27 centimeters thick was the white blanket on the feldberg in the black forest in the morning; the german weather service (DWD) reported 15 centimeters from the high mountains of the erzgebirge. How the winter will turn out cannot yet be predicted. The meteorologists set their sights on a week at the most. "Wet and cold – real gluhwein weather," predicted DWD expert dorothea paetzold until next week.
What will come after that is still completely open. Last winter brought the warmest new year’s day since 1877. Hazels began to bloom, even crocuses ventured out of the ground. In brandenburg, mushroom pickers found chanterelles in the forest. Siberian frost with double-digit minus temperatures prevailed in february only late, but all the more fiercely for it.
For the meteorologists begins next saturday (1. December) the winter, because they calculate the seasons in full months. In the calendar, autumn is not over until three weeks later. According to the calculations of the DWD climate experts, november was significantly too mild in germany – the average temperature was 1.2 degrees higher than in the comparative period from 1961 to 1990. The autumn months of september, october and november together, however, only brought a slight increase of 0.4 degrees.
The year 2012 had begun with strong temperature fluctuations. January was 2.4 degrees too warm, february three degrees too cold, march again 3.4 degrees too warm. In may, which was clearly too warm by 2.2 degrees overall, there was frost in the middle of the month on the ice saints’ day. Of the first eleven months of the year, eight were too warm, and only three too cold, an indication of climate change.
According to scientists, however, the change will not only lead to a warming of the climate, but will also bring more extremes. In addition, striking cold spells such as the one last february could also be paid for. "In this country, however, there has not yet been a significant increase in extreme conditions," said prof. Bernhard stribrny of the biodiversity and climate research center (bik-F) in frankfurt. In general, however, the weather system is becoming more dynamic, "the variability is increasing, there is less normal weather."