UK Weather - Autumn 2023

[Simon Culling]

It is gradually turning colder here in the UK but it is a slow process as we are still getting mild incursions of Atlantic air from time to time - we are seeing another one today Monday 27th Nov) for more southern parts of England + Wales, but it will start to feel colder this afternoon as cooler air follows the low pressure system as it moves into the continent. This low will only slowly move away to the east and will dumbbell around a number of lows over Scandinavia and this will maintain the northerly drift over the UK and keep us on the northern side of the jet stream. Over time we will see a build of pressure to the north of the UK and this will strengthen the flow and turn it more to the NE by the weekend and we could see some very cold air drawn in from Scandinavia - temperatures have fallen well below -30°C in the last week in northern Norway + Finland where Father Christmas lives. There is also the possibility of a low crossing northern France this Thursday and if the track is on the northern side of the range of projections, we may well see a period of sleet or wet snow down here in the south.

In one of the incursions of cold air this past week, we saw the lowest temperature of the autumn season so far in the UK with a low of -7.7°C at Shap Fell in the county of Cumbria on the 25th. On the same night, the mercury fell to -7.1°C at RAF Benson - a notorious cold spot in southern England.

The CET for November was 8.4°C (+1.9°C) up to the 25th and the EWR was 112mm also up to the 25th and this is 106% of the monthly average.

[Simon Culling]

Snow showers have affected the eastern side of the UK in the last couple of days with a sprinkling of the white stuff on the ground for some - on the hills of North Yorkshire they have seen 5-10cm in places.

A low pressure system is moving very slowly close to the far north west of France (in the north of Biscay) this morning (Thursday 30th Nov) and giving a mixture of rain/sleet/snow to the far southern counties of England with again a dusting of snow in parts of Cornwall, Devon + Dorset which is quite unusual for these parts for this early in the winter. Here in Tiverton it is cloudy at 9am this morning and at 0°C, but not a single flake of snow so far and the snow band may not quite reach this far north before moving away to the SE.

The cold weather will persist for a few days and it should be dry, sunny, crisp and frosty over the weekend before the milder air tries to push in from the west. We will see some sharp frosts across the country and maybe the first reading of -10°C for this winter.

[Simon Culling]

An update on the snow in the SW of England on 30th November as this is quite unusual for this part of the UK so early in the 'winter'. Most of the snow fell from the early hours to about lunchtime and the greatest depths were on Dartmoor and Bodmin Moors and the higher ground (up to about 200m amsl) in the far south west of Cornwall. There was a temporary covering in many part of Cornwall and south Devon, but it did not persist as in the places mentioned earlier. Depths of about 5cm in Cornwall but up to around 10cm on Dartmoor were reported. The picture below is from the far SW end of Cornwall and I reckon there are 3-5cm on the ground. A memorable event for this area.

[Simon Culling]

I forgot to add the weather summary for November. Attached is the Met Office review of both November and Autumn 2023.

For the UK as a whole, November was very average for temperature, rainfall + sunshine. However, for England it was a rather wet month.

The Autumn was warmer, wetter + slightly sunnier than normal.

https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/about-us/p ... wet-autumn