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January Med/Long Range Discussion Part 3


WinterWxLuvr

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The 2 storms that I most vividly remember were the last week of Jan and what seemed like a carbon copy exactly a week later. As I recall the NWS was bullish for snow on at least one of these from the 2 day timeframe, but living in western fairfax at the time I don't recall seeing a flake...just 35 and rain. Looked these up on the psu NARR site and you can see why they didn't work out. First storm came into a retreating high off New England so low level flow was easterly. Antecedent cold air mass wasn't that great to begin with either as -5C at 850 was up near the Canadian border. The second system had much better HP placement (over the lakes) but still not that cold of an airmass and it never really was entrenched over the area before the storm arrived. Meanwhile the low was really a pure southern stream bowling ball that developed in the Gulf and headed almost straight north, stacked up to 500mb so lots of onshore flow at all levels. I'm not sure either is a really good analog for what is currently being shown although there are some similarities.

http://mp1.met.psu.edu/~fxg1/NARR/1998/us0128.php

http://mp1.met.psu.edu/~fxg1/NARR/1998/us0204.php

The January storm set the single day snowfall record in Wv. Near Beckley at Flat Top. 35" I believe. Total elevation event.

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Found another on 2/24. I must have given up on the winter by that point as I don't remember it at all. Again, retreating air mass that was marginal to begin with (pocket of -5C over the Lakes). The maps show what looks like a deform band with sub 0 850s over/east of DC as the low pulled away...maybe that's responsible for the 0.7 IAD recorded that month? I don't have the daily snowfall data to check. As bad as this winter has been we should be much better with cold air this week than we ever were in 98. The -5C line was parked up near Hudson's bay most of February that year.

 

Agree that the upcoming event looks like 1/27 in terms of upper level trough evolution. Will be interesting to see if the colder air/slightly better HP placement makes a meaningful difference in the outcome.

IAD- 0.5" on 2/4 and 0.2" on 2/24. 

 

This is a quick place to check for the airports from 1995-2013-- click on "Precipitation": 

http://www.jhuapl.edu/weather/education/ACONdata.html

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a storm quite close to the coast I would think would be bad news depending on high placement and storm strength.

 

Ocean temps are still quite balmy.  A flow out of the ENE or East would be the kiss of death for areas along I-95 but certainly south and east of that point.

 

Again though pointless to even worry about this too much yet.

 

Cape May, NJ 45.0 °F Atlantic City, NJ 44.1 °F Lewes, DE 45.0 °F Brandywine Shoal Light, DE 44.1 °F

 

 

Wachapreague, VA48.0 °FOcean City Inlet, MD46.9 °FKiptopeke, VA46.9 °FBishops Head, MD44.1 °FChesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel, VA48.0 °FCambridge, MD42.1 °F

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On the other side of this coin though is potential faster low development over these warm waters. Will be interesting to see if this helps

a storm quite close to the coast I would think would be bad news depending on high placement and storm strength.

Ocean temps are still quite balmy. A flow out of the ENE or East would be the kiss of death for areas along I-95 but certainly south and east of that point.

Again though pointless to even worry about this too much yet.

Cape May, NJ 45.0 °F Atlantic City, NJ 44.1 °F Lewes, DE 45.0 °F Brandywine Shoal Light, DE 44.1 °F

Wachapreague, VA48.0 °FOcean City Inlet, MD46.9 °FKiptopeke, VA46.9 °FBishops Head, MD44.1 °FChesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel, VA48.0 °FCambridge, MD42.1 °F

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I know this is pointless, but did anyone notice the uber LR GFS showed another Western block and had m.  any snow threats....Pretty interesting stuff. 

 

Knock on wood, but we are tethering on maybe an epic turn around.  

 

I did see that but given the progression of this winter, I don't think its worth looking past D7.  Even the ensembles have been all over the place so far - the mood in here a few days ago made it seem like winter was completely over because the LR pattern was breaking down.  Many of the snowier forecasts predicted an AN February for snow to turn the season so there's that...;) 

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Thanks GOES5, interesting. I wish there was a historical database of storm tracks and attributes like we have with hurricanes. We tend to only look to big local events when analoging etc. 97/98 probably has the most similar pattern overall mtd but none of the strong Ninos since 1950 are a great match. It is certainly possible we just barely missed some events and it sounds that way so perhaps the extra touch of cold is what we need.

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Thanks GOES5, interesting. I wish there was a historical database of storm tracks and attributes like we have with hurricanes. We tend to only look to big local events when analoging etc. 97/98 probably has the most similar pattern overall mtd but none of the strong Ninos since 1950 are a great match. It is certainly possible we just barely missed some events and it sounds that way so perhaps the extra touch of cold is what we need.

 

Isnt the Weather Channel keeping one now that they are naming winter storms...lol

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Our storm is entering the picture on the 00z GFS @ 66 hours. Compared to the 18z GFS it is a little slower & tad NW....I'd rather it be north which down the line would lead to less digging.

Given what I can discern about the Euro you'd probably better worry about suppression

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