psuhoffman

He has that snowstorm checklist and this most definitely doesn’t fit the canonical mold. But sometime ya get lucky. But I remain more skeptical than I would be if we had a more normal setup for big snow here. It’s still forever out. The last snow threat the rug pull happened at like 3 hours out! This is still 120

Some are 10-1 some Kuchy. And different outlets have different Kuchy output maybe dependent on what levels they have info for. Sometimes figuring out Kuchy can be tricky

That is a more classic big snow look yes

I haven't said a thing, I keep my word

yea as I mentioned above it's a much riskier way to get that same clown map look than when its from 1 or 2 defined threats with majority support. But the waves day 7-12 all trended south some and look better today, not "likely" yet but way more hopeful than yesterday and the threat around Feb 20 is starting to show itself a little. It's a good run, I don't want people to think I am saying otherwise...just use caution with that crazy mean.

Ji would like to point out that means you have an 80% chance of NOT getting 18"

so sorry

It's a very impressive mean, so this is not to deb on it...but the way it gets there is not as sure a thing as when its from mostly one or two defined threats. Instead about 4" of it is from that one event...the rest is spread out across like 5 waves where only a minority of the members have a hit for each one. On the one hand it means we have a chance with multiple waves. But on the other hand...if you just take each one the most likely outcome is a miss...historically in these setups that is a recipe for a possible failure despite a crazy good looking mean, although not usually this good...but in the past that is how we failed when the EPS has some 5 or 6" mean for a week and we thought it looked good...but it was from a few hits on multiple waves and once the members converged on the most likely outcome (a miss) for each wave the mean went down to nada. I am NOT predicting that here, just pointing out one thing to be cautious about...and that is for the waves after next Tuesday. I think some snow from that seems to be a really good bet...enough to make Ji happy...that's another story.

He admitted that look is good yesterday when I posted the extended eps, but he doubts it ends up that way due to recent seasonal trends. Thing is I was in his camp to start the season but I’ve seen enough this winter that I now believe we have broken out of the longer term cycle we were stuck in. The pacific base state is different. I don’t think we get the same end of season torch we’ve had most of the last 6 years. We will see. Betting against warm is risky these days!

EPS has the signal for around Feb 20th, GEPS also...

I think some let those two crazy runs of the GFS/EURO 48 hours ago set their bar unrealistically high. Todays GFS we can throw in there also but as others pointed out its an extreme outlier. But synoptically this was never the best setup for a MECS+ level event. You've pointed it out. I've tried to point it out without being a Deb. This has legit SECS level potential...maybe low level MECS is everything goes totally perfectly and we get lucky...but its just not the setup for a classic 12"+ type storm. But some saw a clown map with 18" and...well...now 6" feels like a letdown.

There have been some similarities to 2009 this year... what if....

op almost has my Feb 20 storm...gives us a couple inches of snow but fails to bring it all together until too far off the coast...but the idea is there.

I wouldn't give up on any of those waves

That’s a good point. But isn’t that a different argument. There is the “that isn’t a good pattern on the guidance” which is one argument. Then there is “I don’t think it will actually look that way” which is fair but a different argument.

Also, there are like a dozen variables. They are almost NEVER all aligned. In almost every sense pattern you focus on the one thing that isn’t perfect. We get snowstorms in slightly flawed patterns all the time. Years ago I looked at every 5”+ storm at BWI going back to 1950. There is a thread with the results somewhere in here. Very few were 100% perfect. The number one factor was the AO. If we had a -AO we can survive flaws elsewhere. We don’t need every index to be right.

That’s the gfs. I posted the EPS

It’s a Greenland block. I’m tired of debating the numerical index.

@Stormchaserchuck1

That’s mine

I’m sorry you’re right the thread was better when you were trying to cause mass hysteria because the 170 hour clown maps keep shifting around every 6 hours.

Sometimes I rely on persistence. But my seasonal forecast just got blown up by relying on that too much. I’m guessing the trend of trends not holding continues this season. I just have a feeling the pacific which has been driving much of this is shifting. We will see soon who is more correct.

I can’t tell when a model at day 20 is right or not. But this call was made before any model showed anything. It was based on pattern recognition, analogs and timing the cycles we’ve been in. The fact guidance came around to that only adds some confidence. But I wouldn’t base a long range forecast just on what models show that far out.