Wet and windy

Libby Greenhalgh gives her weather forecast for this weekend's Warsash Spring Series

Start of the Spring Series and what a frightning start it could be! The cold Siberian winds and high pressure of the last couple of weeks has given way to the UK prevailing south westerly conditions. WET and WINDY!

General Situation.
The weekend weather will be dominated by a much more mobile situation than the last week or two. Two separate frontal systems will affect the UK over the weekend.

The low pressure system pushing across from west through Thursday and Friday will still be affecting the UK in the early hours of Saturday. The low will be centred over the Midlands providing a moderate south westerly wind in the Solent which will strengthen across the day. Sunday will see the approach of the second frontal system ahead of which the wind will strengthen to near gale force.



Saturday will see a slightly variable wind direction first thing as the low pressure centre moves north east. The direction will veer from 170deg to a steady 230deg with a wind speed increasing from 8 knots to 15 knots by 1000. Around midday the wind will have freshened to between 18 to 22 knots and will have backed off slightly towards 200deg.
The cloudy conditions to begin with will disperse across the morning to give a sunny dry day with the chance of showers late afternoon as a trough moves over the area. Check out the cloud and pressure charts view the SLP, H500-H1000, Clouds.

Sunday will start with a fairly similar direction to that at the end of Saturday at around 200deg but slightly less in strength - only 8 to 10 knots. This will quickly build ahead of the approaching front and back around to the south reaching 15 knots by 1000 and up to 25 knots (where the wind is funnelled up Southampton Water) but on average around 20 knots by midday.

Signs of the approaching frontal system will be seen in the form of higher cloud pushing in and slowly lowering across the day. Light rain will begin to fall in the early afternoon ahead of the front, with more moderate rain on the front. Check out the movement of the rain with the latest radar. The warm front will pass through the Solent around 1500 with gusts reaching up to 30 knots. Behind the front the wind will veer to around 210˚ with the wind speed maintained at about 20 knots until early evening. The trailing cold front will quickly push through around 1800 providing further rain and gusty conditions.

To see the Bracknell chart for Sunday - click here .