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Late Feb/March Med/Long Range Discussion

WinterWxLuvr

By WinterWxLuvr,
in Mid Atlantic

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cae

cae

Posted
Posted

The GFS looks like it has been trending towards a weaker first wave, which prevents it from cutting quite so much and gives us some snow.  I think it also allows the second wave to develop more.  On the 12z GFS, the second wave shows up as just some light snow in SW VA on Thursday night, but it's something to keep an eye on.

 

The GGEM completely lost the second wave last night, only to bring it back today.  This time it cuts to the system up to Lake Eerie, but somehow it still manages to snow on the cities according to tropicaltidbits...  Given the low placement and temps in the mid to upper 30s, I'm skeptical.  But it's more than a week away, so we'll see a lot of different possibilities between now and then.

 

W0WP6WC.png

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HighStakes

HighStakes

Posted
Posted

Except in this case you are waiting for the cold air to catch up to the precip it is not as if the cold air is in place already. 

This is probably the most frequent way March snows occur. There have been so many systems over the last 20 years that ended in a period of accumulating snow. Usually they are in the 1-3, 2-4 variety because there just is not much precip left once it's cold enough for the changeover. The period of snow is often short lived but does come down heavily. Usually this scenario only benefits areas N and W of  the beltways but some snow gets into the cities. Some of these cases overachieved and produced 4-6 inches, mainly confined to areas 20 miles outside the cities. That seems to be the max one of these storms can produce.

 

Some examples:

Early March 1999: 1-3 immediate suburbs, 3-6 extended burbs. This was an all out blizzard for western PA and western NY. The super clipper followed several days later that crushed IAD. Then 5 days later a strong storm produced heavy snow N and W and some snow in the cities.

 

March 2005: very similar to above mentioned storm.

 

March 1995: A strong cold front with heavy rain changed to heavy snow for a few hours producing 1-4 depending on location.

 

March 1997 and 1998: Both years had rainy cold fronts that ended in a couple sloppy inches for the favored locations.

 

April 2000 same scenario as other storms. 

 

I can think of many others but no need to mention them all. I don't want to get carried away. Bottom line is I wouldn't bet against 1 or 2 more accumulating events. Especially for our locations. 

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CAPE

CAPE

Posted
Posted

Probably. It's not that far out in time and just about perfect everything from track/temps/onset and so forth. 5" in DC and 4" in my yard. PSU won't like it but we both know how it would go if the euro is onto something. 

Salisbury is pummeled, so we know there would have to be some adjusting.

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Joe Vanni

Joe Vanni

Posted
Posted

March is good thru the 7th. You have to have something extraordinary like 93 for it to remain cold post event after the 7th. 6" of snow and 50 the next day is little fun and I would take 2" with highs near 30 for several days anytime

Tenman,

Do you remember Saint Patrick's Day 2014? In the teens and had 11 inches of snow. That's pretty incredible.

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mitchnick

mitchnick

Posted
Posted

Salisbury is pummeled, so we know there would have to be some adjusting.

Frankly, I finally got a little interested with the euro ensemble run  from last night because it had 2 members that kept snow to our south. That's the look those of us up here needed at this range. Temps still suck on this run verbatim, but it's a start maybe.

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Bob Chill

Bob Chill

Posted
Posted

Frankly, I finally got a little interested with the euro ensemble run  from last night because it had 2 members that kept snow to our south. That's the look those of us up here need at this range. Temps still suck on this run verbatim, but it's a start maybe.

 

Temps suck? It's like below freezing the entire event for almost all of us. 

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high risk

high risk

Posted
Posted

     Great examples here.   I have to add in my favorite:  November 1995.    In the 60's ahead of the cold front, even got a severe thunderstorm watch.   Squall line came through with wide area of stratiform precip behind it.   Rain turned to snow and accumulated several inches in the northwestern suburbs.

 

 

This is probably the most frequent way March snows occur. There have been so many systems over the last 20 years that ended in a period of accumulating snow. Usually they are in the 1-3, 2-4 variety because there just is not much precip left once it's cold enough for the changeover. The period of snow is often short lived but does come down heavily. Usually this scenario only benefits areas N and W of  the beltways but some snow gets into the cities. Some of these cases overachieved and produced 4-6 inches, mainly confined to areas 20 miles outside the cities. That seems to be the max one of these storms can produce.

 

Some examples:

Early March 1999: 1-3 immediate suburbs, 3-6 extended burbs. This was an all out blizzard for western PA and western NY. The super clipper followed several days later that crushed IAD. Then 5 days later a strong storm produced heavy snow N and W and some snow in the cities.

 

March 2005: very similar to above mentioned storm.

 

March 1995: A strong cold front with heavy rain changed to heavy snow for a few hours producing 1-4 depending on location.

 

March 1997 and 1998: Both years had rainy cold fronts that ended in a couple sloppy inches for the favored locations.

 

April 2000 same scenario as other storms. 

 

I can think of many others but no need to mention them all. I don't want to get carried away. Bottom line is I wouldn't bet against 1 or 2 more accumulating events. Especially for our locations. 

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HighStakes

HighStakes

Posted
Posted

     Great examples here.   I have to add in my favorite:  November 1995.    In the 60's ahead of the cold front, even got a severe thunderstorm watch.   Squall line came through with wide area of stratiform precip behind it.   Rain turned to snow and accumulated several inches in the northwestern suburbs.

Yup. Remember it well. It essentially was the kickoff to a great winter. 

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HighStakes

HighStakes

Posted
Posted

Don't worry. I'm not excited. I was just questioning Mitch's temps verbatim post. It's a great solution. No denying that. And nice to see as lead time shortens. 

Too early to get excited yes, but it does have a nice look and is a reasonable way to get everyone on the forum an event of some some significance. With that look I doubt temps would be a problem. 

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mitchnick

mitchnick

Posted
Posted

Temps suck? It's like below freezing the entire event for almost all of us. 

Imby, it starts at 34, then cools to 31, but the daylight hours with only .24" qpf falling over the 12 hours (average of .02"/hour qpf) starting 7AM-7PM in March will not accumulate like the snowfall maps indicate. We need upper 20's. I have not forgotten what all the models, Euro included, showed for us earlier this month that failed.

BUT, don't get me wrong, like I said, I think that the model is showing accumulating snow to our south at this range is the first truly encouraging sign I've seen for snow in a while.

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psuhoffman

psuhoffman

Posted
Posted

Probably. It's not that far out in time and just about perfect everything from track/temps/onset and so forth. 5" in DC and 4" in my yard. PSU won't like it but we both know how it would go if the euro is onto something.

I'm really scared I'm going to get fringed. Now excuse me while I find my tin foil hat to protect against the alien telepathy beams
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Bob Chill

Bob Chill

Posted
Posted

BUT, don't get me wrong, like I said, I think that the model is showing accumulating snow to our south at this range is the first truly encouraging sign I've seen for snow in a while.

 

That's the bigger story for sure. Even with that exact track it could easily be a larger precip shield. 

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mitchnick

mitchnick

Posted
Posted

Imby, it starts at 34, then cools to 31, but the daylight hours with only .24" qpf falling over the 12 hours (average of .02"/hour qpf) starting 7AM-7PM in March will not accumulate like the snowfall maps indicate. We need upper 20's. I have not forgotten what all the models, Euro included, showed for us earlier this month that failed.

BUT, don't get me wrong, like I said, I think that the model is showing accumulating snow to our south at this range is the first truly encouraging sign I've seen for snow in a while.

I'll add, I bet some of the ensembles actually will show some big hits this run.

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