psuhoffman

The best news is those really awful January composites I posted are pretty much out the window. I said about a week ago that if we got to January 15th or so and couldnt see the "other side" we would be in trouble because it would be highly likely that would mean enough of January was consumed by that pattern to make the month fall within that analog set. But its obvious now the anomalous central Pac ridge will only last a week or so and then begin to shift into an EPO ridge. It's only the 10th and the other side is clear and moving closer in time. That makes it very likely the January pattern will not match the set that went on to be really awful winters. We seem to have dodged that bullet.

Sorry this is kinda old news but I was busy trying to explain habeas corpus to teenagers... last nights EPS towards the end was moving towards the look we want to get snow in a -EPO+NAO regime. The look before that for a few days with a huge PNA/EPO ridge is a dry look. A huge full lat western ridge overwhelms the pattern and pushes the trough axis too far east for anything to turn the corner usually. What we want is this look...This is the composite of 13 warning level snowfalls for at least a portion of our region. We want the epo ridge building over the top compressing the flow over the CONUS and and an elongated positively tilted trough SW to NE. This allows enough return flow in the SE to get waves up the east coast. Get enough STJ and it can be a really good pattern. Too much SE ridge and it can be frustrating but assuming the EPO ridge flattens the flow enough it works. The EPS was moving towards that look at the end.

Yea in fairness to him he does live in a snow anus. Especially for how far north he is. No worse than other coastal plain locations near water, but worse than some coastal plain locations and way worse than anyone west of the fall line in this sub or the philly one. There is an elevation minimum right there near where the Chesapeake and Delaware River nearly converge. The canal connecting them is just south of him. There is a screw zone there where the warmth that rides up the two waterways tend to engulf that area just as fast as places to the south then stalls out at the fall line just northwest if him. Plus the downslope off the hills just to his north and west cuts down in his precip some and warms a degree or two. Even a NNE wind downslopes off the hills along the DE PA border . On top of that he is just slightly too far south west to really cash on miller b storms but painfully close, even more painful to him when a storms like Dec 2000 or Dec 2010 happens and he can smell the big snows happening 15 miles northeast of him. I totally get his frustration. But he needs to accept (and seems to be) that it’s his climo and a reality that is unlikely to change. I use this to get a lot of my snowfall data. http://climod2.nrcc.cornell.edu There is so much good stuff. You can get daily data from every coop or you can get monthly summaries which will list the avg snowfall also. I am not sure where has the new 30 year climo (technically it won’t come out until after this year anyways) but you can easily calculate it using the yearly summaries.

The high point is in the hills NW of Wilmington near the PA line. But I figured he must have meant biggest hill by vertical top to bottom. That might be true. I know the hill he is talking about. But it’s defini not the highest point in Delaware.

Don’t have time to go into my full thought now but I liked a lot of what I saw from last nights runs. But while the pattern is supportive of a frozen event in the long range, it’s not the kind of pattern that’s good for picking up the details of a discreet event at long leads. Too progressive for that. Waves that look good at day 10 may turn to crap and things not even on the radar will pop up at day 5.

300 feet can definitely make some difference. You are in a bad spot. Im familiar. I grew up SE of Philly in NJ in an equally awful spot. Not any worse than a lot of places SE of 95 near water, but definitely not a good spot compared to places west of the fall line. I understand the job issue. Barring changing jobs and simply moving where there is a lot more snow like New Hampshire, if you went NW from APG (I assume you work there) you would do better. I don’t know how far you’re willing to go. I commute about 38 miles and an hour each way. If you went that far NW you could get to some places in southern PA with an elevation near 1000 feet that do good (like 35” avg 30”median). The hills near New Park in PA. But that area is pretty rural. Even if you just got into NW Hartford County NW of Bel Air you would still do better. The other option are the hills in SE PA northwest of Wilmington. They do ok. But those places still won’t suddenly be deep winter all the time. If you want snow on the ground a lot of winter you need to move further away then even where I live. Like the mountains in New England or western MD. That’s just not our climo here. But if you would be happy simply getting a couple decent snowstorms per year MOST years moving 45 mins NW would do that for you.

Ugh I just realized the date of that threat. I’m taking my wife to a little bed and breakfast in Gettysburg for the night that Saturday and my sister is coming up from Reston VA to watch the kids. Of course that will be the day an ice storm hits.

Haters gonna hate

Plenty of professionals post here and have no problems! And he isn’t taking any crap from snow weenies for being a pessimist/realist. It’s actually the exact opposite.

That perfectly summarized what I thought I had said clearly enough. Thanks

Don’t use my name as an excuse to leave. I’ve not once tried to shut you up. I’ve refuted things I disagree with but always supported your right to say what you want. But if you’re going to act a little arrogant and obnoxious (I know I do too sometimes) you can’t cry and stomp your feet when there’s blowback. That’s weak stuff. Furthermore, and I don’t know if you realize it, but you have on numerous occasions taken comments by myself and others out of context to make a point. You’ve misrepresented things I’ve said several times. And it’s not just me, you’ve had conflict with several members on here now. You don’t have to leave, but if you act in a combative way expect others to push back. I act that way sometimes but I don’t mind the conflict and you will never hear me complaing about it if someone wants to go at it with me.

In the mountains. Or in March where the boundary layer can be warm due to solar before a storm. But thats not really a consistent option here in mid winter. Because there tends to be ridging ahead of storms it would require storms constantly bombing to our southeast and pulling in cold. Not realistic. One fluke storm maybe. Not a pattern. The closest thing is a -NAO pattern like 2010 where it’s not really “cold” when it’s not snowing. Not warm though either. Just not that cold.

I agree...but I do chuckle when going into an advertised cold/dry look people say “well we need the cold to have a chance” or “I’ll take me chances with the cold”. Then a few days into it when it becomes apparent we will waste the cold with 10 days of no precip they are like “this sucks we finally get cold and there is no precip for 2 weeks” when the pattern said that was coming from a mile away. Not saying that’s how we go this time just saying I’ve seen that show before.

That's why I made that post earlier today saying I would prefer a -EPO -PNA look. That eliminates the cold/dry issue...we would need to get the SE ridge suppressed enough but that setup leads to a snowy outcome more often than the full latitude EPO/PNA ridge. It's very hard to get something to "turn the corner" in that look. Its usually cold/dry. This is assuming a +NAO for both scenarios...

One notable improvement on the EPS through day 12, better depth of the trough in the east. That is important because its often what differentiated the "wins" from the "fails" with past similar patterns.

eps looks very "Feb 2015" at day 12.

in this case looks aren't deceiving.

It was 2 different bad patterns though. Dec 20-Jan 1 was a AK vortex -AO pattern. We have been in a pattern flux this week as the NAM flips very positive and the PV centers itself more over the pole/NAO side. During the transition we got some luck as a transient ridge traversed the PNA space...actually the ridge that will get here this weekend and lock in for a week. So we had one bad pattern...and transition week...and now another bad pattern... after that it looks like the next pattern might be more hospitable to sustained cold and snow threats but its too soon to know for sure.

If you don't mind me asking...exactly where are you? I know you are near Newark Delaware but exactly where makes a difference. There is a micro climate there wrt the Chesapeake/Delaware Bay and elevation. If you are where I think you are...it is kinda a snow anus. The low elevation between the Chesapeake and Delaware Bay really hurts you. You are also hurt by a downsloping wind off the hills to your west. I don't know how mobile your work situation is. If you went just 25 miles NNW from your area...some of the hills in that area with some elevation get over 30" per year. Just don't end up in the Susquehanna Valley. That area is a local minimum and would drive you crazy. The hills west of the valley do well for their latitude also. The light blue on that map is about where the 30" avg starts. My area btw.. isn't that much in the middle of nowhere. Hanover PA is only about 7 miles north of me. Westminster 7 miles to my SW and Hampstead MD about 5 miles south. I have 2 walmart supercenters within 5 miles. The westminster Mall is 7 miles away, the Hanover Mall about 9 miles. 2 movie theaters within 10 miles. Gettysburg is only a 30 min drive. My exact location on this ridge is rural but its a very quick drive to 2 towns that have enough to do that I never feel like it's a problem. WRT why the NWS uses avg versus median... I don't know. In a lot of locations that get snow more regularly the average isnt skewed as much away from the median or middle 50% range. In places where they don't get a lot of snow (DC) the fact that they can't get that much below avg because there is a downward limit of 0 allows a few huge snowfalls to skew the avg away from the median. But you are kind of backwards with the concept of how that limit skews things...the fact that it cannot be much BELOW avg because of the limit of 0 means the big years skew it up more than the down years skew it down. Again... you can make of the numbers what you want...you can expect whatever you want...but the numbers show that the most likely outcome for snow in any given year is between 10-11". And that the most significant number of years will fall between 6.7 and 15.8" with a few rare years above or below that. If you want to use 15.4 as "normal" fine but that wont change the fact that it only happens on average 2-3 times out of 10.

I had no problem with your post.

I usually analyze long range patterns through the scope of "how does this impact our chances of snow compared to normal". Doesn't mean HECS or BIG storm. If a pattern is likely to lead to a bunch of 2-3" snowfalls that add up to an above avg snowfall period...or a moderate 3-6" type event...that would still be something I would take notice of. But if the past comps to a particular pattern tended to yield either no snow...or at best a really minor 1-2" event...that would not indicate a good pattern to me. Yea a fluke 1-2" event can pop up in a bad pattern but it's not worth chasing that at long range because there really is no way to pick up on a "threat of a 1" snowfall" at long range. The markers for a particularly snowy period are more rare and therefor a bit easier to identify at range. Doesn't mean we would get a big snow...lots of good looks go to waste, and the pattern could end up completely different than guidance...but sometimes the drivers we need to get a snowy period can show hints at range. We saw the big snow threats (some ended better than others) in December 2018, March 2018, March 2017, January 2016 way in advance. And while the discreet events were hard to pin because of a progressive pattern we saw the potential for a lot of snow way in advance in 2015 and 2014 also. So picking out the threat of a snowy period at range doesn't always end in failure.

No he can question what I say all he wants in the main thread. No one has to use kid gloves with me. But he continually ignores "qualifiers" or misinterprets things people say. It isn't just me. He has gotten into it over that in the NYC sub also. Last week he was taking issue with frd calling a storm to our west a "cutter" because it might not have fit a canonical definition but everyone knew what he meant. With my posts he continually ignores the "if" qualifier and takes a hypothetical scenario as a prediction. When I said ..."If the AO/NAO doesn't improve January is toast" that wasn't a prediction but a possible scenario. It was a scenario I was worried about yes. The guidance right now is improving. They all develop a huge EPO ridge which takes the AO back towards neutral instead of +2/3. That is a significant improvement. But if the AO stays above +2 with that pac look we are toast...there are NO examples of a snowy month in DC with that profile. When I researched analogs to the projected central pac ridge/+AO look in January and it showed that about 80% of the time that pattern in January leads to a below avg snowfall year in DC that wasn't me being pessimistic, its just math. I said the probabilities don't look good. But I made a post that showed the better outcome analogs and what to look for if we wanted those also. But he only commented on the post I made about the "bad" analogs and said I was cancelling winter...when what I said was if that pattern locks in like these bad analogs did then were screwed. He continually takes issue with a specific way someone says something when its not positive, either stating something too strongly (which is ironic because he uses definitive adjectives when he gives positive predictions), or not using the exact perfect term to describe something...imo it doesn't add anything of value but he can continue to question me all he wants. Doesn't affect my day.

All guidance is starting to hit the EPO block hard

There is some divergence in the long range regarding the PNA. The euro is trending towards a PNA ridge...where the GEPS and GFS continue a -PNA. If the NAO remains positive and we get an EPO ridge (all 3 agree on that) I would actually rather a -PNA. 2015 was a great example of a -EPO+PNA+NAO working but there are more examples of that pattern failing. Feb 2015 Feb 1995 AFTER the one snowfall early in the month that took place BEFORE the EPO ridge set up. I could show more examples but frankly 2015 was an anomaly...historically a full latitude PNA/EPO ridge with a +NAO is a dry progressive pattern and when storms do happen they tend to have to amplify so much to come up they end up cutting. On the other hand...there are more examples of a -EPO/-PNA/+NAO pattern working. The key would be the depth of the trough and the alignment. Best example of a win with that look... Feb 2003 An example where our area did OK...but the best results were just North Feb 1994 An example of a fail in that look Feb 1989 You can clearly see the depth of the trough determined the outcome. 1989 the trough was simply not deep enough to keep the boundary south of us. 1994 the boundary ended up right through our region and 2003...well we all remember that. But there are more examples of that pattern leading to a snowy outcome here than the 2015 EPO/PNA ridge look. All of this is predicated on the NAO remaining positive. If the NAO goes negative either look suddenly becomes favorable and none of this matters. The details of all of this remain outside reliable forecast range...this is just to give a profile of what the different options look like. But a SW to NE oriented trough through North America under an EPO ridge with a suppressed SE ridge is a very good look to get progressive waves running at us with cold available, provided the trough ends up suppressed enough by the EPO ridge. The full latitude western ridge look has more mixed results with a couple "wins" March 1993 and Feb 2015 to name some, but a lot of total fails also.

some people KNOW what's going to happen...I am not one of them.