Break in the grey as Aberdeen sees sunshine for the first time in 21 days

Aberdeen has finally had some sunshine, for the first time in 21 days – marking the end of the longest sunless period in the area since Met Office records began in 1957.Residents of the Granite city in north-east Scotland glimpsed the sun late on Thursday afternoon, with sunshine having been last recorded on 21 January.The Met Office said that 30 minutes of sun was officially recorded in the Dyce area in the hour up to 4pm.It followed weeks of unrelenting rain in the region and throughout the UK.More than 277mm of rain fell on Aboyne in Aberdeenshire in January, about four times the monthly average, while the first 10 days of the year brought heavy snow to the north-east of Scotland.In just the first three days of this month, south-east England received nearly a third of its average February rainfall.The wintry weather is expected to continue, with a yellow warning for snow and ice for most of Scotland and northern England in place until 12 noon on Friday.The Met Office spokesperson Grahame Madge said an air mass called Arctic maritime air is bringing temperatures down.He said: “The snow and ice warnings that we’ve issued at the moment cover pretty much Scotland and northern parts of England. There may be some snow showers a little bit further south than that.“We’re not expecting any particularly impactful snow and the conditions will be quite brief before we get another system coming in from the Atlantic over the weekend, but for the next few days it will feel quite a bit different, as we’ve got colder air coming in.”BBC Scotland weather presenter Judith Ralston said: “With a change in weather type, we finally lose the stuck pattern of cloud, rain, and bitingly cold winds.“This finally breaks, allowing a northerly air mass to set in, bringing much drier, brighter conditions, sunshine on the way on Friday and Saturday and a few wintry showers on Friday.”