OceanStWx

You should post a trigger warning before these.

I enjoyed the 0% chance of tropical cyclone formation. Well it's 0% because they get to make the call on whether it's tropical or not. Strictly speaking I would say it's a decidedly non-zero percent chance that it is subtropical.

You could actually see the mixed precip wash out between Augusta and Bath as it ran into colder air to the southwest.

I don't like to use that word in general around here because it evokes 1998, but coupled with words like major the messaging can get out of control quickly. We'll see how it plays out Downeast, but with a forecast of 0.5-0.75" flat ice I could live with significant ice storm. Major? That's like 1" radial (so more like 1.5" flat).

We even took a few calls yesterday from people who went online and saw Wunderground forecasts of 5-8" and wanted to know why we weren't also honking about it.

I would be leaning more snow/sleet showers too.

Not sure how much of that is going to be snow. It's warmer to the east, GYX had a 776 mb temp of -1.2 C, so not a lot of wiggle room.

It seemed mostly fine as long as you knew to toss the clown maps and dig into ptype.

Yeah, my gripe is when there is a dry slot or at least saturation that mimics a dry slot. The 06z Euro had over 0.33" QPF through 18z today at PYM. Clearly that didn't happen, but would certainly drive some big modeled snow totals.

Big night at the breweries. We've all had that kind of morning after.

Just so, so bad on QPF when the column isn't totally saturated.

Forecast soundings were showing rolling waves of lift in the DGZ, so a ragged radar does not surprise me one bit. This band more or less should hold together through 1 to 4 AM, so once the sun lowers in the sky snow will start to stick more readily. It really is a perfect storm for things models handle poorly. They don't do well estimating QPF when there is dry air aloft. They don't do well estimating snowfall in marginal environments.

I think we need to deep six that 4-6" area, or at least shove it way in and up. My ideal might be to take all our totals down a category (i.e. 4-6 becomes 3-4 etc).

I buy some of the Cape/SE MA totals, but otherwise there's just too much contamination with sleet for these modeled snow amounts to be real. Any time steps with sleet dominating are going to be like 3 to 5 times too high in snow amounts.

Climate Forecast System. It's an ocean/atmosphere coupled seasonal model.

I would consider it a win if you can coat the ground. Euro snow depth change is like 2 inches, which is about as high as I would be willing to go.

DGZ is a little high, and not always fully saturated on the forecast soundings, but otherwise there are several periods today where the max omega is forecast to be right in the heart of the DGZ. Should be good for at least a couple nice bursts. I could see the advisory expanding southwest towards EWB.

Just save the energy next time the Euro pops a +PNA and get one of these.

I don't have the numbers handy right now, but it's something like every degree warmer is 4% more water vapor. So there are definitely positive feedbacks as well as negative. No doubt it will continue to be cold enough to snow. Mentally I'm pretty much preparing myself for more of our snow coming on fewer days, and fewer days with snowcover. If the pattern evolves like guidance is showing, we should be able to make some good gains in our northern zones anyway, if not down here. The western trof/Southeast ridge could just result in a bunch of 4-6ers for our CAD zones.

And it's really freezing drizzle, which is harder to forecast and more dangerous for accretion.

Split second decision to exit 84 after seeing the billboards for Electric Blue? Roads are terrible around here too. Freezing rain on bare pavement, despite being in the 50s yesterday there was no sun to really warm up surfaces after a few typical January cold days.

Verbatim, we're really cooked in the low levels. The temps aloft remain pretty cool on all the American models, while the surface torches. I'm intrigued for interior areas locally. Those lapse rates are pretty steep in the snow growth zone, so the thump may be real.

I've had way more success in the last year with fantasy baseball than I have had using my snowblower.

What grade do you give a winter that warms up so much your office snow stake sinks into the ground? Asking for a friend.