nj2va Posted October 29, 2011 Share Posted October 29, 2011 It doesnt except when it does. Climo still won as much as it could given the setup. CWG did really well with my forecast so good job. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ian Posted October 29, 2011 Share Posted October 29, 2011 CWG did really well with my forecast so good job. Group effort. I certainly didn't make the map tho I liked it. My last minute fine tuning worked out with today's forecast. CWG better be careful... If we ever bust we'll surely hear it. I'll blame Wes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stormtracker Posted October 30, 2011 Author Share Posted October 30, 2011 Lesson for today...NAM ran too cold. Gotta watch that in future events. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ian Posted October 30, 2011 Share Posted October 30, 2011 Lesson for today...NAM ran too cold. Gotta watch that in future events. maybe.. it might just have gone haywire because it's october Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deck Pic Posted October 30, 2011 Share Posted October 30, 2011 Lesson for today...NAM ran too cold. Gotta watch that in future events. euro wins again......the NAM isn't very good and shouldn't be taken too seriously when it has a wacky solution....It will score a coup sometimes, but I think this was not one of those times to get uber bullish for lower lying areas Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mappy Posted October 30, 2011 Share Posted October 30, 2011 Lesson for today...NAM ran too cold. Gotta watch that in future events. What ya talking about? I got 14 IMBY Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ian Posted October 30, 2011 Share Posted October 30, 2011 katie has snow fail disease v Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mappy Posted October 30, 2011 Share Posted October 30, 2011 katie has snow fail disease v Whiskey is the only cure Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ian Posted October 30, 2011 Share Posted October 30, 2011 Whiskey is the only cure At least it's really cold and windy! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mappy Posted October 30, 2011 Share Posted October 30, 2011 At least it's really cold and windy! Yay! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
H2O Posted October 30, 2011 Share Posted October 30, 2011 maybe.. it might just have gone haywire because it's october I blame DST Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
H2O Posted October 30, 2011 Share Posted October 30, 2011 katie has snow fail disease v Y'all got more than me so models had this fairly well Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
schinz Posted October 30, 2011 Share Posted October 30, 2011 That or many of us have noticed a pretty strong trend around here over the years... whenever there is a potential storm and one model shows no snow...that model tends to verify the best. If you simply go with the most conservative model in each event you will do well more often then not around here. Painful fact. Hmmm..... I don't think the NAM/Euro did too bad, especially in the way of temp profiles...particularly in our neck of the woods. The GFS going wet is not the be all end all, especially in the face of a cold and whiter Nam/Euro combo, even though they had both trender warmer sincer their coldest solutions. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
usedtobe Posted October 30, 2011 Share Posted October 30, 2011 Group effort. I certainly didn't make the map tho I liked it. My last minute fine tuning worked out with today's forecast. CWG better be careful... If we ever bust we'll surely hear it. I'll blame Wes . I'll blame you and Jason with an assist from Scuddz Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ellinwood Posted October 30, 2011 Share Posted October 30, 2011 The verification: I'd give that a B+ ...probably the best verification yet! GFS actually did better than the NAM regarding the contouring along the western edge (not sure about the actual totals). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wonderdog Posted October 31, 2011 Share Posted October 31, 2011 The verification: I'd give that a B+ ...probably the best verification yet! GFS actually did better than the NAM regarding the contouring along the western edge (not sure about the actual totals). FWIW, I give you an A. May I ask what was the determining factor in your analysis? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BTRWx Posted October 31, 2011 Share Posted October 31, 2011 Any thoughts on precipitation chances for Halloween? Today's model runs look interesting with that 540 line imo. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
psuhoffman Posted October 31, 2011 Share Posted October 31, 2011 I think it was mentioned somewhere but when evaluating the models performace on this storm I think too much is being given to the GFS simply because the sensable weather ended up being more wet then white in the metro area. However, when looking at overall performance I think the EC/NAM/UK blend was much closer to reality then the GFS/GEM solution. The problem was surface temps ran a few degrees too warm in the boundary layer for areas with no elevation, but the fact that there was off and on mixing with snow all day anywhere west of the fall line indicates the thermal profiles once above the boundary layer matched with the Euro/NAM much better then the GFS, which if correct would have made it impossible for any snow to be falling anywhere east of the blue ridge until the very end of the storm. I know its hard when the end result on the ground was wet not white, but the GFS was way too warm at 850 and also too warm at the surface for that matter even though the NAM was slightly too cold. When surface temps are less critical it might be important to remember who had the mid level thermal profiles progged the best. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ellinwood Posted October 31, 2011 Share Posted October 31, 2011 FWIW, I give you an A. May I ask what was the determining factor in your analysis? I can't give a forecast that was off (sometimes considerably) on southern and western areas an A A lot of the analysis comes from checking forecast soundings (for the vertical temperature profile). I also look at the dynamics (how strong is the system in the mid and upper levels), where the low will set up, QPF amounts (usually a blend of two of the three from the GFS, Euro and NAM), snowfall ratios and compensation for model biases/trends. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WxUSAF Posted October 31, 2011 Share Posted October 31, 2011 I think it was mentioned somewhere but when evaluating the models performace on this storm I think too much is being given to the GFS simply because the sensable weather ended up being more wet then white in the metro area. However, when looking at overall performance I think the EC/NAM/UK blend was much closer to reality then the GFS/GEM solution. The problem was surface temps ran a few degrees too warm in the boundary layer for areas with no elevation, but the fact that there was off and on mixing with snow all day anywhere west of the fall line indicates the thermal profiles once above the boundary layer matched with the Euro/NAM much better then the GFS, which if correct would have made it impossible for any snow to be falling anywhere east of the blue ridge until the very end of the storm. I know its hard when the end result on the ground was wet not white, but the GFS was way too warm at 850 and also too warm at the surface for that matter even though the NAM was slightly too cold. When surface temps are less critical it might be important to remember who had the mid level thermal profiles progged the best. Bingo! I mentioned something very similar in this thread or the Obs thread after the storm. The NAM had the upper levels quite well it seems (upper as in above ~950), but the lowest few hundred feet were 3-4 degrees warmer than the NAM was indicating. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SeanVA Posted October 31, 2011 Share Posted October 31, 2011 I know none of you guys live down here, but it SW VA the models did poorly. The southern extent of snowfall was about 80 miles north of what any model predicted. I'm at 2,000 ft and only saw a few flakes when the models were predicting accumulating snow even after the storm was right over us. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ian Posted October 31, 2011 Share Posted October 31, 2011 I know none of you guys live down here, but it SW VA the models did poorly. The southern extent of snowfall was about 80 miles north of what any model predicted. I'm at 2,000 ft and only saw a few flakes when the models were predicting accumulating snow even after the storm was right over us. Models often have issues at the edges. You never want to be too close to it.. especially the southern edge. Regarding the rest of the model debate.. not sure how much it matters going forward. We should know the NAM is usually going to do OK with temps about a day out though it tends to run a little cold. But not sure how many lessons can be taken forward from this event re the NAM/GFS battle. The GFS was still clearly the better model in the last 2-3 days of the two IMO. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
catoctin wx Posted October 31, 2011 Share Posted October 31, 2011 It's probably been discussed in this thread, but apparently Frederick had some sort of micro-climate thing going on Saturday. Not only was it still a rain/snow mix when just about everybody else was in full snow, our temperatures seemed much more moderate. I was driving back from central MoCo around 9 PM on Saturday and there were a few inches everywhere along rt 70 and my car thermometer read 32F the entire time. When I hit Frederick at the intersection of 70, 270, and 15, the temperature jumped up to 37F and never got below 35F between that intersection and 4 miles north on 15 where I live. This was taken at noon out my front door. By 9 PM, we had even less snow. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WxUSAF Posted October 31, 2011 Share Posted October 31, 2011 Elevation was really critical in this storm and since Frederick sits so low in that topographic bowl, it's near-surface temps stayed warm. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
psuhoffman Posted October 31, 2011 Share Posted October 31, 2011 It's probably been discussed in this thread, but apparently Frederick had some sort of micro-climate thing going on Saturday. Not only was it still a rain/snow mix when just about everybody else was in full snow, our temperatures seemed much more moderate. I was driving back from central MoCo around 9 PM on Saturday and there were a few inches everywhere along rt 70 and my car thermometer read 32F the entire time. When I hit Frederick at the intersection of 70, 270, and 15, the temperature jumped up to 37F and never got below 35F between that intersection and 4 miles north on 15 where I live. This was taken at noon out my front door. By 9 PM, we had even less snow. Frederick was the worst screw zone I encountered when I drove from Manchester MD down to Reston VA Saturday night. THere was solic snowcover of at least 2-3" all the way down 27 and across 26 until just outside Frederick, then all of a sudden about a mile from 15...nothing. THen again as soon as I left south of town and 15 went up in elevation a couple hundred feet there was 2 or 3" of snow again until just north of Leesburg. Amazing but understandable how with such marginal temps the valley floor would have problems. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
catoctin wx Posted October 31, 2011 Share Posted October 31, 2011 Elevation was really critical in this storm and since Frederick sits so low in that topographic bowl, it's near-surface temps stayed warm. Frederick was the worst screw zone I encountered when I drove from Manchester MD down to Reston VA Saturday night. THere was solic snowcover of at least 2-3" all the way down 27 and across 26 until just outside Frederick, then all of a sudden about a mile from 15...nothing. THen again as soon as I left south of town and 15 went up in elevation a couple hundred feet there was 2 or 3" of snow again until just north of Leesburg. Amazing but understandable how with such marginal temps the valley floor would have problems. I never thought that we would do terribly well with this storm to begin with, but this total lack of accumulations was suprising. I guess I didn't realize how low Frederick actually sits compared with the surrounding area. Obviously to the west the topography increases dramatically, but I never considered northern Montgomery County, or the other areas towards Mt. Airy to have much elevation on us. Looking at some maps, it looks like even going the 15-20 miles to Mt. Airy increases elevation by some 400 ft. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bob Chill Posted October 31, 2011 Share Posted October 31, 2011 I never thought that we would do terribly well with this storm to begin with, but this total lack of accumulations was suprising. I guess I didn't realize how low Frederick actually sits compared with the surrounding area. Obviously to the west the topography increases dramatically, but I never considered northern Montgomery County, or the other areas towards Mt. Airy to have much elevation on us. Looking at some maps, it looks like even going the 15-20 miles to Mt. Airy increases elevation by some 400 ft. Frederick city proper has a few things working against it. Parrs ridge hurts with wraparound and the catoctins can hurt with clippers. Not always the case but it happens sometimes for sure. IIRC, clippers with optimal tracks for DCA will generally mean the Fred valley ends up on the low end of accum. The ridges to the west hurt with the front end and Parrs hurts as the vort turns the corner. Classic coastals are a different story though. Good deform stuff always seems to butt up against the catoctins and frederick can do very well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
clskinsfan Posted October 31, 2011 Share Posted October 31, 2011 Frederick city proper has a few things working against it. Parrs ridge hurts with wraparound and the catoctins can hurt with clippers. Not always the case but it happens sometimes for sure. IIRC, clippers with optimal tracks for DCA will generally mean the Fred valley ends up on the low end of accum. The ridges to the west hurt with the front end and Parrs hurts as the vort turns the corner. Classic coastals are a different story though. Good deform stuff always seems to butt up against the catoctins and frederick can do very well. As far as coastals go. I think alot of the reason we do well to the west is our temperature difference from the city. It increases our ratio's out this way. Many storms including last December 09, we had much less QPF out west but ended up with the same if not more snow. Just because our ratio's were so much higher. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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