Germany and Eastern Europe have been gripped by freezing temperatures and snow for a week, and now Germany’s no.1 daily Bild has an online report warning that “things are going to get a lot worse over the coming week”.
Temperature forecast for next week. Chart source: National Centers for Environmental Protection: http://wxmaps.org/pix/temp4.html
A blast of frigid air is once again getting ready to make an already cold situation even colder – much colder! Bild writes: “NOW COMES THE SHOCK COOLING!”
Beginning in the middle of next week, night-time temperatures down to -20°C are expected. In the daytime the mercury will climb to only -10°C. Everywhere in Germany!”
For those waiting for warmer winters with little snow and balmy temperatures, as the warmists used to promise us, you’ll just have to forget about it this winter too. If the current cold keeps up, then this will be the 4th colder-than-normal winter in Central Europe in the last 5 years.
And what do the weather models show for Week No. 5 (the week after next week) for Central Europe? Right now they show things staying pretty cold. Here’s the forecast for next Thursday, 24 Jan.:
Source: National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP), http://www.wetter24.de/profikarten/gfs-ncep.html
And here’s the projection for 12 days from now, Wednesday, Jan 30:
A bit warmer…Source: National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP), http://www.wetter24.de/profikarten/gfs-ncep.html
And here’s the projection for 15 days from now:
Source: National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP), http://www.wetter24.de/profikarten/gfs-ncep.html
Clearly temperatures for Central Europe will remain far below normal, and with no relief in sight.
It’ll be interesting to see if the German power grid holds up. If neighboring Eastern Europe, and France to the west, are hard hit by bitter cold, then they may not have any surplus power to spare for Germany, which shut down 8 nuclear power plants a year and half ago. Germany thinks that it can fill that gap with wind and solar energy.
Of course that will only work if the sun shines, and there’s no snow covering the solar panels, and if the wind blows steadily, and if people don’t run too many dryers. Don’t be surprised if the government orders large power consumers and factories to shut down.
As for myself, I’m going to start looking for a Honda generator to power our gas-furnace. Even though we’re living in times of “global warming”, I’m not keen on freezing to death in it.
How much is this cold going to cost?
A lot. Bitter cold always claims more lives. Donnerwetter.de here tells us that warm winters are far more agreeable for humans, as they entail fewer car accidents, lower heating costs, and better economic activity. Moreover, cold claims far more lives. Donnerwetter.de writes:
The colder it is, the more people die! Already starting at a temperature of 18°C, the death rate climbs 0.6% for every degree Celsius it gets cooler! Especially old and sick people are hard hit. At a temperature of 0°C, about 9% more people die than at a relatively mild temperature of 15°C.
Now just imagine how bad it’s going to get when the mercury plummets to -20°C! It works out to 21% more deaths! And the idiots want us to fight warming?
Cold weather in the winter time? I am absolutely gobsmacked. No record breaking cold?
It looks like Australia is not only having hot weather in the summer…..it is having RECORD HOT weather in the summer. Much like Russia in 2010, Europe in 2003, the US in 2012, etc.
Yes….the heat keeps ticking upwards all around the globe. Little bit, by little bit.
http://phys.org/news/2013-01-australia_1.html
You’re ignoring all the cold and that temperatures are no different than 15 years ago. You’re practicing tea-leaf science. Shows us trend charts with real data for a change.
Don’t waste your time.
I’m still interested in whether JC Smith is a gravy train rider or a front for vested interests; maybe a paid troll.
JCSmith, I won’t wright what I think the JC stands for, but he has been trolling other site with his crass stupidity. Follow Edwards lead.
This blog had a visit last year from a goon of an EU commissar. The goon was going through all blogs that reported about a particularly mad idea of the commissar and denied the claims made.
So, the Eurocrats are definitely watching the blogosphere. That’s why I think JC Smith might be one of their goons, tasked with spreading FUD.
“Yes….the heat keeps ticking upwards all around the globe. Little bit, by little bit.”
It’s been doing that since the LIA. Why did we come out of the LIA, JC Smith? CO2 was not rising. Why should this natural warming stop now?
Why was there warming from 1910 to 1940?
You can’t answer any of these questions, and you are in fact not interested in answering them as you only want to keep spreading your alarm – but you have no scientific basis for it. Oh, and of course the very idea that warming is bad is exactly wrong in the first place.
Maybe I waste my time, but JC is picking only the cherries he can get. He acts like the crows (here in Ireland) last summer, when they picked the green (do you get it) one.
Only one, yes only one, cherry survived the crows and went ripe.
I look at mother nature and I see things turning and I mean cooling. Like the 60’s and 70′.
The Irish Winter of 2010/2011 was the coldest in 13o years. County Mayo recorded a low temperature of -17.2C. 130 years warming and then back to square one.
Ireland is suppose a mild climate but the last 5 years can’t be called mild.
Pierre,
you should repair the broken link to BILD online:
http://www.bild.de/news/inland/kaeltewelle/deutschland-winter-wetter-jetzt-kommt-die-kaeltekeule-28148582.bild.html
No more Schwarzwald.