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Central PA - Second Half of February 2013


MAG5035

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Its done fairly well...jm said it handled the huge nor easter best. I do think unv has a shot at advisory snows though.

The GFS was terrible with the 2/8 storm here. It consistently had it too sheared out and offshore even as the event was happening. There were one or two runs where it gave us maybe 0.5-0.75" qpf and almost all of that rain. It had some convective feedback issue and kept trying to form it too far east. The Euro was way better overall with it, but it was a little too cold. The NAM kept trying to form it too far west and one 0z run it literally gave N NJ about 5-6" qpf as almost all snow. This is a different kind of storm though and central PA's environment is much different than New England and Long Island's.

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Map is exactly whatvI am thinking. Srefs dont budge.

It could be a good surprise if it's just cold enough, or almost all slop if the GFS wins out. Must be a really tough forecast for CTP tonight along the I-99 corridor and up to you and just north/west.

 

SREFs haven't been great this winter either. They seem to follow the run behind it and don't foresee well what the next model suite shows.

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Yep, very tough forecast. Even with a gun to my head, I don't know if I could be any more precise than the NWS. I do think 2-3 inches is unlikely, though. I think it'll either be 6"+, or 1-2 inches or less.

I agree... 0z NAM rolling in and has UNV over 1.2" QPF with temps so close it could go either way as you said... either 6"+ or 1-2 inches of slop or less

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nam a good bit warmer..moves toward the gfs.

Actually no it's not for you... has you at 32-33 at surface and 30-33 at 850... seems a little colder than 12z to me in your area and I-99 area... will be interesting

 

MOS had IPT at 31 at 10pm on 18z gfs and 12z NAM... 30 at 9pm

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nam a good bit warmer..moves toward the gfs.

 

Certainly hasn't moved towards the GFS, just different with the placement and intensity of things, I would say. But it is a tad warmer, yes.

 

Still, I'd trust the NAM less than the GFS anyway. But I trust the Euro over both of them. Which is what makes this forecast so tough... they're all so very different.

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UNV just about right on 0C at 850 for the whole storm. Bust potential much?

 

I might lean toward the higher end of the potential because I've seen sometimes that marginal setups like this can produce-one example I can think of was back in late March 2005 when State College had about half a foot of gloppy snow and I think even Lewistown 30 miles away had mainly rain down by the Juniata River. 10/25/05 was another situation I can think of that was heavy snow when just about everyone thought would be all rain. There's a nice wedge of dry air in place now too, so there's opportunity to wetbulb. But we'll see-could easily just be an inch or two of slush downtown.

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The Euro is like tenths of a degree warmer at 850 just glancing at text data for AOO/UNV/IPT. AOO actually climbs the least ranging from -0.4ºC to 0.1ºC at 850mb. UNV gets to 0.7ºC for a frame (after at least .4 of probable snow) and IPT sneaks to 0.2ºC. I"ll have to look at a skew-t in a bit when the full euros in to see if we still have that isothermal profile right on the 0ºC line or if there is a region that gets notably above freezing. There is also more QPF after the particular frame that edges the freezing mark for these locations as well. The ptype forecast is about as hard as they come by with this situation. 

 

Here is a frame (hour 28) off the Canadian ptype product. 

 

post-1507-0-34998100-1361859653_thumb.pn

 

You can look at the full loop HERE

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Hearing RGEM is warmer also.

 

Heaing Euro is warmer and less impressive with slug of precip. Gfs is looking good.

 

6z even warmer....Im waving the flag....we will be all rain here. Maybe an inch or two for unv.

 

Gfs is warmer...either its terrible or we see some major moves from euro and gang tonight!!

 

nam a good bit warmer..moves toward the gfs.

I guess rain Huh?

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Lol yea not great trends overnight bud, guess I could have edited them down. Not good when the new york state thread is saying too warm.

AccuWeather for some reason has us at 3-6, which surprised me given trends overnight.

 

BTW you guys wanting spring, going to have to wait. We are definitely not done with winter. No evidence of that right now anywhere. 

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My thinking is Altoona, Williamsport, State College advisories are dropped and previous watch counties go to advisories for 2 to 4. As for delay of spring...terrible news if it isnt going to snow anyway. Also, we gotta give gfs some love if trends hold.

There's also no evidence that it won't snow, either. 

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Just to get an idea about how the models are handling temperature for this event, here is the observed 12z sounding for KPIT and the modelled 6-hour NAM forecast at the same time and place:

 

Forecast:

 

post-1406-0-50439800-1361887392_thumb.pn

 

Actual:

 

post-1406-0-05629000-1361887406_thumb.pn

 

So while the obs are 1-2 degrees warmer than the forecast, the dewpoint is cooler than expected. This may lead to more evaporational cooling than expected from the surface to 700mb. 

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Well, last model I check for this event, nam now almost warm as gfs. Gfs wins this round of model wars. See you back here for the next one everybody.

I wasn't talking about this event....I think you thought I was. I am talking about going forward after this. I guess the next chance is around March 5 and then again March 10-11. 

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