DONEGAL WINTER WEATHER UPDATE: THE good news is that it won’t be anything like the Big Freeze of 2010/11 – according to the forecasters at least.
But Donegal will get a dusting of snow overnight with more being predicted tomorrow and on Sunday – and one forecaster saying our hills could get 25cms at the weekend, with up to 10cms on lower ground.
Both Met Eireann and the UK Met Office also say a storm is on its way on Friday.
“Temperatures will drop and it is going to be a bitterly cold weekend,” said a Met Eireann spokesman.
He added: “There is a high risk of a very cold week ahead with some severe frosts. Some falls of snow possible also especially early in the week.”
Peter O’Donnell from The Meteo Times, in a winter weather update earlier this evening, warned of big snow falls for the North West.
“Put into forecasting terms, this looks like being a gradual north to south replacement of mild Atlantic air now present by snow-chilled air masses seeping into the increasingly easterly circulation from a much colder Britain,” said Peter.
“The process starts late Friday night when tonight’s frontal system stalls and gets pulled back into low pressure near Donegal/Derry. That should place most of Ulster in the colder variety of air masses near -1 C with sleet changing to snow, and there could be heavy falls on higher terrain. Expect 5-10 cm in places but 15-25 cm on some hills in the north by late Saturday.”
He added: “The most likely places to see heavy snow would be hills in south Donegal and about halfway up the eastern slopes in Wicklow and south Dublin (around 350m might see the heaviest accumulations).”