Temperatures are set to plunge over the coming days with it feeling no warmer than -6C by the weekend.

According to the Met Office, Saturday morning could feel like minus 6C at 6am in Bournemouth caused by a recent Sudden Stratospheric Warming which could bring a risk of snow to the UK.

On Friday, the Met Office warned there was “increasing confidence that the recent Sudden Stratospheric Warming above the North Pole could lead to prolonged cold conditions over the UK, increasing the risk of easterly wind and significant snow.”

Prof Adam Scaife, of the Met Office Hadley Centre, said: “Signs of this event appeared in forecasts from late January and in the last few days we have seen a dramatic rise in air temperature, known as a Sudden Stratospheric Warming, at around 30km above the North Pole.

“This warming results from a breakdown of the usual high-altitude westerly winds and it often leads to a switch in our weather: with cold easterly conditions more likely to dominate subsequent UK weather.”

Frank Saunders, a Met Office Chief Operational Meteorologist, said: “A Sudden Stratospheric Warming implies around a 70 per cent chance of cold conditions across the UK. There tends to be a lag of about 10 days before we see the downstream effects on the UK’s weather, as it takes time for the influence in the upper atmosphere to feed down to those levels where our weather happens.

“The outcome for the UK’s weather is still uncertain, but forecasts from computer models at the Met Office and at other centres are beginning to coalesce around a greater likelihood of cold conditions in the days and weeks to come.”