Greater Manchester set for ‘cold and wintry’ weather with chance of snow this week as mini-heatwave ends

Following a week of unusually warm and sunny weather, Greater Manchester is set to face a spate of ‘wet and wintry’ conditions.

Throughout the last week, Brits up and down the country were able to enjoy summer-like conditions with blue skies, prolonged sunny spells and temperature highs of 20C. 

Scientists suggested that Britain’s ‘early summer’ could have been caused by a ‘completely unprecedented’ heatwave in the Arctic, where shocking temperatures nearly 30C above normal were experienced in the North Pole. 

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Alternatively, the BBC’s weather forecaster Phil Morrish said the warmer weather was a result of warm air coming in from Africa.

Calling the spike in warm weather a ‘Saharan Sizzler’, Morrish told The Express : “We’ve got a large area of high pressure which is now sitting over Europe, but what that is going to do is gradually bring the air coming from Africa during next week.

“We can call it a Saharan Sizzler, with lots of warm hot air coming up from across the country.”

However, the weather will reportedly settle back down into conditions more accustomed to March this week, with the Met Office predicting spells of rain alongside ‘wintry’ conditions.

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For Greater Manchester, the weather is expected to decline from Wednesday (March 30th), where the region will experience ‘unsettled spells of rain through the day’.

The Met Office’s summary for Wednesday reads: “Cloudy with outbreaks of rain, potentially wintry over higher ground. Thereafter sunny spells and showers, some perhaps wintry, and feeling colder as temperatures drop.”

These weather conditions will stay in place until at least Friday (April 1st), with some areas of the region expected to experience ‘light’ showers of snow.

For the weekend and the rest of next week, high pressure to the west of the UK will mean northerly winds will bring a ‘cold start to the period’, with a number of ‘wintry showers’ expected.

Read the Met Office’s full forecast here.