Settled and generally quite chilly. Rather cloudy with overnight fog some nights – that is the general pattern for the next week.

Thanks to Tim for the photograph.

Tonight sees fog forming widely – quite dense fog so tricky driving conditions. Cold, down to around 2’C.

Friday starts foggy for most. It will slowly lift during the morning, but remains cloudy as a very weak weather front slowly spreads up from the south – perhaps giving a little drizzle or light rain at times in the afternoon. Around 6’C. Mostly cloudy overnight in a south-easterly breeze, the odd spot of light rain still likely. A touch milder, 8’C.

Saturday will be mostly cloudy for much of the day, though there should be some sunshine before the end of the day as the very weak weather front bringing all this cloud clears north. Milder in a south-easterly breeze, 11’C. Cloudy overnight with mist and fog forming in places. Chilly, around 5’C.

For Sunday the general European situation sees low pressure over the Mediterranean thanks to the split jetstream – which is taking some low pressure systems to the north of the UK, and some to the south. The kind of pattern that can be conducive to cold spells for the UK. And sandwiched in the middle is the UK and Scandinavia under high pressure.

Sunday looks cloudy and cool. Perhaps a tiny bit of brightness in the afternoon. Around 8’C. Cloudy overnight, fog forming in places, down to around 3’C.

Monday starts foggy for some, cloudy for all. Staying mostly cloudy – though again a chance of some limited afternoon brightness. On the chilly side at 7’C. Mostly cloudy overnight – a chance of a bit of rain as a weather front brushes along the east of England, around 6’C.

For Tuesday I’m hopeful for a bit more in the way of sunshine – but still plenty of cloud around. Still on the cool side, around 8’C. Likely chilly overnight – cloud/fog uncertain.

Wednesday is uncertain. Weather fronts will be starting to approach as low pressure moves down from the north-west, but actual conditions on Wednesday are uncertain. There could be some rain forming ahead of these weather fronts, or it could be cloudy, or perhaps even sunny. Still rather cool.

Thursday does look like low pressure will be very close to the UK, though the position and track is not yet certain. Rain is likely – though details are not yet set in stone, and probably still rather chilly, around 6’C.

Low confidence by Friday – models were suggesting that Thursday’s low pressure would move south of the UK, but are now suggesting that it stalls over the UK, feeding in some pretty chilly air from the north.

So until the models get a handle on this, forecasts for Friday and next weekend are pretty much semi-educated guesswork – the general pattern in the northern hemisphere is fairly unusual with the split jetstream and the polar vortex being over Eurasia rather than Greenland as it has been in many recent winters.

If low pressure does hang around the UK, still a pretty big if, then further showery rain would be likely for Friday and the weekend…and with cold air being fed in…well…we could even see a bit of wintry precipitation mixed in. I stress, very, very low confidence for position of low pressure next weekend, let alone anything else.

There is no quick route back to the traditional Atlantic-led wind, rain and mild conditions of our seemingly perpetual autumns for at least the next 2, possibly 3 weeks, so the potential for colder conditions is there – therefore maybe we’ll get lucky (or unlucky depending on your point of view) and see some snow at some point.

Gosh. I’ve said the s-word. I better finish this post. Don’t get excited – the first steps are in place – plenty needs to go right still for it to snow in our lowland southern location. Still more likely not to snow, than to snow…but there is potential up until around the middle of December. And yeah, perpetual autumn will return!