by Snow is heading to parts of the UK next week, the Met Office said.
It issued snow and ice warnings for northern England and Scotland on Monday and Tuesday.
A yellow warning is in effect for much of north and east Scotland, the north east of England and North Yorkshire from midnight on Monday until 11.59pm.
A separate alert applies to a slightly larger area throughout the day on Tuesday, including more parts of Scotland and Yorkshire.
Forecasters are warning areas of northern Scotland and north east England are expected to experience snow showers on Monday, with a low chance of road delays and travel disruption.
The mild weather that dominated February is set to be swept away with freezing temperatures hitting the whole country and ice warnings expected next week.
Deputy Chief Meteorologist Chris Almond said: “Although we have moved into meteorological spring, our weather next week will have a distinctly wintry feel.”
“Very cold air will spread across the UK bringing snow showers down to sea level in the north on Monday and those snow showers could spread further south on Tuesday.
“With freezing overnight temperatures and a risk of ice, weather warnings are likely to be issued for Monday and Tuesday as details of potential impacts become clearer. So keep an eye on the Met Office forecast.”
The UK Health Security Agency has issued a Level 2 cold weather alert across England, which is expected to be reviewed and expanded in the coming days.
Last week, the Met Office suggested that in some areas of the country in early March “there is a small possibility that rain or snow will spread southwards in a more organized manner”.
This is due to a phenomenon known as “sudden stratospheric warming”.
Here Yahoo News explains how it works.
What is sudden stratospheric warming?
Stratospheric sudden warming (SSW) refers to rapid warming — up to about 50°C in just a few days — high up in the Earth’s stratosphere.
This is so high up that we don’t feel the “warming” ourselves, but it can cause a domino effect a few weeks later that affects the weather we experience further down in the troposphere.
Every winter, strong westerly winds circle the Arctic high in the stratosphere — what’s called a stratospheric polar vortex, the Met Office explains.
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Sometimes, though not every year, this causes the winds in the polar vortex to weaken or even flow from east to west.
Cold air then sinks rapidly in the polar vortex, causing temperatures in the stratosphere to rise by up to 50 °C within a few days.
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Cooler air from the higher level disperses and sinks into the troposphere, which can cause the jet stream to change shape and “snake” across the North Atlantic and northern Europe, including the UK.
A sudden stratospheric warming event was linked to the beast from the east sweeping across Britain in 2018.
What is the beast from the east?
The Beast from the East, a winter storm that raged from February 22 to March 5, 2018, saw weeks of heavy snowfall and winds battering the UK and other parts of Europe.
It resulted in a total of 17 deaths in the UK, with 22 inches of snowfall in some areas and £1.2 billion in damage.
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Since then, the term has been used in the media to describe subsequent heavy snowfalls.
Although the blizzard was caused by a SSW event, the Met Office says there is a “low likelihood of having widely disruptive winter weather” like that of March 2018.
Is there a sudden stratospheric warming takes place now?
A major SSW occurred earlier this month about 50 km over the North Pole and caused the stratospheric polar vortex to reverse.
This weather event is currently still taking place, although as mentioned, it usually starts with a delay before people feel it on the surface of the earth.
The cold snap is expected to hit within the next two weeks, according to the Met Office, with “much colder” weather expected in mid-March.
The long-term forecast for March 9-23 reads: “Rain or snowfall is more likely than earlier in the month, with a low chance some wintry episodes could be disruptive, although northwestern areas are most likely to experience the driest conditions.”
“Winds could often be from the north or east and temperatures overall are below average rather than above, but later in the month colder air will battle a strengthening sun.”
