It would appear that The BBC is suffering its worst spell of weather hysteria this winter with experts predicting that this condition will last for at least the rest of the week.

Clare, a BBC Breakfast reporter on a motorway bridge in Huddersfield, reported that last night the temperature had plummeted to -3c with a dusting of snow that is normally associated with winter on the West Yorkshire Moors.

Clare, bless her, reported that the traffic was building on the M62 (as it normally does in rush hour) and warned us via the RAC not to leave snow on our car roofs or slam our brakes on whilst driving on ice, as ice is apparently quite slippery.

We were then informed that in many places, it was our coldest night since 2012, which made the death of Britain’s oldest woman (aged 114) last week, all the more poignant, as she would have been one of the few people who could remember that far back.

The coldest place in Britain last night was Loch Glascarnoch where the temperature fell to -12c just -15c off the 1982 record set in Braemar (-27c) another place where you would have to be a mental patient to stand out in on any given night.

Forecasters are now told to say “Look at these figures minus one, minus two, minus three” before pointing at the camera and saying “and that’s just in your towns and cities..minus seven or eight is possible in the rural snowfields and the Glen’s of Scotland”.  

A stark and forthright warning to anyone mad enough to be planning to spend the early hours standing in a snow covered farmer’s field or a Scottish Glen.

Weather forecasting has become a patronising idiots guide to the bleeding obvious, warning us to wrap up warm and endure the impending ordeal of having to leave the house two minutes earlier in order to de-ice the car. One forecaster last night described today as being a miserable morning scraping ice off windscreens. Bloody Hell mate, it’s hardly a tsunami and besides, quite a lot of people like walking their dog on a clear frosty morning in winter.

The forecast maps are patronising crap as well, no occluded fronts, cold fronts, warm fronts or isobars, just a yellow bit called warm air and a blue bit called cold air, with each shifting the other around according to the mood of the jet stream. Don’t even get me started on the jet stream.

Phwooaar! I Long for a Return to Cold, Warm and Occluded Fronts

Weather porn is all the rage and as a sad case who used to like analysing all the pressure charts and second guessing the forecast, I feel like a nation of deluded imposters have invaded my private party and trashed it with razzmatazz that is fit only for the masses addicted to reality TV. How long before ‘Weather Factor’ Britain’s search for the next Carol Kirkwood?

“Today Simon I am going to be grossly exaggerating an Arctic plume…just look at this cold air pluuuuun…ging down from the North Pole, look at these temperatures and that’s just your town and cities…winter really is here, so get those winter woolies out!”

“You owned that forecast…you’re through to the next round!” 

Because of the great Michael Fish and his hurricane gaff, forecasting has perpetually erred on the side of caution ever since, meaning that the BBC Forecast is doing itself an injustice by predicting extreme events just in case they happen. Twice last week, southern England was warned about snow that never arrived.

As far as I am aware you can’t sue the BBC for slipping on the ice or sticking your car in a ditch after deciding to slam your brakes on when hitting a patch of snow, so why the drama? Maybe they are not only forecasting the weather, perhaps they are anticipating a time when some malnourished parasite can go after Tomaz Shafernacker for £250k because he failed in his forecast to add that there will be “some icy patches on side roads”.

It might not be long before ‘Where There’s Rain There’s a Claim’ adverts are filling up the airwaves in between the Jeremy Kyle Show and weather forecasts are warning that in the instance of wet weather, we would be well advised to use our windscreen wipers, especially when driving.

The fact is, the British weather is a bit of this and a bit of that, it always has been and always will be. In winter it will get cold now and then and in the summer it will be hot now and then. In between these occasional non life threatening events, a prevailing westerly wind means it is temperate and non-descript for the majority of the year.

Thankfully in Britain we have Carol Kirkwood, as without her advice, I would have gone out in shorts and flip flops today.