22nd January - Today's News: Could the Mail Have Been More Wrong?

Yesterday, both the Express and the Mail had front page headlines proclaiming could the Met Office have been more wrong?   Oddly, the Mail's story quickly disappeared from the front page of their website though, perhaps in embarassment after the MetO's response?  Oops.  The fact is, the MetO issued no such forecast and the report issued to contingency planners (so secret it's published every month on their website!) gave a 15% probability that winter would be in the wettest category (so slightly less likely than the average 20% probability but by no means unlikely).   Nathan Rao went one further to say that he did accurately forecast the weather this winter, just that we had rain instead of 100 days of snow .....   The comments below his 'story' are quite amusing.

At least the Mail got this story right: January was the fourth warmest on record, despite eastern US freeze - the full NOAA report is here

And winter doesn't give up in the US as another powerful winter storm pushes east whilst in Maryland, rare February tornado tracked 18 miles through St Mary's and Calvert counties

Beijing raises pollution alert to orange for first time as heavy smog blankets the capital

Antarctic glacier thinned rapidly in the past - ~8ka in fact, at the height of the current interglacial, before the onset of the Neoglacial that, in theory, should be seeing increased glaciation at the poles due to reduced axial tilt and consequential reduced insolation.