psuhoffman

it makes me feel awesome that we need to rely on dynamic cooling to get snow in the mountains from a blocking regime on January 26th!

West to east waves really only work when there is good cold in front of them. Two things working in conjunction made this harder then it looked from range. One is that even though the airmass coming in ahead of this is polar in origin its simply not that cold. It gets easily bullied out of the way by that very weak washing out northern stream wave. The second is that NS wave. Even though its weak...the flow around it still wrecks the thermal profile ahead of the southern wave. So it took both...the cold is pathetic for a polar airmass on Jan 25...but it still would have been good enough had that NS wave not come across ahead of the southern wave. On the other hand....had there been a truly cold by normal Jan 25 polar airmass standards...the thermals probably could have survived that weak NS wave. But both those factors together...womp womp

yes but once the wave clears the cold presses behind it on the NAM some...not so much here but in the midwest which suppresses the next wave. On the GFS there is no separation so the ridging goes up before the cold can press at all.

I know but I was pointing out why it was different. It trended towards the globals a little but its still by far the furthest south of all guidance. What's hilarious is if the NAM is right it might be a total non event anywhere in the east because its so suppressed with the wave I doubt heavy precip makes it much further north then the PA line but the cold is further north...it might be another perfect track rainstorm on January 26 in a blocking regime with a polar airmass. LOL

The real issue with this...is we need the upper low and associated surface system in the TN and OH valleys to be stronger. This is not an amplifying up the coast coastal setup. These can be nice storms...but the mechanism is a strong upper low and surface system to our west into the Ohio valley pressing WAA against the compressed confluent flow over the northeast. That ends up creating a really strong inverted trough to focus moisture transport and lift along as the secondary forms off the coast. But that secondary will not gain much latitude. If the system in the midwest is weak and not amplified enough to create that strong inverted trough feature this is a non event. The coastal itself will not affect us. This is 100% about the strength of the upper level wave that ejects out west. Stronger and further north...we have a storm. The trend the last 24 hours was suddenly weaker on average across all guidance after it had been a very healthy wave...even on the GEFS in prior days. All I want to see today is trend back towards an amplified closed upper level low coming across.

weren't you complaining there was no high like that for the last storm...and now this one that is the reason it wont hit. Guess you are consistent with your character at least.

The NAM is much slower with getting the wave organized and moving east...and that allows cold to press in behind the northern stream low that comes across Sunday. That suppresses the wave as it finally gets its act together to come across. The GFS is the most extreme in the other direction where it organizes the wave so fast that by the time the NS wave clears the ridging in front is already blasting up the ohio valley and the cold comes down behind that wave not in front and on top of it. A pretty major difference when it shows up at only about 50 hours now on the NAM.

Euro looking kinda weak this run.

But other then that how was the play Mrs Lincoln

Dynamically driven...its actually raining on the northern fringe of precip on WV while its snowing in SC on the gfs run...but with incredibly heavy precip and crashing heights under the mid and upper level lows it creates just enough cold to get snow.

DC only averages 14" a year. It hurts more because they are closer to places that do typically get snow...but truth is the DC/Baltimore area is usually just south of where snow is common in winter...but our averages and perceptions are inflated by those few years where the boundary ends up south of normal and we get a lot of snow. We are far enough north that we can win once in a while in a normal year...and get a big year every so often but truth is the majority of the time we watch places not that far away snow but are on the wrong side of the boundary.

the op probably just drank Jobu's rum

cutter suppressed cutter... it knows our climo

The good news WRT the TPV lobe is at the rate its slowing down EVERY run lately...its probably going to end up to the west of the next wave also and not be an issue.

it was better then last run lol. But really want to go crazy...the TPV lobe that was supposed to slide across in front of the monday wave and help suppress the flow over top of that wave...and keep it from cutting...slowed down sooo much that not only did it allow that Monday wave to get out in front of it and drive north but its still around and compressing the flow over the top of the storm later in the week. LOL

CMC went north for the next storm also. Unless the GFS is correct with ejecting a weak POS wave out west...and I won't buy that until I see evidence on something other then the GFS at range... I wouldn't worry too much about that yet. This first storm Monday is slipping away though unless we see a reversal soon.

@stormtracker One of the things screwing us over is how the TPV lobe up in Canada has shifted the last 48 hours. Remember we were looking at how the GFS was phasing that out west and other guidance was shifting it east and sliding it across on top. Well the GFS caved on that western phase idea...and for a moment all guidance looked good. But what has happened the last 48 hours is that piece of the TPV that breaks off and slides across Canada has slowed down every run. And now instead of it being in front of the wave suppressing the flow over top of it it slowed down so much that the wave got in front of it...which allows it to ride north more. Without a true cold airmass in the way...all it takes is something small like that because we were living on the edge to begin with.

Ok let me clarify what I meant above before I start a panic....this run of the GFS does not bother me because its the GFS and its all over the place at this range. But...the way it suppressed the storm on THIS run was a more realistic scenario. What I saw on the last few runs didn't bother me at all because it was suppressing the storm for the wrong reasons. So...as long as none of the other guidance trends to a weak pathetic flat wave ejecting out west tonight...we are fine. But if we start to see across guidance a trend weaker with the upper level low coming across that is BAD because that is what is driving this storm. There has to be an amplifying upper level low to our west to pump ridging for this scenario to work. The trough axis is off the east coast and the flow is NW to SE...this isnt a type of setup where a surface low is going to amplify up the coast along the baroclinic boundary. This only works if we have a strong upper level center to our west pumping heights into the confluence to our NE creating a strong inverted trough for a low to amplify along. That won't work if the upper low is weak.

If we're going to fail might as well do it in the most epic way possible!!!

too weak... the wave was simply too weak and couldn't amplify at all. Dampened as it came east. We need a healthier wave to eject from that western trough then that. Just the GFS but that run troubled me slightly more then the last few misses to the south because that was at least consistent with itself. If the wave that ejects out west is that weak...it will go south. The other runs were just doing stupid GFS stuff but the storm should have been further north. This run did was it will do IF that wave is actually that weak.

What's sad is its not like the block isn't doing its job...this storm isnt very amplified...it only rides north because its following the thermal boundary and that is so far north...but no precip even makes it to Boston and NYC is on the northern fringe. And yet DC is all rain...think about that. Even with a block strong enough to stop a system dead in its tracks and force is southeast such that from a primary that far NW anyone northeast of NYC gets no precip...and we still can't get frozen...on JANUARY 26!!!!!!!!!!!!! Frankly the whole lack of frozen to the north and northeast of the low is amazing given the blocking on top and the time of year. Amazing scarily pathetic! Rant over...our only hope is that the globals are pressing the boundary too far north with such a relatively weak wave and that blocking over the top. But the trend is all the wrong way for 48 hours now.

No I posted the 18z NAM in comparison to the GFS showing that same thing...and 0z NAM went even further in that direction 0z. We all know its the NAM at 84 hours. But the typical bias for the NAM at range is over amped not under. The NAM also might be better suited to handle the thermal profile which might impact the ridging in front...this is not a particularly amplified system that will automatically bully the flow. Once in a while the NAM sniffs something out. Lets just hope this is one of those "once in a while". We all know the risks of believing anything the NAM has to say at range though so its fine to point out the NAM would probably be a good outcome. It's ok to dream!!!

This isn’t a setup like when we’ve missed South recently. The gfs doesn’t have a weak wave off Florida while the euro targets NC and we’re kidding ourselves about “north trend”. The cmc ensembles are targeting just north of us eps right over us and gefs just south. but forget the clown maps look at the setup... this is the most suppressed gefs. But the pattern doesn’t support that. That’s a healthy upper level disturbance (1) and look at where the 50/50 is. This isn’t a case where there is a vortex over or just north of Maine like most of those suppressed examples lately and we are acting like maybe that will somehow relax. The 50/50 is well NE. If it wasn’t for the block so far SW this would likely be a rain problem with that 50/50 location. Look at the latitude of the upper low and the ridging ahead of it. Even on the gefs that doesn’t look suppressed to me. I would think anyone south of the red line is ok. I wouldn’t want to be north of there and the blue line is the “probably smoking cirrus” line. The 18z euro is even more bullish look at the ridging already in front...and that upper low is coming across at a pretty high latitude. There isn’t enough pna ridge to really dig that into the southeast like the last few. I think the eps/geps has the right idea here. Frankly Imo the gefs itself doesn’t really support that much suppression.

Don’t worry it will adjust north.