Europe braces for significant continent-wide cold outbreak

After the Sudden Stratospheric Warming (SSW) event at the beginning of January 2021 and the Polar Vortex collapse, weather patterns across the northern hemisphere became very dynamic and progressive. This has set the stage for a potentially quite significant cold outbreak across the European continent over at least the next three weeks.

"What weather models are hinting at lately is a severe cold outbreak setting up this weekend into next week. A so-called Beast from the East will push extreme cold and also develop some snow towards the west and south," Severe Weather Europe's Marko Korosec said.

We have seen a system after system moving from the Atlantic into the continent, delivering unsettled weather conditions regionally over the past few weeks, Korosec added.

"But now, the general patterns are slowly coming together into a more wintery mode."

A potentially quite significant cold outbreak is expected to spread into Scandinavia this week and then move toward western and central Europe early next week.

Once the cold reaches higher moisture further south, winter storms are likely to form and bring snow for some regions.

"The temperature forecast is definitely trending towards a deep freeze similar to the Beast from the East experienced three years ago, in 2018," Korosec said.

Forecast models

Featured image: 850hPa Temperature Anomaly for February 19, 2021. Credit: TropicalTidbits, GFS