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Weekend Storm Discussion 2/18-2/19


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Sweet. Looks like euro has my exact call ;) There is still so much time for things to change. I think any guess and any model output at this range is very low confidence especially as to any specifics but even on the general track

Adam said the key was up in Nova Scotia, if the low there is stronger it will flatten the jet across the mid-south and take the system OTS. If it is weaker and farther north, as the Euro is showing, it will create a temporary blocking pattern and will allow the system to gain latitude.

He thinks there is too much that needs to come together right now for this to be a significant storm - but he also said there is not an insignificant chance that it could become something major for someone.

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Adam said the key was up in Nova Scotia, if the low there is stronger it will flatten the jet across the mid-south and take the system OTS. If it is weaker and farther north, as the Euro is showing, it will create a temporary blocking pattern and will allow the system to gain latitude.

He thinks there is too much that needs to come together right now for this to be a significant storm - but he also said there is not an insignificant chance that it could become something major for someone.

And by the bolded, I meant a KU-type storm

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Adam said the key was up in Nova Scotia, if the low there is stronger it will flatten the jet across the mid-south and take the system OTS. If it is weaker and farther north, as the Euro is showing, it will create a temporary blocking pattern and will allow the system to gain latitude.

He thinks there is too much that needs to come together right now for this to be a significant storm - but he also said there is not an insignificant chance that it could become something major for someone.

The pattern is lightning quick. I'm not that concerned about the low in Canada. It isn't a displaced stable feature.

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No real concensus gives you pause until you realize that this is still 5+ days away. Hopefully the GFS will start coming around to the Euro way of thinking.

The HPC discussion is very positive IMO.

COMING WEEKEND MODEL AND ENSEMBLE GUIDANCE DISPLAYS

SIGNIFICANT SPREAD WITH RESPECT TO THE EVOLUTION OF AN EJECTING

NWRN MEXICO CLOSED LOW AND POSSIBLE INTERACTING NRN STREAM ENERGY.

THIS LEADS TO BELOW AVERAGE CONFIDENCE IN SPECIFICS OF

CORRESPONDING SFC DEVELOPMENT AND SENSIBLE WEATHER IMPACT OVER

AREAS FROM THE SRN PLAINS/GULF COAST NEWD THRU THE ERN CONUS.

GIVEN THE PROGRESSIVE NATURE AND PACIFIC ORIGIN OF THE NRN STREAM

ENERGY... IT MAY WELL TAKE UNTIL WITHIN A COUPLE DAYS OF ACTUAL

SYSTEM DEVELOPMENT BEFORE SOME CONSENSUS EMERGES REGARDING

IMPORTANT DETAILS. AMONG THE OPERATIONAL MODELS THE 00Z ECMWF

CURRENTLY IS MOST AGGRESSIVE IN TERMS OF STRENGTH AND NWD/NEWD

TRACK OF THE SFC LOW. THE 12Z/13 UKMET WAS FAIRLY SIMILAR TO THE

00Z ECMWF. THE 00Z GFS/UKMET/CMC HAVE MORE SUPPRESSED SOLNS TO

VARYING DEGREES WHILE THE 06Z GFS SHOWS NO STREAM INTERACTION AND

WEAKENS THE SRN STREAM FEATURE TO SUCH AN EXTENT THAT THE SFC WAVE

DOES NOT SURVIVE PAST THE ERN GULF OF MEXICO. ENSEMBLES WIDEN THE

SOLN ENVELOPE FURTHER... AS THE 00Z GEFS MEAN TRAILS THE SLOW SIDE

OF THE OPERATIONAL SOLNS WHILE THE AVERAGE OF VARIED 00Z ECMWF

ENSEMBLE MEMBERS YIELDS A WAVE FASTER THAN THE 00Z ECMWF. OVER

THE PAST DAY THERE HAVE BEEN ENOUGH INDICATIONS FROM OPERATIONAL

MODELS TOWARD AT LEAST A MODERATELY DEFINED SYSTEM... AND

SUFFICIENT TROF AMPLIFICATION UPSTREAM TO SUGGEST A SFC TRACK

SOMEWHAT NWD OF THE SRN SIDE OF THE SPREAD..

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S/W galore in the NE at 84 hrs on the 12z NAM at h5. Before you all say the usual, I am just looking at it to see where the major pieces are (mainly the 552 DM h5 low in the SW) and compare them with the GFS and EURO.

If I take the NAM at 84, print it out and trace it with a little less resolution, I get the 06z GFS at 90.

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Ya think? I see the southern s/w as healthier. At first glance the nothern impluses seem better but at second glance I guess you're right, they are similar.

It is, but how much of that has to do with resolution? Obviously no two runs are identical 3.5 days out, but as I was watching it come in, I was struck at how similar they looked when I toggled between the two. I don't want to say that the NAM supports the GFS's final solution, because frankly the Euro isn't shockingly different at that time frame either.

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I'd lean against suppression in this pattern with a GOM low. Doesn't mean the storm will hit us flush either. I think our biggest issue will be the air mass. But track and timing and amplification could help. We probably start as rain or a mix. But snow and 32-34 degrees is achievable with dynamics and timing and a good track.

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I'd lean against suppression in this pattern with a GOM low. Doesn't mean the storm will hit us flush either. I think our biggest issue will be the air mass. But track and timing and amplification could help. We probably start as rain or a mix. But snow and 32-34 degrees is achievable with dynamics and timing and a good track.

if there's persistence in this pattern (and I'm not saying there is since we only have 1 southern storm to compare it to), we would see a similar result as this past weekend with the southern system taking over but just grazing us

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if there's persistence in this pattern (and I'm not saying there is since we only have 1 southern storm to compare it to), we would see a similar result as this past weekend with the southern system taking over but just grazing us

I think we would need timing for suppression so I would lean against it but it's just a guess. This past weekend I think we had a big vortex in southern Canada with a weak surface low in an unfavorable position to amplify.

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While the general pattern is favorable for a mid-atlantic snowstorm (Southern Greenland Blocking / Slit Flow) there are a lot of s/w in play here and thats is going to significantly increase the uncertainty. With this caveat in mind, we are going to see huge short term changes in the storm track and intensity for the next 2-3 days before the solutions converge.

However, I think the GFS has an increased probability to be wrong with the current storm evolution, mainly because it won't be able to properly handle the smaller scale features that will be pivotal to the following storms evolution. This doesn't only have to do with the GFS's poorer resolution in comparison to the ECMWF. The GFS also uses the leapfrog time step algorithm. This is important, because the main fallacy with the algorithm is that unless diffusion is applied for the first few time steps to dampen the higher frequency signals (smaller scale waves such as small shortwaves), the model will amplify features too quickly and cause the model to blow up or crash. While all models do apply some form of diffusion to handle poorly resolved waves, using this diffusion in tandem with the leapfrog method also sacrifices overall accuracy.

My hunch is based on this knowledge. The GFS will tend to handle the overall pattern along with larger waves well, but its the small features (like what the ECMWF has been showing that will interact with the southern stream shortwave) that will make all the difference. If the GFS may not be able to model these waves to the same degree of accuracy as the ECMWF, then it makes more sense to believe a model that tends to have the higher accuracy.

Another thing worth mentioning is that in general, models are generally too slow with the forward propagation of waves, which is why we so often see solutions bust on the slow side, even in the short term forecast. That is another thing that should be in the back of many peoples minds when trying to forecast shortwave evolution.

Of course none of this means that we will see a huge snowstorm or even a storm at all. Its just in the overall scheme of things, the ECWMF will tend to have better resolved shortwave features in comparison to the GFS based on more than just higher resolution, and that the models as a whole tend to move waves too slowly (by a very small magnitude, but this can be amplified over time).

Thank you. I had never heard that before and appreciate that kind of insight from a red tagger.

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