Britain is on track for one of its warmest Christmases on record with the Met Office predicting temperatures that could peak at more than 6C above the seasonal average in some parts of the country.
The band of “remarkably mild” weather arrived in time for Christmas Eve, with forecasters expecting automated weather stations to record 13 to 14C across much of Britain, with 15C possible in places such as north-east Wales.
While Christmas Day itself is expected to be a degree or so cooler, it will still be far warmer than the 6-7C typical for the time of year, and closer to the warmest UK Christmas on record, when 15.6C was logged in 1920 at Killerton in Devon.
“It might not be the crisp winter’s day that a lot of people appreciate on Christmas Day, but at least it’ll be mostly dry and settled,” said Aidan McGivern, a Met Office meteorologist. Commenting on what he called the “remarkably mild” Christmas Eve, he said: “This sort of weather is becoming increasingly traditional at Christmas time, I think, in the UK.”
The warm front now parked over Britain swung in from the Atlantic and covered the entire country in a blanket of cloud, though there will be some breaks for the sun to peek through. The front arrived courtesy of a mangle-like mechanism, with Britain sitting between a low pressure to the north, which generates anticlockwise winds, and a high pressure to the south, which drives clockwise winds.
With temperatures so unseasonably high, the Met Office sees no chance of a white Christmas in the UK this year, ending a four-year run from 2020 to 2023 when at least some snow fell in the country.
For the Met Office to declare a white Christmas, an official Met Office observer or one of their automated weather stations has to observe at least one snowflake falling on the day. No snow was recorded on Christmas Day in the UK in 2018 or 2019.
Expectations of a white Christmas trace back to the colder climate between 1550 and 1850, when Britain and the rest of the northern hemisphere were locked in a little ice age and snow was more common. Some Januaries, the temperature dropped enough for Londoners to hold frost fairs on the River Thames, complete with football pitches, food stalls and temporary pubs.
Since the Industrial Revolution, global heating driven by greenhouse gas emissions has driven up average temperatures, reducing the odds of a white Christmas further. Nowadays, for most of the country, Christmas is close to the start of the snow season, meaning snow is more likely later in winter. A typical December in the UK will have on average three days when snow settles on the ground, a figure that rises to 3.3 days in January and 3.4 days in February.
So rather than a white Christmas, the Met Office forecasts a grey Christmas for Britain this year, with the mild weather expected to last until Friday before conditions become more unsettled into the last weekend of the year.
