hosj III Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 I'm 90-95% certain. Enough to have deterministic wording. What I can't stand is people ruling out a good winter, but a historic winter (50"+ for BWI/IAD) is much, much harder to get. If you went with a forecast of 0% chance of a historic winter every winter you'd be right at least 90% of the time, which by your logic is enough to claim you are always right. Seems legit. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fozz Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 If you went with a forecast of 0% chance of a historic winter every winter you'd be right at least 90% of the time, which by your logic is enough to claim you are always right. Seems legit. 95% is a pretty standard confidence interval Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bob Chill Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 Imo- there's really only one thing to focus on at this point and that's the ao if we want a realistic shot at climo+. It can happen without it (like last year) but past stats are pretty bad if we don't get a prolonged blocking period. Guidance has shifted across the board towards a +ao in the +1-2sd range shortly after new years and the neg period that was looking good now appears brief and transient. We can still score in a -epo and or +pna regime but it's far from optimal in our area. I'm not optimistic for a sustained decent snow pattern anytime soon. But we're moving towards our best climo period for getting something in a less than optimal regime so there's that. I'll hold off on quick flip thoughts until the flip is inside of 5 days. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WinterWxLuvr Posted December 23, 2014 Author Share Posted December 23, 2014 I'm 90-95% certain. Enough to have deterministic wording. What I can't stand is people ruling out a good winter, but a historic winter (50"+ for BWI/IAD) is much, much harder to get. Sorry, but your 95% certainty means exactly squat. As far as getting something historic, the definition of the word means it would be a long shot in any setup. For all you know, every record might be a new record by April 1. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fozz Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 Sorry, but your 95% certainty means exactly squat. Give me a good reason to think a historic winter is more probable... otherwise I'm stepping out.. this is a banal and tedious argument. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cold Rain Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 It would seem hard to have a historic winter if you have to can virtually an entire meteorological winter month, but I guess that depends on how you define historical. Still, a very cold Jan/Feb/Mar is still on the table. But like Bob said, until a cold pattern works itself around and inside of 5 days, it's going to be hard to take it seriously. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scarlet Pimpernel Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 Its true that you can have a Dec shutout and still get an above average winter overall, but the odds of a historic winter overall like many called for on this forum are pretty slim to none right now. It's really only happened twice- 1978-79 and 1986-87. Now you can still get a HECS in an otherwise crappy winter (Jan. 2000 and Mar. 1942 come to mind) but most of our historic winters were well underway by this point. And a lot of those you mentioned (85/86, 04/05, 06/07, etc.) were still below average snowfall overall even though the winter itself was backloaded. But I do agree with you that around 1/20 is probably the point of no return. Hard core weenies may have interpreted things as a forecast for a "historic winter" (or hoped for that). But with all due respect I don't recall any of the well respected long range forecasters in here calling for anything like that. Perhaps some were more bullish on the cold than others, but nothing extreme. And nobody was going overly huge on snowfall. General call for snow was "somewhat above normal". I guess some people translated that to mean 2002-03 redux or something. That said, this month has been disappointing and there is some legitimate concern on how things might shake out from here (without declaring "winter cancel"). I'm not overly impressed by the medium range through pretty much the rest of the month and even into the first part of January, but we'll see. The good thing is, there is some decent cold air in Canada and it wouldn't take much to dislodge some of that. As many on here have said, the global models have had a difficult time with the pattern beyond a few days (for whatever reason...fast flow, etc.). It was only a week or so ago there was serious talk about a "ripe" pattern shortly after Christmas. That all but disappeared a couple of days later. We really, really (really!) need to see some concrete indications of -NAO blocking, and it just ain't happening thus far. That's got me perhaps the most concerned. My hope is that we have a back-loaded winter, maybe close to the last 2/3 being good. 2006-07 comes to mind in that regard, which would have been even more notable had we scored on the Valentine's Day storm (instead of getting 3" of sleet). Still cannot believe how cold that February was...heck, even March and early April! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bob Chill Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 It would seem hard to have a historic winter if you have to can virtually an entire meteorological winter month, but I guess that depends on how you define historical. Still, a very cold Jan/Feb/Mar is still on the table. But like Bob said, until a cold pattern works itself around and inside of 5 days, it's going to be hard to take it seriously. Historic is a subjective metric for people on the forum. To me, historic requires all 3 met months to have anomalous winter conditions. Doesn't have to be snow. If I was skating on a pond in the woods today with no fear of drowning it would be a good winter month. Dec so far has been far below historic standards and that applies to just about everyone in the US. Scoring a storm late could save the month but Jan still needs to perform in some fashion to even discuss historic. I don't think very many folks called for historic door to door but there were some. The majority called for a solid jan/feb in the east. Time will tell but I doubt many lr folks would say things are going as planned at this point. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gymengineer Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 Two things: 1) Like Fozz said, any official predictions of a historic winter were rare from this subforum..... Matt's forecast through CWG is always one of the most "official" forecasts published by anyone who lives within this area, and that forecast was for just a tad above the average snowfall. 2) Waiting until January for the first accumulating snow can end up any number of ways. The examples listed in the posts above all skew optimistic. Even the ones that ended below average for snowfall still had a distinct wintry period of a month or so (like 04/05, 06/07). No one mentioned 08/09 with the wait until past 1/20 for the first region-wide accumulating event... and then the favorable modeled pattern for early Feb that ended up verifying as an inverted trough dumping 8" on Philly while DC remained snow-free. It ended up being a two storm winter. 91/92, 94/95, 01/02, etc. were also dismal January starts.... 86/87 was a once-in-a-lifetime winter for DC where just three events sent the city into historic territory for snowfall. The more modest goal is for a winter that has numerous chances, even if they don't all pan out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fozz Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 Two things: 1) Like Fozz said, any official predictions of a historic winter were rare from this subforum..... Matt's forecast through CWG is always one of the most "official" forecasts published by anyone who lives within this area, and that forecast was for just a tad above the average snowfall. 2) Waiting until January for the first accumulating snow can end up any number of ways. The examples listed in the posts above all skew optimistic. Even the ones that ended below average for snowfall still had a distinct wintry period of a month or so (like 04/05, 06/07). No one mentioned 08/09 with the wait until past 1/20 for the first region-wide accumulating event... and then the favorable modeled pattern for early Feb that ended up verifying as an inverted trough dumping 8" on Philly while DC remained snow-free. It ended up being a two storm winter. 91/92, 94/95, 01/02, etc. were also dismal January starts.... 86/87 was a once-in-a-lifetime winter for DC where just three events sent the city into historic territory for snowfall. The more modest goal is for a winter that has numerous chances, even if they don't all pan out. Sounds like a lesser version of a certain winter we're all very familiar with Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cold Rain Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 Historic is a subjective metric for people on the forum. To me, historic requires all 3 met months to have anomalous winter conditions. Doesn't have to be snow. If I was skating on a pond in the woods today with no fear of drowning it would be a good winter month. Dec so far has been far below historic standards and that applies to just about everyone in the US. Scoring a storm late could save the month but Jan still needs to perform in some fashion to even discuss historic. I don't think very many folks called for historic door to door but there were some. The majority called for a solid jan/feb in the east. Time will tell but I doubt many lr folks would say things are going as planned at this point. Yeah the only thing historic about this December is that it'll be the only December 2014 they ever make. Good riddance.I suppose if we rapidly change to a persistent cold pattern that lasts the rest of the winter and contains multiple KUs, then maybe that would qualify. But that's kind of absurd to even talk about at this point. I agree with the last point too. According to prevailing preseason wisdom, things are not unfolding according to plan so far. Edit: at least we're heading into a climo period where we (especially you guys) can make do with a less than ideal pattern. So, if we can sneak an event or two in, maybe a better pattern sets up later and maximizes chances in a less than favorable climo time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scarlet Pimpernel Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 Historic is a subjective metric for people on the forum. To me, historic requires all 3 met months to have anomalous winter conditions. Doesn't have to be snow. If I was skating on a pond in the woods today with no fear of drowning it would be a good winter month. Dec so far has been far below historic standards and that applies to just about everyone in the US. Scoring a storm late could save the month but Jan still needs to perform in some fashion to even discuss historic. I don't think very many folks called for historic door to door but there were some. The majority called for a solid jan/feb in the east. Time will tell but I doubt many lr folks would say things are going as planned at this point. I think this is a good definition for "historic". In the time I've lived in this area (since summer 2001), I'd say that 2002-03, 2009-10, 2013-14 would count as historic. Those are also the only years I experienced above (or well enough above) normal snow. All three were colder than normal on the whole as well. One can argue 2013-14 might be kind of borderline because December wasn't exactly anomalous (at least we did get some interesting stuff through mid-month, then a torch for a week around Christmas). But March was truly epic. On the flip-side of that, the "anti-historic" top 3 crap winters for me include 2011-12, 2001-02, and 2012-13 (in that order). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fozz Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 I think this is a good definition for "historic". In the time I've lived in this area (since summer 2001), I'd say that 2002-03, 2009-10, 2013-14 would count as historic. Those are also the only years I experienced above (or well enough above) normal snow. All three were colder than normal on the whole as well. One can argue 2013-14 might be kind of borderline because December wasn't exactly anomalous (at least we did get some interesting stuff through mid-month, then a torch for a week around Christmas). But March was truly epic. On the flip-side of that, the "anti-historic" top 3 crap winters for me include 2011-12, 2001-02, and 2012-13 (in that order). I think it's still possible to pull of a historic winter even if one month is kinda lame. 1995-96 for example had a lame December (1.3" total for DCA) with some big 40N events that screwed over this area or had snow changing to rain... I mean just take a look at this map for 12/19/1995, it looks hideous for our region... I can only imagine how certain weenies would reacted if this forum had been around http://www.raymondcmartinjr.com/weather/1996/19-Dec-95.html Then January happened and the rest is history. Another fascinating winter was 1933-34, an amazing backloaded winter with a torch January followed by frigid cold and heavy snow in February and March and a very impressive snow total in the end especially for Baltimore. Some of the famous cold records of all time came from February 1934. Basically 2006-07 on steroids. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
T. August Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 I think it's still possible to pull of a historic winter even if one month is kinda lame. 1995-96 for example had a lame December (1.3" total for DCA) with some big 40N events that screwed over this area or had snow changing to rain... I mean just take a look at this map for 12/19/1995, it looks hideous for our region... I can only imagine how certain weenies would reacted if this forum had been around http://www.raymondcmartinjr.com/weather/1996/19-Dec-95.html Then January happened and the rest is history. Another fascinating winter was 1933-34, an amazing backloaded winter with a torch January followed by frigid cold and heavy snow in February and March and a very impressive snow total in the end especially for Baltimore. Some of the famous cold records of all time came from February 1934. Basically 2006-07 on steroids. Wow... I just checked the total snow and that's pretty good. 47.9" with 26.1" of that coming in February. March wasn't bad either with 13.8". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HighStakes Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 I think it's still possible to pull of a historic winter even if one month is kinda lame. 1995-96 for example had a lame December (1.3" total for DCA) with some big 40N events that screwed over this area or had snow changing to rain... I mean just take a look at this map for 12/19/1995, it looks hideous for our region... I can only imagine how certain weenies would reacted if this forum had been around http://www.raymondcmartinjr.com/weather/1996/19-Dec-95.html Then January happened and the rest is history. Another fascinating winter was 1933-34, an amazing backloaded winter with a torch January followed by frigid cold and heavy snow in February and March and a very impressive snow total in the end especially for Baltimore. Some of the famous cold records of all time came from February 1934. Basically 2006-07 on steroids. Looks like in 1960 winter went to town starting in February. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fozz Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 Looks like in 1960 winter went to town starting in February. March 1960 was literally colder than both January and February.... absolutely frigid, not to mention a KU storm that ranks right in between PDII and January 1996. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EasternUSWX Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 GFS has the 28-29th storm. Just south, right where we want it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bob Chill Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 GFS has the 28-29th storm. Just south, right where we want it. Decent cad/overunning look. H5 is flat as a pancake but meaningless at this lead. Nice to see cold in place either way. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kurtstack Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 Decent cad/overunning look. H5 is flat as a pancake but meaningless at this lead. Nice to see cold in place either way. The entire run seemed to have a pretty cold look to it, at least cold enough that every storm has a shot at producing some frozen. Not bad. And the XBOX really wants to go bonkers with the reinforcing shot of cold around hour 198, with a 1056 High in the center of the CONUS. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bob Chill Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 The entire run seemed to have a pretty cold look to it, at least cold enough that every storm has a shot at producing some frozen. Not bad. And the XBOX really wants to go bonkers with the reinforcing shot of cold around hour 198, with a 1056 High in the center of the CONUS. Para is similar with the 28th. Euro ens had a cluster of ok solutions as well. Its sketchy but 90% of our snow events are sketchy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kurtstack Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 The strong ridge over Alaska works to keep the cold air around and could allow for several possible overrunning threats over the coming weeks. We may just nickel and dime our way to a good january snow total. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deck Pic Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 Other than 1991,1994,1996,1997,1998,1999, 2001, 2004, 2006, 2008, 2011, and 2012, this is one of the worst Decembers in the last 25 years... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Interstate Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 GFS has the 28-29th storm. Just south, right where we want it. Are you sure... seems like if they are south they just go further south Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deck Pic Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 Are you sure... seems like if they are south they just go further south I think it is too early to really discern anything...it is a good overrunning pattern with a big southeast ridge, which really doesn't support something sliding to our south....but who knows? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deck Pic Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 I think it is too early to really discern anything...it is a good overrunning pattern with a big southeast ridge, which really doesn't support something sliding to our south....but who knows? The 0z Euro has a storm that makes more sense given the pattern...low to our west, slides underneath us, but it is a bad track and the cold gets here too late....is a small hit for far western burbs and a nice hit for Western and central PA.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ji Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 Well that sucks. We have had like 4 rain and 35 degree storms already Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AlaskaETC Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 All it takes is one good storm...one good storm... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deck Pic Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 Well that sucks. We have had like 4 rain and 35 degree storms already the new years storm is the same thing...but further south......it is a Nina-esque pattern but with a southern stream..... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AlaskaETC Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 the new years storm is the same thing...but further south......it is a Nina-esque pattern but with a southern stream..... Weird....I wonder if this Nino will be a bust after all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ji Posted December 23, 2014 Share Posted December 23, 2014 New Years storm is cold enough though. Just no precip Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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