday. That would suggest possible
local frosts due to inversions and temperatures below 10C given any
inversions.

2. Look at the sounding for yesterday:
http://tinyurl.com/y2z5hp
Temperatures at and slightly below freezing point at surface and a very
strong subsidence inversion above 700m. The temperatures recorded at surface
were to be found at 3500-4000m again in free atmosphere.

*Question: what was the weather like yesterday in Vienna?
Answer: very low clouds, almost foggy, temperatures around zero. It was
snowing but one couldn't really see the snowflakes most of the time. The
whole cloud mass was in cold air masses and any precipitation was snow.
Right above the cloud mass, the sun was shining bright. Very light
accumulations on grass and cars.

Yannis.