Welcome to the Weekly Weather Update – your guide to the world’s oceans and seas. Each week, we highlight key marine weather patterns and analyse unusual or significant weather events. From calm spells under high pressure to tropical cyclones forming in equatorial waters, and from jet streams steering oceanic storms to anomalies in sea-surface temperature that shape global climate patterns. Here’s what this week’s weather has in store.
Northwesterly flow over the North Sea
Thanks to high pressure over the Atlantic and low pressure over Scandinavia and Eastern Europe, northwesterly winds will prevail over the North Sea this week. This results in occasional strong winds and high waves, with temperatures gradually lowering.
Examining the tracks of the low-pressure areas in more detail, the first low is positioned over NW Russia on Tuesday. At the same time, a ridge of high pressure associated with the Atlantic high extends southeast over the southern North Sea. A new active low is expected over the Norwegian Sea on Wednesday, moving into southern Scandinavia on Thursday. It will curve slowly east via the Baltic afterwards. This low will cause increased northwesterlies later this week.
A strong gale is expected over the entire northern and central North Sea on Thursday, with a risk of whole gales in the north. A trough developing towards the North Sea might strengthen the northwesterlies again during the weekend.
The highest waves this week are expected overnight Thursday into Friday, thanks to the aforementioned low-pressure area. By then, the significant wave height over the northern half of the North Sea will be between 5.0 and 7.0 meters, while significant wave height over the southern part will range between 2.5 and 4.5 meters.
As it looks now, pressure will remain high over the Atlantic after the coming weekend, although it will shift south toward the Azores. Meanwhile, low-pressure areas continue to affect Scandinavia and will also affect the North Sea at times.
Tropical Cyclone activity over the southern Hemisphere
Meanwhile, in the Southern Hemisphere, two tropical cyclones are affecting the weather over the Indian Ocean and Australia. Tropical Cyclone Grant is positioned over the central Indian Ocean and is moving in a westerly direction. Current forecasts expect it to pass about 500 km north of Mauritius next week. Tropical Cyclone Hayley is positioned just northwest of Australia; it is moving east-southeast (ESE) and will soon make landfall near Cockatoo Island.
To remain informed about the weather at your location, we recommend you to consult the latest weather reports. Stay safe, and we look forward to updating you again next week!
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We plan to post this Weekly Weather Update on our Infoplaza for Marine Weather Operations LinkedIn page as well. This is also the place where we will share other insightful marine weather articles, so be sure to follow us to never miss an update.
