While temperatures are struggling to get above freezing this week, you will be happy to hear there is a change on the way. It is to gradually get milder over the weekend, and by next week weather presenter Derek Brockway says it will feel almost "tropical" in comparison.
In a forecast on Tuesday (December 14), he said it was 4C or less in Cardiff with Arctic maritime air, but it will be "14°C next Monday with tropical maritime air". The Met Office agrees saying wintry conditions will continue until the weekend, before milder and wetter weather sweeps in to create a temporary reprieve.
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A number of weather warnings for snow or ice are in place across the UK for wintry hazards as the cold weather continues this week. Temperatures could drop as low as -8°C in Wales on Tuesday night into Wednesday morning.
The Met Office says the UK will remain cold through this week with the risk of sleet and snow at times continuing across northern and eastern locations, but with a chance of some snow across parts of the south west later on Tuesday. At the moment it doesn't look like that band of weather will affect Wales and there are no weather warnings in place.
Paul Gundersen, a Met Office chief forecaster, said: "Over the last week, the UK has been held in a northerly airflow bringing cold, sometimes Arctic air, to the UK. We will still have this northerly influence to our weather patterns until the weekend, but then the cold conditions will lose exclusive dominance over the UK’s weather patterns and we will move into a regime where relatively mild and relatively cold conditions will vie for supremacy.
“We can expect changeable conditions with colder and milder air not too far away from our shores, but it does seem that the Atlantic ‘has woken up’ compared with recent days and will be a stronger influence, countering any further bouts of extreme cold conditions, although spells of further wintry weather remain possible through the rest of December."
Although these temperatures aren’t exceptional for winter in the UK, it is the most significant and widespread spell of cold conditions since February 2021.
Steven Keates is a Met Office Deputy Chief Forecaster. He added: “The boundary between the two air masses will create a window for snowfall over the weekend. This is likely to be transient in nature as the mild wet air from the west will ‘bump’ into the colder air, before displacing it further east. This potential spell of snow will lead to some temporary disruption before the snow quickly turns to rain.
“While the freezing conditions remain, drivers especially are reminded that freezing fog, snow and other wintry hazards will continue to create difficult conditions in places this week.”
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