Storm Ciara battered many parts of the country yesterday with wind gusts peaking at 93 MPH across northwest Wales although gusts widely were into the 60's and 70's, even across inland regions. The good news is that Ciara has now moved away to the northeast but she continues to dominate the weather across the country with strong westerly winds bringing blustery showers for the start of the week.
It's a blustery start to the day with fresh to strong westerly winds affecting most places, these winds gusting to over 50 MPH in exposed spots. Winds will tend to pick up again, especially along the south coast of England where gales or severe gales gusting 60-65 MPH are possible again during today. These winds are associated with a weather system moving in from the west, this system bringing showery outbreaks of rain across many parts of England and Wales today, the rain turning to snow over higher ground. Meanwhile, for much of Scotland, Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland it will be a day of sunny spells and wintry showers, the heaviest and most frequent showers coming across the north and west with some of the showers containing hail and thunder. Snow will fall over the hills and mountains with the strong winds leading to blizzard conditions whist snow will accumulate with several cm's in regions above 150 metres or so. Temperatures will be much colder than yesterday with a noticeable wind chill, top values ranging from 3°C to 5°C in the north and 6°C to 9°C further south.
It remains windy tonight with showers continuing to feed in from the west. Many of the showers will be wintry in nature with snow accumulating over higher ground. The showers will continue to be most frequent towards the north and west with clearer spells developing towards the south and east of the country. Temperatures will drop low enough for some frost and ice to form in many places, but values will remain a touch higher in the far south. Tomorrow sees little change with sunny spells and wintry showers continuing towards the north and west with the best of the drier and brighter conditions coming towards more sheltered eastern regions.
METEOROLOGIST: BARBER
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