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Central PA Late January Thread Part III


Rick G

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That'd be a historic ice storm. And I dint just mean regional historic, that'd make the Paducah, Kentucky, storm a few years back seem pedestrian. I pray that doesn't happen.

If this happens this area wouldnt know what to do, we have never experiences a crippling ice storm, its mainly always sleet or snow here, man I hope it trends either rain or all snow :(

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I'm honestly rooting for rain here. MDT has no legit snowpack (a few inches in grass) and I'd like to not mess with zr. I want snow badly, but id rather just have rain and not thr ice. Hope you guys north get a nice snow thump.

It'll be interesting to watchvthis unfold over the next two and a half days.

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Mets...what affect will the high pressure have on this storm. It's there in every model run, and in a fairly good spot for CAD.

The strength of the high pressure will likely dictate how anchored the cold air stays in our region. I'm def not liking the look of things attm. If this storm doesn't make any adjustments southeast to say.. what the NOGAPS has or more this is going to be a major ice event potential. With the general track the models have now (and the interim assumption the euro comes in with about what it's had the last couple runs), the strength and positioning of the high probably plays more of a role of sleet vs. freezing rain with the primary storm after what should be an initial wave of WAA snowfall for at least the northern folks and probably most of everyone else too. I'm hoping that deeper cold air holds in the central counties longer because I do not think it gets routed out at the surface until maybe near the end of the event briefly in areas generally above the turnpike and then north of Harrisburg some in the Sus Valley. With that said, there's still some time yet to hash out some of the mixing details of this event. This storm is likely going to essentially be forced to maybe an eastern lakes tracks at worst (westwise) because the very strong high pressure region out west isn't going to let it really cut. There's still the possibility that a secondary could try to pop on the coast if its southeast enough and that'll help us anchor cold in longer if it happens.

That'd be a historic ice storm. And I dint just mean regional historic, that'd make the Paducah, Kentucky, storm a few years back seem pedestrian. I pray that doesn't happen.

That was a truly extreme even and yea, that is something you certainly don't want to happen. I happen to have an uncle that lives in Paducah. The pictures he took from that event were just unreal. I talked to him on the phone the night that was going on and you could hear pretty much a constant sound of trees falling. And then they were topped by about 2-4 inches of snow at the end.It pretty much destroyed most of the weaker trees down there, and the damage was still quite evident this past summer when i was down. Thats not just in Paducah itself, you see the same general thing in a lot of places on the 140 miles of the western KY parkway prior to the final 40 miles on I-24 into town, and then that ribbon of devastating ice went further into Missouri from there. It'd be basically like driving I-80 across most of the state with 1.5-1.75" of ice.

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The weather channel just showed a bunch of their "in house" models and it looked like the HP to the north keeps it from cutting and slides it through central pa! They were saying as of right now most areas in northern pa should remain all snow which i thought was pretty bold of them.

http://wxcaster.com/...3?STATIONID=BGM

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Mets...what affect will the high pressure have on this storm. It's there in every model run, and in a fairly good spot for CAD.

It's a pretty remarkable situation. The area of high pressure is very broad, with a monster 1055 mb center developing over the Northern Plains. There looks to be another high pressure center that will develop over Eastern Canada that won't be as impressive, but 1030+ mb highs can be tough to move.

What affect will this have on us? If the track stays similar, it will determine how long places east of the mountains stay freezing rain vs. changing to plain rain. Also, like Michael said, it will prevent this system from cutting too far to the west and may even try to shove it farther south, which could leave some snow/sleet in the equation.

For most people in this thread, the best part may come before the storm with the initial overrunning Monday night/Tuesday morning. We might be able to squeeze a few inches out of that.

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It's a pretty remarkable situation. The area of high pressure is very broad, with a monster 1055 mb center over the Northern Plains. There looks to be another high pressure center that will develop over Eastern Canada that won't be as impressive, but 1030+ mb highs can be tough to move.

What affect will this have on us? If the track stays similar, it will determine how long places east of the mountains stay freezing rain vs. changing to plain rain. Also, like Michael said, it will prevent this system from cutting too far to the west and may even try to shove it farther south, which could leave some snow/sleet in the equation.

For most people in this thread, the best part may come before the storm with the initial overrunning Monday night/Tuesday morning. We might be able to squeeze a few inches out of that.

One thing that i've been intrigued about the last day or so of these warmer models runs is the fact that CTP up to this point (watch it change later this morning) has been very cold with regards to the precip type, keeping snow in the grids pretty much everywhere the whole event. Everyone has freezing rain and snow for Wednesday in their county forecasts, with moderate accums possible (except for laurels counties, they're light). Everything all day saturday has pretty much suggested a good many folks have precip types other than snow and even plain rain potential for the primary event, and they only really specified the rain potential for folks along the m/d line. They could be just goin for continuity with a complicated situation, but I wonder if they might also be thinking that the deeper cold stays anchored in better than modeled via the high pressure. I'm personally very leery of how models warm things up relatively easily. Where initial mon night- tues snowfall axis sets up is going to be very important IMO with regards to whether folks (esp under I-80) see mostly frozen (snow/sleet), or mainly liquid (zr, rain) with the main system.

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One thing that i've been intrigued about the last day or so of these warmer models runs is the fact that CTP up to this point (watch it change later this morning) has been very cold with regards to the precip type, keeping snow in the grids pretty much everywhere the whole event. Everyone has freezing rain and snow for Wednesday in their county forecasts, with moderate accums possible (except for laurels counties, they're light). Everything all day saturday has pretty much suggested a good many folks have precip types other than snow and even plain rain potential for the primary event, and they only really specified the rain potential for folks along the m/d line. They could be just goin for continuity with a complicated situation, but I wonder if they might also be thinking that the deeper cold stays anchored in better than modeled via the high pressure. I'm personally very leery of how models warm things up relatively easily. Where initial mon night- tues snowfall axis sets up is going to be very important IMO with regards to whether folks (esp under I-80) see mostly frozen (snow/sleet), or mainly liquid (zr, rain) with the main system.

I'm guessing continuity is the reason more than anything. A lot of times in these situations, it just doesn't pay to monkey with the forecast all that much until you can get a very clear picture. That being said, unless the track changes, I think the chance for snow is very small by Wednesday, as we would probably all be over to ice and rain by then. They may be thinking the high keeps the track farther south -- that would result in a colder solution.

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BGM is going with the cold surface solution themselves.

SENSIBLE-WX WISE...THE MAIN SYSTEM OF INTEREST THIS PERIOD

CONTINUES TO BE A DEVELOPING CYCLONE COMING OUT OF THE LWR MISS

AND OH VLYS TUE NIGHT AND WED. MODEL CONSENSUS IS GROWING THAT A

SIGNIFICANT QPF EVENT COULD BE IN THE OFFING FOR NY/PA...WITH

DECENT JET DYNAMICS COUPLING WITH PLENTIFUL MOISTURE...AS THE GULF

OPENS IT WITH THE APPROACH OF THIS SYSTEM. HOWEVER...P-TYPE IS

STILL QUESTIONABLE...WITH THE EXTENT OF WARM AIR ALOFT UNCERTAIN.

GIVEN THE EXPANSIVE COLD SFC HIGH TO OUR NW...ANY CHANGE OVER TO

RA SEEMS UNLIKELY...BUT A TRANSITION TO FZRA/PE IS CERTAINLY

POSSIBLE. FOR NOW...WE`VE GONE WITH THE LIKELIHOOD OF SNOW FOR

MUCH OF CNTRL NY LATE TUE NIGHT/WED...WITH SN/PE/FZRA ALL

MENTIONED S OF THE PA/NY BORDER.

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I'm guessing continuity is the reason more than anything. A lot of times in these situations, it just doesn't pay to monkey with the forecast all that much until you can get a very clear picture. That being said, unless the track changes, I think the chance for snow is very small by Wednesday, as we would probably all be over to ice and rain by then. They may be thinking the high keeps the track farther south -- that would result in a colder solution.

This is exactly what the weather channel was saying, said that some of the models were under estimating the HP and their tracks showed more of a southern solution

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I'm guessing continuity is the reason more than anything. A lot of times in these situations, it just doesn't pay to monkey with the forecast all that much until you can get a very clear picture. That being said, unless the track changes, I think the chance for snow is very small by Wednesday, as we would probably all be over to ice and rain by then. They may be thinking the high keeps the track farther south -- that would result in a colder solution.

Yea its possible. Certainly an option that can't be written off attm, especially with this winter's knack to sneak these things southeast some late in the game. Although this is a different animal, the first true miss-valley toward the lakes low of the season. The NOGAPS curiously has all snow for pretty much everybody with a low that sneaks under PA and a nice banana high up above. I don't really put any stock in that model but it seems like its been actually holding its own with the other models the last couple storms. The CMC also very similarly snuck the low underneath PA but with much warmer 850 temps in PA. The models are really all clustered pretty close together track-wise, but a noteable but not necessarily significant shift southeast makes a huge difference for us in the p-type department. Also possible that the secondary reflection to the coast shows back up in later model runs, the new Euro i think had a late one. Winter storms are almost always an adventure to nail down, but you gotta love how everything this season has presented ridiculous challenges to getting a good picture of where/how much/what type/etc.

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