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December Med/Long Range Disco


WinterWxLuvr

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Not sure this is the right place to past, but I have been searching and searching and can not seem to find month by month Snow averages for the Fredericksburg, VA area.....

 

Does anyone happen to have any of those numbers, or if you could kindly point me in the right direction, that would be great. Thanks!

You can check stations around your area here:

http://www.sercc.com/climateinfo/historical/historical_va.html

I haven't looked at the Fredericksburg area to see if there are any long-standing climo sites around there. Good luck.

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You can check stations around your area here:

http://www.sercc.com/climateinfo/historical/historical_va.html

I haven't looked at the Fredericksburg area to see if there are any long-standing climo sites around there. Good luck.

I started to post the same site. I don't trust it though. Too much missing data. For Fredericksburg it lists 14.5 or so as the avg, but has no data since the late 90's

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I started to post the same site. I don't trust it though. Too much missing data. For Fredericksburg it lists 14.5 or so as the avg, but has no data since the late 90's

I would estimate that area at 16-18" depending on elevation. When I lived in the DC burbs the storms with Fredericksburg to Southern Md. bullseyes were some of the most heartbreaking, as the cold won out.

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Lived in Rockville over 50 years. As Matt,Ian and others have mentioned . Dec generally sucks around here. Sometimes even into early Jan. I remember many a bad pattern early in winter flipping and producing significant events mid late winter. Personally , I'm not worried. Been there done that type of thing. I fully expect winter to come back with a vengeance. Lot of analog support for cold in Jan, Feb. Long range models should start hinting at changes soon.

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There have been plenty of El Nino winters in the DC area that were memorable based on two or three storms (including two out of the three winters your listed) whereas the rest of the winter saw few accumulating snow opportunities. And we've had many El Nino winters that had similar number of total events to those winters (like 06/07, 94/95), but none of the storms exceeded 10+" resulting in near-median seasonal snow totals. 

 

For a generic Nino winter, I would be fine with three or four snow events making up most of the seasonal total. It's the amazing ones like 02/03 and 09/10 where we end up with the active STJ and blocking in tandem to yield two or three more moderate events to push us into "amazing" territory. For example,1/29/10 was always going to be a cold day given the overall pattern, but we didn't have to max out on the far northern extent of a southern storm like we did.

 

The -AO dominance forecasted for this winter makes me hope for an 02/03-style winter, but I think I'd be fine for a winter where we just get our two or three decent storms to push us above median. 

A 02/03 style winter would be ideal. What I find interesting about that snow season was that just about every storm was a cold event if not extreme cold event starting with 12/5. The only major storm that year associated with a marginal airmass was the Christmas storm. Perfect combination of plenty available cold with an active jet. The huge high that set up PDII was unreal. Even the storm in January that busted would have been a very cold event. JB has been pushing 02/03 as one of his top analogs especially now that 76/77 has fallen off.

 

We certainly haven't been dry as of late so I assume that can't be a bad sign. There should be plenty chances for everyone in the region but as you know things still have to come together and it never hurts to be lucky. In some nino years like 06/07, 04/05 and the non nino year of 10/11 luck was against us.

 

Another caveat is blocking. We've all been waiting for this and if we get it I just hope it doesn't overwhelm the pattern and leave us frigid and dry. Since last year there seems to be a lot of cold to tap especially with cross polar flow so if we get the -AO dominance you have to figure we could be in for at least a couple extreme cold episodes. Maybe we get a chance at something big on the tale end of an extreme cold shot but that's hard to say. There wasn't much snowfall in Jan. 03 and I guess that's probably because the NAO was deep negative but I didn't go back and look. Then when a negative NAO is more favorable for us in Feb. we got crushed that year. At this point I don't think a lesser version of 02/03 is unreasonable.

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CFS weeklies have been showing a somewhat similar progression to euro weeklies. I guess question is does pattern turn favorable sooner or later than hints.

Good question. Good or bad patterns typically last longer once established. Things will get worse before better. I suppose some of it will depend on how bad it gets in epo/ao domains going forward.

Otoh- assuming things flip it could be fast and not a step down like we saw in Nov. If we go +pna/-epo at the same time then the cold pattern would be aimed further east first and not a bleed process. I would sure hope it happens at least before the end of the month. A Christmas mecs would be ok in my book.

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Weeklies are tasty. Ridging builds up through western canada during week 3. -EPO shortly after Christmas. Coldest 850s anoms in the hemisphere are centered in the east half of the conus as we close the year. 

Just got to wait for that Caspian Sea ridge to rotate all the way to Alaska.

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Good question. Good or bad patterns typically last longer once established. Things will get worse before better. I suppose some of it will depend on how bad it gets in epo/ao domains going forward.

Otoh- assuming things flip it could be fast and not a step down like we saw in Nov. If we go +pna/-epo at the same time then the cold pattern would be aimed further east first and not a bleed process. I would sure hope it happens at least before the end of the month. A Christmas mecs would be ok in my book.

 

I'd probably usually take the over on a pattern change date or a snow possibility. You can get some good storms on the flip though. Might still target Jan 1 on for legit winter and nightly euro tracking / suppression sadness but could be sooner I suppose. 

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Not exactly long range, but any thoughts on the day 4-6 time frame? I really haven't looked at anything except the GFS ens.....not sure what other models have in there.

Model war. GFS shows first wave scooting north and nothing behind it for the most part. Euro is hanging onto the low stalling off the coast, phasing with the second wave, and going boom over NE. Gives us a little snow.

The only scenario that would work for us is a crawling bomb tucking west into SNE and precip driving all the way down here in the cold sector. It's only possible with a bombing/crawling system and not worth thinking too much about. There's some ensemble support for a little frozen down here but I'm not enthused unless a perfect scenario happens and we won't really know the evolution until Mon.

The way it's going this year I could see us getting some sleet.

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Model war. GFS shows first wave scooting north and nothing behind it for the most part. Euro is hanging onto the low stalling off the coast, phasing with the second wave, and going boom over NE. Gives us a little snow.

The only scenario that would work for us is a crawling bomb tucking west into SNE and precip driving all the way down here in the cold sector. It's only possible with a bombing/crawling system and not worth thinking too much about. There's some ensemble support for a little frozen down here but I'm not enthused unless a perfect scenario happens and we won't really know the evolution until Mon.

The way it's going this year I could see us getting some sleet.

There are several GFS members that are toying with the idea of unsettled weather along the coast at our latitude anywhere from 96 hr to 132 hr.

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The upcoming event will probably end up being like 11/26 regarding snow accumulation. Rain to snow at the end will amount to something like C-1" I-95 to the Bay, and maybe 2" in favored spots NW.

Really hard to say at this point given the spread. Other than the GFS, the guidance is suggestive of a coastal storm... exact track, intensity and overall evolution unknown. 

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Really hard to say at this point given the spread. Other than the GFS, the guidance is suggestive of a coastal storm... exact track, intensity and overall evolution unknown. 

I'll have a map out by tonight ;)

 

My "forecast" is just how I'm feeling right now. Low expectations... And, let's be honest. Would you really be surprised if Parkton got 2"?

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It's hard to excited about any coastal early next week with a big low over the great lakes.  Even if it develops as forecast, I95 would probably get screwed and it looks like by the time it really gets going its north of us.   On a more positive note,  last night's euro ens mean weeklies still are predicting below normal heights south of us and above up in Canada with a positive pna look for the last week of Dec.   That's not a bad look. When and if  it starts showing up on the D+11 superensemble mean or the euro en mean in the D+11 range, I'll have a fun outlook to write.

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Cookie crumbs keep appearing.... GFS showing the +pna returning down the line with ec troughing. EPO starting to go negative and higher heights building at the pole.

0&6z GEFS memebers showing more and more of the same as well.

Yeah, was debating commenting on this.  That was the best Op run of the GFS I've seen in awhile for the long-term.  Ditches this April or October-type look with a bunch of short wavelength troughs/ridges and the polar jet way north in Canada. 

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Yeah, was debating commenting on this.  That was the best Op run of the GFS I've seen in awhile for the long-term.  Ditches this April or October-type look with a bunch of short wavelength troughs/ridges and the polar jet way north in Canada. 

 

Looks like a parade of shortwaves riding under the wall of high heights in Canada on the ec ens. OPs are taking on that look as well.  A few days ago it looked really flat and even uphill in our parts but that has changed.

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haha. I lobbed and you swung. It's still illegal here though. I'll have to roadtrip to DC. 

Still illegal here too until Congress approves it.  :rolleyes:

 

Anyway, I'm out of town next weekend (taking the kid to a Detroit Lions game....yes...I'm going to Detroit on purpose)...so that's the range of yalls next snowstorm.  Enjoy.

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