Winter is coming: cold weather on the way after mild spell
IT’S time to get the woollies out again as the mercury is set to plummet this weekend.
The recent spate of unseasonably mild weather is behind us as a cold mass was set to descend over Ireland last night.
There will be a distinct chill to the air starting today, according to Met Eireann.
The air mass will bring heavy showers, hail and thunder to the west by this morning which will move eastward over the course of the day and become widespread by the afternoon, a forecaster said.
Although it should be sunny today, it will still be cold and blustery with sharp westerly winds.
It will also feel much colder than of late, with top temperatures of just 7C to 9C although possibly up to 10C along the south and south-east coast.
Showers will continue into this evening while the mercury will plummet to between 1C and 5C overnight, bringing widespread frost.
But the showers will ease in the east and south by tomorrow morning with the winds easing as well.
Although it will remain cold – with top temperatures of between 8C and 11C – it will be sunny in most places on Sunday.
Sunday night will be cold and clear – with frost forming early in the night in Leinster, east Ulster and east Munster as temperatures drop to between zero and 2C.
But the picture will change again on Monday as clouds move in from the west, bringing some patchy rain and drizzle overnight as the temperatures shift to between 6C and 12C.
Monday morning will start off bright in the east but rain and drizzle will move in from the west, turning heavy and persistent in the west and northwest by afternoon.
Temperatures, however, will bounce back to between 10C and 13C.
But the heavy rain will then extend to all areas by Monday night. But it will ease off overnight as temperatures drop to between 3C to 6C.
Although the weather will feel more seasonal as we move into November, it’s a far cry from this time three weeks ago when the country was battening down the hatches in preparation for the arrival of ex-hurricane Ophelia on October 16.
“It’s not too bad,” the forecaster said.
“Ophelia was unprecedented. We never had a hurricane this far north before,” she said.
As for the arrival of winter, she said we aren’t quite there yet.
“There is no mention of the W-word yet,” she said.