A MEMBER of staff at the University of Reading has explained the challenges involved in predicting snow.
Many parts of the UK woke up to a blanket of snow on Monday morning but knowing it’s going to happen ahead of time means working within very fine margins.
Reading’s Dr Rob Thompson explained: “Exactly how cold the temperature is determines whether we get rain, sleet, snow and whether any snow settles.
“If we are wrong by one or two degrees in predicting that temperature, we get the wrong answer. We need to be so precise. If the temperature was five or six degrees warmer, it would be relatively simple. There would be rain. If it was five or six degrees colder. It’s still really simple. There would be snow.
“The problem is just exactly where we are on that temperature threshold. And that’s a regular problem in the UK, we are often right on that threshold when we get these events. Is it going to be snow or rain? It is very difficult to predict because one degree temperature difference will make a massive difference to what our forecast outcome is.”
