Temperatures are soaring across Western Europe, with daily highs more than fifteen degrees Celsius above normal. The greatest anomalies in the Alps will be in northern France and Switzerland. The warm temperatures will spread east into the Austrian Alps on Tuesday. 

The culprit is the strong ridge parked over Western Europe. The clockwise flow around this area of high pressure will result in southwest winds that will pump warm Atlantic air into the region. 

Temperatures will start to cool off slightly starting on Wednesday but remain above normal for the weak storm passing to the east Thursday night. Some rain/snow showers are possible, mainly in the Austrian Alps. 

As the ridge weakens and flattens out over Southern Europe, the upper-level low will try to move west and fill the void. This could bring a round of heavier precipitation Monday through Wednesday. The models have been trending farther west with this feature over the last day, and thus more significant impacts. I haven’t seen enough consistency in the models to be convinced just yet, but I am watching it closely. 

I am still watching the period from February 7th to the 10th for a more meaningful pattern change, capable of delivering big storms with cold temperatures. The ensembles show an upper-level low setting up north of the Alps while some of the deterministic runs show several strong systems during that time. I’ll let you know when they start to agree on a solution. 

Thanks for reading the Europe Daily Snow!

Luke