A quick look back at the autumn season reveals a typical mix of weather including the equal-second warmest September for the UK and a pretty cold November.
In terms of the other weather variables, the main themes were drier and less windy than average (about three quarters of normal rainfall and wind) and sunnier than average, notably in northern Scotland; the third sunniest autumn on record.
Looking forward to December we anticipate some big changes in the first week. The opening days will be mostly dry and cold with light winds, the weekend of 3 and 4 December should be sunny in most places. This is due to an area of high pressure centred over Germany and impacting much of Europe.
However, a strengthening Atlantic jet stream will rearrange the position of the high pressure. It will tend to settle over Iberia, and at the same time low pressure will develop to the south west of Iceland. These changes on the weather map leads us to forecast a notable rise in temperature as much warmer southwesterly winds arrive. Both the day and night times will be milder, and we'll notice the breeze picking up which will bring spells of rain, especially to Ireland and western parts of Scotland and Wales.
The details become very sketchy after the middle of the month but the overall pattern should be for cooler west or northwesterly winds coming in from the Atlantic and confidence for the last two weeks of month is fairly low.
The maps - courtesy of ECMWF and MetDesk - in the summary image and above show the big difference in the weather patterns between 2 to 6 December and then 7 to 11 December.
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