As on Thursday, the State Meteorological Agency (Aemet) announces water for this Friday in most of the country due to the passage of frontal systems associated with Atlantic storms. Looking ahead to the weekend, the anticyclone will take hold over Spain and warm air will arrive from low latitudes, which will shoot temperatures to "abnormally high" values for the time. The cause of this new warm episode, the third of the autumn-winter season, is that the air mass that will fly over the country will be "one of the warmest recorded at this time of year". Thus, the atmosphere will be "very mild" both at the end of this week and at the beginning of next week, with values between 5° and 10° above normal. "Temperatures will be more typical of the second half of October than of mid-December. In parts of the southeast of the Peninsula it could even exceed 25°," says Rubén del Campo, spokesman for Aemet.
Here's the prediction, day by day:
On Thursday, a "quite active" frontal system left rains in almost the entire territory, the most abundant and intense in Galicia, with up to 91 liters per square meter in Rois-Casas do Porto (A Coruña), 88 in A Lama (Pontevedra) and 85 in Beariz (Ourense), very high amounts, even for the parameters of this community. And this Friday will be "another rainy day in a good part of the Peninsula" and this time, also in the Balearic Islands.
It is not ruled out that the rains will be heavy in the eastern Cantabrian Sea, the Pyrenees and the Balearic Islands and that they will be accompanied by storms and some hailstorms in parts of Galicia and the eastern interior of the peninsula. "It is unusual for there to be storms in December, and even hailstorms, but the prevailing atmospheric instability will be enough for it to happen," says Del Campo.
Probability of #precipitación GREATER THAN 2 MM expected today in #Península and #Baleares, based on the EPS of the European Centre. More info in https://t.co/9PLsmvqyfS pic.twitter.com/SJeuyhqvDG
— AEMET (@AEMET_Esp) December 8, 2023
Rainfall, except in the far north, will subside throughout the day. The snow level will drop to 1,200 metres at the end of the day in the Pyrenees, with "significant accumulations" from that quota. On the other hand, in the Cantabrian Mountains the altitude will be above 2,000 metres. The winds "will blow with intensity in the northern and eastern thirds of the country and there will be bad sea conditions in general. The minimum temperatures will rise in the north and east of the Peninsula and in the Balearic Islands and the daytime temperatures will fall, especially in the east of the Peninsula and in the southern half," the meteorologist completes the forecast.
From Saturday 9th, the anticyclonic weather will prevail, that is, stable and sunny, but it will still rain, and even with significant accumulations, in Galicia and, to a lesser extent, in parts of the Cantabrian Sea and the Pyrenees and, perhaps, in the north of Castilla y León. There will be fog banks in low-lying areas of the interior and temperatures will rise, both maximum and daytime. At the northern end of the Peninsula, the ascent can be up to 4° or 5°. The frost will disappear and in parts of the Bay of Biscay and the Mediterranean coast temperatures will exceed 20°, up to 23° in Valencia and Malaga.
🌡️Over the next few days we expect a notable rise in temperature in practically all of Spain.
The air mass that will fly over our country will be one of the warmest recorded at this time of year.
We'll tell you more in this thread 🧵 pic.twitter.com/L50cYZPJhL
— AEMET (@AEMET_Esp) December 7, 2023
On Sunday the 10th, a new temperature rise, which will be pronounced in most of the Peninsula and the Balearic Islands. "It will be an abnormally warm day, with values between 5° and 10° above normal in much of the north and east of the territory. Only in areas of the west and centre of the Peninsula, where there may be abundant low cloudiness or fog banks, temperatures will be more in line with the season," says the Aemet spokesperson, adding that in few capitals it will drop below 7° and in the Mediterranean and the Cantabrian Sea it will exceed 20°, even 25°. in Valencia and Murcia. The rains will be restricted to Galicia and surrounding areas.
On Monday the 11th and Tuesday the 12th there will be no major variations in the thermometers, although on the first day of the week they will continue to rise in the south and the second, in the east. "There will be two very unusually mild days, in which temperatures will exceed 15° in the central hours of the day in general, 20° in the Cantabrian Sea and in the Guadiana and Guadalquivir valleys and 22° in the Mediterranean area, even 25° in Valencia, Alicante, Murcia, Melilla and Malaga," says the expert. However, in the interior of the central and southwestern area, and it is possible that also in the northeast, fog banks and low clouds may form again due to the stability, which will persist for a good part of the day, which will mean that the environment will not be so anomalously warm.
But, overall, "the intensity of the warm episode will be such that Monday and Tuesday could be the warmest 11th and 12th warmest days recorded in this month since at least 1940." In other words, records for warm days would once again be broken. This is the third warm episode recorded in Spain in autumn and so far this winter after the anomalously intense summers of San Miguel and San Martín. In the last episode, between November 11 and 19, seven records for warm days were broken. This year there are already 37 of these records, two more than in the whole of 2022 "and seven and a half times more than would be expected if anthropogenic climate change were not occurring". Normally, in a climate unaltered by the hand of man, there are five records for warm days and five cold days each year. So far this year, there has been no sign of the cold records.
"The year 2023 is competing with last year to become the warmest year of the series in Spain. At the moment, he wins with a slight advantage in 2022. But it is indisputable that warm episodes throughout the year have been much more frequent, intense and long-lasting than cold ones," stresses the agency, which expects this episode to end from Wednesday, when temperatures could begin to drop and reach more normal values.
As for the rains, on Monday and Tuesday they will only see them in Galicia and nearby areas. "Perhaps on Tuesday, with the arrival of a new front, they could spread to other parts of the Bay of Biscay and Castilla y León," Del Campo said. In the Canary Islands, the next few days there will be "some cloudy intervals, practically no rainfall and rising temperatures". At night, it will drop to between 18° and 20° and, during the day, it will reach between 24° and 27° in coastal areas.