Northern Ohio Obs/Discussion Thread

[Trent]

I took a little snow trip today. Left home and took 90 out to Lake County. Basically just an inch or two along the entirety. I was surprised how little snow was in Lake County and northern Geauga. Stopped at the Hell's Hollow and Paine Falls metro parks right at the border of Lake and Geauga and there wasn't more than 3" at both spots. Doubtful anyone in Lake County got more than 4". I then drove south to Chardon where the snow totals quickly picked up. There was a good 7" just to the north of Chardon and then appeared to be about 5 or 6" as I headed west into Chagrin.

The warnings probably verified just barely for Cuyahoga. They really need to split Lake County into 2 zones (Coastal/Inland) and then split Cuyahoga into 3 zones (Coastal/Southern/Eastern Heights).

I'm also growing tired of the 12 hour reports. It makes it very hard to figure out what a storm total is for a place. Especially if you have a quick hitting 3 or 4 inches that falls in the 6 am - 10 am time frame, you'll see half the storm total reported in the morning and then the other half reported at 10:30 pm at night. This storm made it even worse as you would have had to add up three different reports (which aren't archived) to figure out a storm total.

The Wednesday storm is almost too good to be true. The Euro has held serve with about 10 inches (give or take a few) each run, which is a great sign, but we are still 3.5 days out.

[NEOH]

Nice to see we are still on track for two storms next week. Wednesday/Thursday storm still in question... But the euro has held steady so no reason not to ride the euro. I like where we sit at this point.

[OHweather]

Ok...looking at the Christmas Eve system...

Given the rex block and strong upper low ahead of the Christmas Even shortwave generating a good amount of convergence, I'd support the farther south storm track, keeping the Cleveland/Akron area all snow. Although it looks like moisture return will be limited, if the shortwave takes on a bit of a negative tilt over the lower lakes on Monday, there may be a nice burst of dynamically driven precip with the system...note how on the GGEM (shown as the higher end of possible solutions), we see good ventillation from the right-entrance portion of a jet streak to our northeast and the left-exit portion of a jet streak to our south:

The model also shows a nice quick shot of 500mb PVA and decent negative mid-level vv's:

Now, given I'm favoring supression here, I think we may not see such impressive dynamics play out, which may make it difficult to see the 3-5" snow amounts some models are throwing around.

Given I'm favoring a cold solution, and factoring in the strength/track of the system I'm favoring, I'm going to go with a general 1-3" of snow across much of northern Ohio Monday into Monday night. But, I'll keep watching for trends among the models as it looks like we are walking a fine line with this system.

[OHweather]

I just posted about the December 26-27 storm in the main storm thread but it quickly got burried...regardless...

I'm leaning towards a track from eastern Texas to western TN to either SE OH or WV due to the blocking making it hard for the storm to take on a negative tilt west of the Mississippi River. This is a classic snow storm track and we should see an intense and moisture laden storm moving northeast from the Gulf States Tuesday into Wednesday.

There is still the chance that the system does phase fully over the deep south, in which case a more pronounced NNE track towards perhaps central Ohio can't be completely ruled out, although I don't see it getting much farther NW than that. In that situation, there should be enough high pressure to our north/east to allow for a front end snow to ice to brief rain back to snow shower solution over northern Ohio.

Basically I think we will worst case see front end snows to mixed precip Wednesday-Thursday with a decent chance at a mainly snow event that is significant. The shortwave responsible for this mess should be fully sampled by the 0z Monday model runs, so look for things to perhaps come to a better consensus starting with those runs.

[NEOH]

I just posted about the December 26-27 storm in the main storm thread but it quickly got burried...regardless...

I'm leaning towards a track from eastern Texas to western TN to either SE OH or WV due to the blocking making it hard for the storm to take on a negative tilt west of the Mississippi River. This is a classic snow storm track and we should see an intense and moisture laden storm moving northeast from the Gulf States Tuesday into Wednesday.

There is still the chance that the system does phase fully over the deep south, in which case a more pronounced NNE track towards perhaps central Ohio can't be completely ruled out, although I don't see it getting much farther NW than that. In that situation, there should be enough high pressure to our north/east to allow for a front end snow to ice to brief rain back to snow shower solution over northern Ohio.

Basically I think we will worst case see front end snows to mixed precip Wednesday-Thursday with a decent chance at a mainly snow event that is significant. The shortwave responsible for this mess should be fully sampled by the 0z Monday model runs, so look for things to perhaps come to a better consensus starting with those runs.

Thanks for the forecast. Looks like the euro shifted east overnight. NAM and GFS would certainly mean mixing issues. A blend of each would be a very nice storm for OH.

[NEOH]

CLE is riding the euro

THIS LOW LOOKS AS IF IT WILL REMAIN SOUTH OF THE OHIO RIVER VALLEY BUT ANY WOBBLE

NORTHWARD WILL AGAIN HAVE IMPACTS OF PRECIPITATION TYPE. AGAIN HAVE LEANED TOWARD THE ECMWF SOLUTION WITH IT REMAINING FURTHER SOUTH AND EVENTUALLY TRANSFERRING ITS ENERGY TO A LOW THAT WILL DEEPEN OFF THE

NEW JERSEY COAST. THIS WILL BRING A PERIOD OF SNOW THAT MAY BEGIN SLIGHTLY BEFORE SUNRISE ON WEDNESDAY. BY THE TIME THE STORM ENDS WE MAY SEE 4 TO 8 INCHES OF SNOW COVER AT LEAST THE EASTERN HALF

OF THE REGION. MORE DETAILS WILL COME OVER THE NEXT COUPLE DAYS.

[FL510]

After the short-wave on the 29th-30th the ECMWF finally shows some real arctic air with the best lake effect setup so far this season. Even with clear skies, snow cover and calm winds Chagrin Falls only had a minimum temperature of 19F this morning. Definitely modified arctic air at best.

However, in another week the long-wave pattern becomes even more wintry for this time of year, finally with a big ridge around 140 W longitude so we can finally get a true flow from Canada without Pacific influence.

[FL510]

A beautiful day. It's nice the stratus over Michigan are evaporating as they advect SE.

[NEOH]

Great day today... clouds this afternoon limited melting which was nice. CLE is still riding the euro. Tebo vs. the Euro, DT and JB.

THE MODELS STILL HAVE SOME MAJOR DIFFERENCES IN THE TRACK AND WITH PRECIPITATION TYPE WITH THIS STORM. THE EUROPEAN HAS BEEN THE BULL STEAMING FORWARD WITH LITTLE IF ANY CHANGE TO ITS SOLUTION. THE GFS HAS BEEN TRENDING TOWARD THE WARMER SOLUTION. CURRENT FORECAST HAS BEEN LEANING IN THE DIRECTION OF THE COLD EUROPEAN FOR LAST FEW DAYS

SO SINCE THERE IS SO MUCH UNCERTAINTY WITH THE TRACK...WILL REMAIN STATUS QUO AND KEEP THE COLDER TRACK GOING. EUROPEAN HAS BEEN PERFORMING WELL AND HATE TO TRY AND SECOND GUESS THE MODEL AT THIS POINT.

IF THE TRACK HOLDS TRUE ON THE EUROPEAN...THE FORECAST AREA COULD WIND UP WITH SEVERAL INCHES OF SNOW AS THE TRACK WOULD FAVOR PLACING THE BEST FRONTOGENETICAL FORCING LOCATION SOME PLACE OVER OUR FORECAST AREA.

[Trent]

The Euro's consistency has been great. Would be a slap in the face if the euro ends up dropping the ball when it shows a great Ohio snow storm for days on end.

That WTOD still concerns me. The snow to rain to snow scenario can never be taken off the table in these situations.

[NEOH]

The Euro's consistency has been great. Would be a slap in the face if the euro ends up dropping the ball when it shows a great Ohio snow storm for days on end.

That WTOD still concerns me. The snow to rain to snow scenario can never be taken off the table in these situations.

The wtod is always a concern. Cant remember a time it wasnt. I wouldn't complain about a front end dump with drizzle for a few hours afterward.

[Paweatherguy1]

I find it amusing that while every WFO around PIT is going with the Euro, PIT is going with the GFS. That doesn't make sense given the Euro's consistency, and much stronger track record.

[OHweather]

I'm going to wait until tonight's 0z runs before making any judgements. I'm worried about the WTOD but am leaning towards areas north of I-80 and also west of I-77 remaining all snow with some mixing south/east of those corridors with 6-12" where we stay all snow and 4-8" south of I-80 and east of I-77 with a glaze of ice. This is at this time a compromise between the GFS/Euro with some lean towards the Euro.

[OHweather]

As I said in the main thread (part 1) last night there is only so far west this thing can go negative tilt and only so far northwest this can track due to the blocking over Canada, confluence ahead of the shortwave and upper low north of the Great Lakes:

If we see a full phase a track towards central Ohio is possible but at this time I'd lean a bit farther southeast than that before the primary begins weakening and a secondary on the coast begins taking over Wednesday evening.

I still think worst case scenario we see front end dump to either mixed precip or light/cold rain back to some wrap around/lake enhancement Wednesday night, and more likely we see mainly snow (expect for the southeastern portion of CLE's CWA where mixing may be harder to avoid).

[OHweather]

The GFS, GFS ensembles, UKMET and Canadian are all in the ballpark of recent Euro runs 0z...let's see if the 0z Euro can come in and ice the cake for us in about an hour. All of the above models showed a major, 6"+ synoptic storm for NE Ohio. The NAM had a lot of mixing but would still be a few inches of snow and a nice glaze for much of the area.

[FL510]

WTOD?

[chuckster2013]

WTOD?

Warm tongue of death

....

[FL510]

Hahaha. I'm originally from New York and that wasn't a issue since cold air damming east of Appalachia always seems present at the 850 level.

The 0Z Mon operational GFS shows the 850 hPa 0 C isotherm getting as far north as about I-80 on the East side of CLE Metro on the 26th at 12 Z...so we should be good seeing the model consensus is slightly colder than that?

Nice polar vortex just north of Michigan at 192 hr.

[Trent]

EURO shows about 1.1" liquid equivalent for CLE. Nice to see it hold firm. That's probably going to be mostly snow. I think the odds of a 6-10" event are quite high at this point. Even the NAM has started to come around for these parts.

[Trent]

And the NAM comes into line with the colder solution that the Euro has been advertising all along. High confidence for a significant snow event now.

[Speedskater]

AJ Colby over at WJW 8 TV just played this animation for Thursday morning with snow depths of up to 24 inches! Although he thought that the depth numbers were highly exaggerated.

[OHweather]

I'll look closely at this after work...my gut is to take a little off snow totals due to relatively low ratios...I'm thinking general 6-10" for much of northern Ohio with 8-12" in the Snow Belt where some lake enhancment may occur Wednesday night into Thursday.

I'm a bit worried about power outages given we will see a copious amount of wet snow from this system.

[Trent]

NAM, EURO, and GFS all in agreement with 1" of QPF for Cleveland falling as snow. I always lean towards lower QPF so the 6-10" call seems quite good right now.

[NEOH]

NAM, EURO, and GFS all in agreement with 1" of QPF for Cleveland falling as snow. I always lean towards lower QPF so the 6-10" call seems quite good right now.

Probably fair to say we won't see any major shifts in the models. If anything, we may just be on the northern edge of the heaviest snow if the subtle SE shifts continue.

My final call is 8-12"... with most along the 80 corridor. The wet nature of the snow will make seem like a lot more.

[Speedskater]

AJ Colby just re-posted that computer model, this time with snow depths!

http://fox8.com/weather/forecast/

[Paweatherguy1]

AJ Colby just re-posted that computer model, this time with snow depths!

http://fox8.com/weather/forecast/

Yeah, that wasn't really a good thing for him to post. People are now going to think they will see 2ft of snow, and that is not going to happen.

[carumba]

NAM, EURO, and GFS all in agreement with 1" of QPF for Cleveland falling as snow. I always lean towards lower QPF so the 6-10" call seems quite good right now.

Yet no watches or warnings out of CLE still despite the midday AFD being just released. They talk about thermal profiles requiring a cautious approach as some could get rain but, based on the model output I've seen and based on discussions on this and other boards, it seems likely that NE Ohio will remain all snow. In light of the amount of precipitation expected and given that it'll be the day after Xmas, I'd have thought they would've hoisted a warning already.

[NEOH]

AJ Colby just re-posted that computer model, this time with snow depths!

http://fox8.com/weather/forecast/

Lol. CLe gets shafted with 17 inches. If only....

[AppsRunner]

AJ Colby just re-posted that computer model, this time with snow depths!

http://fox8.com/weather/forecast/

Yeah, that wasn't really a good thing for him to post. People are now going to think they will see 2ft of snow, and that is not going to happen.

If I don't get my 30" here I'm gonna be pissed

[OHweather]

December 26-27 snowstorm forecast for northern Ohio:

A strong shortwave is carving out a deep trough over the western US at this time, and this trough is going to eject east into the Plains tonight into Christmas day sparking off a moisture laden area of low pressure over Texas that will kick NE Tuesday night into Wednesday.

The pattern features west based –NAO blocking with an upper low pegged to the north of Lake Superior, with another shortwave, not visible in this image, moving southeast towards the western US. These two features, combined with confluence behind the shortwave currently dropping precip on Ohio, will act to keep the Gulf low rather suppressed. This is the scenario the ECM has been depicting consistently for days and this solution looks to verify.

An examination of the 12z Euro valid at forecast hour 48 reveals a wound up system lifting NE as the shortwave “rounds the corner” south of the upper low to the north of the Midwest and taking on a negative tilt…it appears because of this that our system will reach peak intensity at some point Wednesday morning before beginning to transfer to the east coast Wednesday night.

The 12z Euro shows a feature much talked about over recent days, the Warm Tongue of Death, or WTOD, which is absolutely a 100% scientific term, nosing north towards southern/eastern Ohio to the east of the storm system Wednesday morning. Given the lack of true arctic air in place ahead of the storm and angle of approach, more from the south, the WTOD will be a concern mainly to southeastern Ohio. The tick back southeast among the 12z and last night’s 0z models has greatly relieved WTOD concerns here in northern Ohio and we should remain all snow in Cleveland and Akron.

Given I have been leaning towards a slightly more suppressed storm track for a few days now, I believe the models will not trend significantly NW due to the factors suppressing the storm listed above, which supports this all snow idea.

An examination of the upper jet structure Wednesday afternoon on the 12z European model reveals the likelihood of very strong upper level lift over Ohio…as we get into the right-entrance portion of a departing jet streak to our northeast and left-exit portion of the jet-streak rounding the base of our negative tilted shortwave. The height lines also strongly diverge to the east of the storm indicating good upper level lift.

An examination of the 500mb level (courtesy of the 15z SREF) shows that we will see heights fall several DM Wednesday as the closed low moves just to our south, with northern Ohio on the nose of very strong positive vorticity at the 500mb level. This also suggests strong potential for heavy precip rates, especially Wednesday afternoon.

An examination of the 18z NAM valid 18z Wednesday shows the edge of high mid-level theta-e’s moving into the cold air mass over Ohio on the northeast side of the storm, with the region also on the nose of a very strong low level jet:

This all supports intense lift in the lower, mid, and upper levels of the atmosphere Wednesday afternoon as the storm moves by to the south, and very heavy, perhaps convective, precipitation in this time frame.

The NAM confirms this with very strong negative vv’s from just above 850mb to above 500mb (700mb shown above) and the GFS also shows this, although is a bit less extreme. In addition, the region will be beneath an area of strong mid-level frontogenesis Wednesday afternoon as the deform zone pulls through:

This is again all supportive of a period of heavy precipitation Wednesday afternoon across the region.

When examining snow ratios…there should be a moderately deep DGZ over northern Ohio Wednesday afternoon from about 650mb to 500mb or so, with deep moisture and lift throughout. This supports good dendrite growth. However, with the whole column below 700mb only a few degrees below freezing if not near freezing, it is interesting what snow ratios will be. I’d go conservative for now and lean towards standard 10:1 ratios.

This all supports about a 6 hour period of very heavy, .1-.2"+ per hour liquid rates, precip Wednesday afternoon bookended by a few hours of lighter precip on either side.

Given all this above and the NAM, GFS, EURO, Canadian, SREF, UKMET, all show a good .75-1.25” of QPF with this system, a general forecast of 7-11” of snow across the area seems reasonable. Areas closer to the lake may benefit from better snow ratios while areas well south see a little mixing, but that is my general thinking. Some local 12” amounts may occur but it is a bit early to begin pin-pointing them.

Map: