Irish winters are rarely cold. They are usually mild, very mild even relatively speaking to latitude. This is especially true earlier on in the season when the zonal westerly winds are at their most intense and seas are still mild unravelling from the summer and autumn. Occasionally, blocked weather patterns can occur to give severe winter weather, most infamously in 2010. Most recently, a blocked weather pattern brought a cold spell in early to mid-December 2022 bringing down an arctic maritime airstream to Ireland. A lot of the cold air was modified by the mild seas which were unusually warm thanks to such a warm 2022 and there was a lack of a true easterly feed to enhance instability so whilst the nights were persistently very cold with hard frost, it wasn't a remarkable spell by any means with not much snow. However, the novelty of a cold spell before Christmas was certainly there and there were moments to remember including the snow overnight the 8th/9th in the southside of Dublin and over the mountains and the freezing fog on the 12th.
The gallery below is a selection of photographs I have taken during the December 2022 cold spell to make the most of the rare weather.
