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Upstate NY/North Country + adjacent ON, QC, VT: Heading into December


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No, not really. the details of what you mention, IMO, (at 4+ day leads) are highly variable.  My "increase" in confidence is more borne in seeing a decent amount of moisture through during the drawn out event.  Many shortwaves will most likely be embedding in the mostly laminar flow, which certainly would "straighten" up the shear many times....but again, those details (shear and moisture) can still vary a decent amount at these lead times. 

 

Also, we have been LES starved for quite some time....so maybe my "enthusiasm" is a bit hypersensitive to that fact. :)

well to be fair, I don't see moisture being all that major of a problem either, at least for Sunday.  However, we might have 40 kt sustained on the lake which could cause some issues...but I'd think heavy snow for some period of time for the Tug itself as orographic lift would be nice.  I could see someone in Pulaski getting screwed in that scenario, though, as the band wouldn't organize over the lake itself due to the strong winds.  I think the shear is legit.  If you notice...the streamwise vorticity stays along Lake Ontario or just to the north....you want to be north of that area. 

 

Compared the vort to feb 4, 2007...that shear axis was over the mid-atlantic.

 

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I'm talking early next week....

 

I agree. The period from late Monday into Wednesday is starting to show some potential for significant lake effect snow, especially east of Lake Ontario. There looks to be a decent amount of moisture up through 700 mb associated with a shortwave and cold 850 mb temps around -20C. While these temperature will lead to high LI instability, they may also make snow growth a bit less favorable. This scenario is depicted by both the 12z GFS and Euro, with the Euro having a slightly more northwesterly flow at 850 mb.

 

The CIPS analogs based on the 120 hr GFS pick up on this potential as well, with several impressive events for the eastern Lake Ontario region showing up as matches. A few matches were also significant events for areas west of Lake Erie. A more northerly flow as shown by the Euro would obviously be less favorable for those parts of WNY.

 

The models right now are showing a fairly static 850 mb height field for this period. This may allow for a more stationary band to set up leading to impressive totals for a narrow region. It's still early, but there seems to be a decent chance of lake effect snow especially for parts of CNY Monday into Wednesday.

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At this point I'd favor 6-12" accumulations for the upslope region of the Tug Hill, mostly on Sunday.  Maybe another area of 3-6" for the hilltops of the Chautauqua Ridge...and areas that benefit from 300 flow...from Rochester to Oswego..maybe as far south as Syracuse.  A general 1-2" with the initial front on Sunday.  Everything shuts off late Sunday/early Monday as the arctic front drops through and surface winds go north.

 

Then perhaps another start up of multiband les on Tuesday?

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Anyone watching the Kbuf radar?  Super shallow lake effect on Ontario moving East to West, while deeper flow just above is moving West to East.  You can see strange interactions undulate through the bands as the forcing and shear moves through.  'Very cool stuff.

 

Note-  I tried several times to upload a GIF of the current radar but it failed to animate.  Anyone have any suggestions?

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most interesting thing for BUF the next 7 days will probably be the high winds on early Sunday morning lol.

 

The most disconcerting thing that I'm seeing is that there is no defined surface low north of the lakes beyond Sunday.  You basically have high pressure bisected by a weak thermal trough extending from Lake Ontario to the upper lakes.  A loop of GFS BUFKIT shows the very changeable sfc-900mb winds undercutting fairly well-defined 850 to 700mb west to northwest winds through the period. 

 

It's more than just oh I live in Buffalo and i need SW winds to have good LES problem...it's a general problem for the next week.

 

just to illustrate my point further:

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Closing in on 6" and still coming down fairly hard... big fluffy flakes. Nice surprise with the snow.

Congrats....definitely overachieved.

 

As Nick has correctly pointed out, early next week will be dependent upon the thermal low and it's direct impact on the area wrt LES orientation and dry air sneaking in from the north.  I'm not sold completely on the idea (yet) that ESE, SE and S of the lakes won't end up with significant accumulations....but Nick's points are absolutely sound as we are getting closer.

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just catching up on the thread

 

we lost all of our snow in st albans to burlington vermont corridor during the thaw. only some snow piles remained.

 

i finally took the drive back to ottawa yesterday for the first time this winter. no snow at the border, and very little S of montreal. as i drove into S burbs and downtown montreal, there was a covering with some open patches. as i headed west to the West  island, coverage and depth increased dramatically. then it got dark between montreal and ottawa lol. but there was a solid snowpack all the way.

 

as i pulled into ottawa, i was shocked at the amount of snow still on the ground despite the recent 4 day thaw. basically 95% + coverage except where snow gets windblown and doesnt pile up well. otherwise looks about a foot of solid glacier on the ground, and driveway piles topping out to 5 feet in spots. i can only imagine how much snow was on the ground before the thaw! my dad tells me that at least 50% of the snow melted, probably closder to 2/3rds!!

 

ill post up some pics tomorrow after a day walk....defintely was not expecting to see a mid winters scene after the snow got blasted away in northern vermont.

We definately lost close to half of our snowpack....it rivaled 07/08 before the thaw.  But as you can see, we've had winter in Otawa since it started on the 21st of December.  Enjoy the freezer today :)

 

PS. the canal opened today!

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Local forecaster calling for 6-8" tonight and tomorrow....it's been cold up here! -15F this am, and getting much colder next week.

Who was that? JJ Clark? You guys are having an amazing winter! Toronto looks to get into some of the action this upcoming week, in terms of cold that is. Have to feel bad for chicago though; they're getting completely shut out of snow. Historic snow drought for them.

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Who was that? JJ Clark? You guys are having an amazing winter! Toronto looks to get into some of the action this upcoming week, in terms of cold that is. Have to feel bad for chicago though; they're getting completely shut out of snow. Historic snow drought for them.

No it was Richard Zerowski on the radio...after the last couple of winters, we certainly can't complain here in Ottawa. It's been steady since he 21st. Now the cold has been a little annoying....the wind nearly shattered my face this morning.

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No it was Richard Zerowski on the radio...after the last couple of winters, we certainly can't complain here in Ottawa. It's been steady since he 21st. Now the cold has been a little annoying....the wind nearly shattered my face this morning.

Just wait until this upcoming week. Just remember that it's cold like this which prevents tropical diseases, along with large killer insects (including killer spiders) like the ones found in Australia from being able to survive up in these northern latitudes. Our climate is actually healthier than that of the Carribean because of our cold winters!

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I think you know my feeling on that

They maybe over hyping to a certain extent, but the amount of low level convergence that will be ongoing along with wide open lakes and orographic effects will give the areas south of BUF (Ski areas??) a chance at well over a foot of snow over 2-3 days....ESE of Ontario we MAY be able to get a decent band going for a bit into Monday morning before the AF slides through...and if it "slides" through slow enough, we could be looking at several hours of "tremendous" rates off Ontario Sun. night.

 

Mon. afternoon, we will transition into much less intense banding and most likely much smaller dendrite sizes.  Still can accumulate around these parts in that scenario.

 

As for Accuweather's proclaimation that ART and BUF will see heavy LES???  That's not going to happen...at least for any substantial length of time....say for SUN morn..

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