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Season Finale :(


Ji

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not so sure of this Bob

the Euro got colder with the last storm as we approached crunch time and I wouldn't rule out a repeat wrt temps going lower with this one (assuming the storm hits us, of course)

Timing of onset kinda sucks. Around noon for the front end stuff. I doubt it would be hot and heavy until the low deepens off va-oc. Ccb/deform would be the big show. Hp to the north isn't very impressive like st paddy.

All speculation of course. If it does phase and captures south of our latitude then we get hit square. We can still get snow without a perfect phase but rates would be an issue until it gets dark.

Honestly, I'm pretty baffled on which way to hedge right now. We haven't really had a miller A bomb this year. 2/12 was a different type of system. Hopefully this weekend we are talking about how much and not if.

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not so sure of this Bob

the Euro got colder with the last storm as we approached crunch time and I wouldn't rule out a repeat wrt temps going lower with this one (assuming the storm hits us, of course)

doesn't have as good a cold air source from what we see now.  we need rates and lots of rates. also hope it shifts a bit with timing.. which it could.

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doesn't have as good a cold air source from what we see now. we need rates and lots of rates. also hope it shifts a bit with timing.. which is could.

The only similarity to paddy is the mid levels. At least we're plenty cold there. Cold feed is kinda weak. The airmass is getting stale and not crazy cold to begin with at the surface. There will be plenty of accum sacrifice this go around if we even get hit. Everybody should accept that unless onset is delayed and it saves the dump for overnight.

This is too complicated to make any type of early call.

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It is funny you can tell everyone's a little less gunshy on this one after early week. No one is all in yet but there are a lot less people dismissing it entirely. ;)

We could get 50% more precip and 50% less accumulation than last week. If we get 50% less precip we could get no accumulation

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doesn't have as good a cold air source from what we see now.  we need rates and lots of rates. also hope it shifts a bit with timing.. which it could.

well, that's my point...this past weekend got colder from what it showed 5 days out so I'm suggesting that if we repeat, this will get modeled colder too

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well, that's my point...this past weekend got colder from what it showed 5 days out so I'm suggesting that if we repeat, this will get modeled colder too

Yeah, it did. I think some of that was track though.. the warm models had it pass fairly close on some runs.  As Bob notes this air mass is a bit more stale. There's no super cold super close to tap into.  On the flip side it's way more dynamic so if we get into the super thump it probably won't matter a ton other than day v night.  Even there we can get snow to stick if it's hard enough. Plus we'll have picked up another 3 degrees of climo -- I know -- but still, you need more to get there.

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well, that's my point...this past weekend got colder from what it showed 5 days out so I'm suggesting that if we repeat, this will get modeled colder too

Just because the previous storm was modeled progressively colder doesn't mean this one will be. If we an get an early phase/capture, we have a better shot at colder 850s when it actually matters..

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All speculation of course. If it does phase and captures south of our latitude then we get hit square. We can still get snow without a perfect phase but rates would be an issue until it gets dark.

 

It would be nice to see it slow down just a bit for temps, but I'm not sure phasing south of us is a guaranteed hit.  There have been runs where it starts to bomb off of NC only to swing out to sea (e.g today's 12z GFS).

 

Good to hear that the Euro is looking more positive, but the GFS / GGEM ensembles aren't quite there yet.  Here are the snowfall probabilities from the 12z combined GFS and GGEM ensemble runs.  This is just for Tuesday, so there would be likely be a bit more on Wednesday.

 

bE4eJb6.gif

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I thought people on this forum generally say sun angle isn't as much of a factor as people hype it to be..?

It matters unless you get big rates and cold temps.. Especially this time of year. The roads were mostly fine by like 10-11a St Patricks day even with temps below freezing.
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I thought people on this forum generally say sun angle isn't as much of a factor as people hype it to be..?

Temps above freezing for at least part of the storm if the euro is right with timing. It will be above freezing tues afternoon because the airmass doesn't support -25 departures. That's an issue.

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It matters unless you get big rates and cold temps.. Especially this time of year. The roads were mostly fine by like 10-11a St Patricks day even with temps below freezing.

Not to mention the ground was plenty warm before it started accumulating. The ground was never frozen even once covered with 9" of snow.

I know you know this but snow is an insulator that works both ways. If the ground is 40* and air drops below freezing after a coating of snow the heat actually gets trapped at ground level. Snow melts from the bottom even when the top is stable. Paved surfaces augment this.

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I thought people on this forum generally say sun angle isn't as much of a factor as people hype it to be..?

I agree it does tend to get overplayed, but that's when people make it their #1 worry in like the middle of February. March 25th is a whole new ball game, and light rates won't get the job done even if temps are 29-30 or so (and as currently progged they won't even be that cold during the day, if even below freezing...though that can obviously change). Sun angle didn't completely prevent bad road conditions on March 3rd because we had built a snow pack prior to sunrise (with sleet/ice covering underneath that really helped thanks to a period of IP) and temps were crashing through-out the day into the teens by noon. That airmass was insane for March.

 

The more we can delay whatever snow falls (if any falls at all), the better. March 25th last year we had no problem accumulating on paved surfaces because we had absolutely perfect timing with all snow falling after sunset and mostly before sunrise. 

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Not to mention the ground was plenty warm before it started accumulating. The ground was never frozen even once covered with 9" of snow.

I know you know this but snow is an insulator that works both ways. If the ground is 40* and air drops below freezing after a coating of snow the heat actually gets trapped at ground level. Snow melts from the bottom even when the top is stable. Paved surfaces augment this.

true. i was surprised with how well it survived the first day.. then it was one of the quickest disappearing big snow ever the next two days. definitely not a time of year to get hung up about it sticking around long..

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true. i was surprised with how well it survived the first day.. then it was one of the quickest disappearing big snow ever the next two days. definitely not a time of year to get hung up about it sticking around long..

It was a top and bottom devastation once air temps got going. I was shocked at the ratios. Fluffy snow disappears faster than free beer at a party.

When I took an avalanche and backcountry survival training class in my CO years one of the courses was snow caves and surviving overnight. A 2 man snow cave would warm to 40F in less than 2 hours with air temps near zero . One of the keys was never digging to the ground because it would suck the heat. The walls would glaze with thin ice but never melt. Luckily I never had to build one to survive but the insulating qualities amazed me

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