The repeated storms fit into a pattern of disturbed weather in the Northern Hemisphere, which saw from November 2013 a disturbance to the jet stream in the western Pacific, which propagated eastwards bringing a warm winter to Alaska, drought to California, and repeated cold air outbreaks to the eastern USA where the early 2014 North American cold wave resulted.

[2] On 2 November the M4 Motorway was closed between Margam and Pyle due to the weather, and a roof canopy at the Princess of Wales Hospital Bridgend was damaged.

[3] Late November and early December saw an area of high pressure positioned to the west of Britain and Ireland, this directed the westerly path of weather systems moving over the Atlantic to the north of the UK, along which the storms developed before impacting across the Nordic countries.

A change in the weather regime began as active depressions brought strong rain and snowfall to the mountains towards the month end.

Until 13 December, France (and UK and Ireland) were protected by a powerful anticyclone stretched from the Maghreb to the British Isles, which deflected the Atlantic storm track north into Scandinavia.

[11][12][13] Met Éireann issued red warnings for wind at 9:00am on 18 December for counties Donegal, Galway, Leitrim, Mayo and Sligo.

[16][9] Deepening below 935 hPa (27.6 inHg) is considered uncommon in the North Atlantic, but has been recorded on a number of occasions, measured from ships transiting the ocean and from land based-recording stations.

[18][19] On land the low pressure during the storm was measured at 936.8 hPa (27.66 inHg) on 24 December at Stornoway, Isle of Lewis off the north west coast of Scotland.

The Felix low was more remote from European mainland and brought strong tightening of isobars across NW France, where winds of 141 km/h (88 mph) were reported in Camaret-sur-Mer, Brittany.