Texas/New Mexico/Louisiana/Mexico Obs And Discussion Thread Part 8

[aggiegeog]

Early next week is becoming interesting for areas north of I-20. Still many days to watch so I am being cautious for now about getting my hopes up.

[raindancewx]

My pure analogs had 3-5F below average for March in North Texas. I didn't buy it...so I warmed it up 2F. But maybe I should have given what may happen next week.

For Albuquerque, every El Nino back to 1931 that has achieved six days with accumulating snow has had a 7th. We had day six on Friday.

If the rule holds, it means snow in March or April since we're done with snow in February.

[cheese007]

18 hours ago, aggiegeog said:

Early next week is becoming interesting for areas north of I-20. Still many days to watch so I am being cautious for now about getting my hopes up.

I'm expecting the usual "35 and pouring outside" we've been getting this winter and last

[aggiegeog]

5 hours ago, cheese007 said:

I'm expecting the usual "35 and pouring outside" we've been getting this winter and last

Looking at all of the models it has a 3/2/14 feel with very cold air to our NE and a shortwave out of the NW. That produced a line of sleet thunderstorms followed by light dry snow the next day. For that to happen we need the shortwave to be stronger than modeled though. As it stands I see 30s and rain on Monday followed by very cold air and maybe light snow north of I-20 on Tuesday. I am not seeing much room for good snow, but if the high can come down over 1050 MB and a bit further W it is possible late Monday. Wed morning looks like around 20 (warmer if no snow and colder if there is snow on the ground). Wed morning will likely  be the coldest of the season, but whether that is just barely colder than January or much colder is TBD.

[aggiegeog]

Areas along and north of I-20 could see sleet on Thursday. Temps in this area are unlikely to reach 40. NWS is calling for 50s and I just don't see it as the Arctic front looks to solidly push through.

[aggiegeog]

Three small chances for winter precip over the coming few days. I'm not excited about any of them right now. Some record low highs could be challenged with this and Wed morning could drop into the teens.

[aggiegeog]

Models are not handling the SW push of the Arctic air into the TX Panhandle well at all. 

[cheese007]

Already at freezing here in Dallas. May be in for a surprise during the morning commute?

EDIT: well its gonna be cold enough now but apparently things are drying out as well. Precip or cold: pick one

[aggiegeog]

An icy mess this morning across DFW and all of N TX. WWA in effect.

[cheese007]

Guess we got the icy surprise after all. As for the weekend system, it seems that the moisture will clear out before temps have a chance to drop below freezing, with Monday and Tuesday being bone dry. Unless we get a spring break surprise again this winter is effectively a wrap 

EDIT: WWA Just extended until noon. Maybe a long day ahead of us 

[aggiegeog]

On Monday the GFS had the front along the Red RIver right now haha. I had the I-20 corridor in the 70s today and the Hill COuntry in the 80s. only a 40-50 degree bust.

[raindancewx]

Coldest winter high (Dec-Feb) in Albuquerque since 2009-10 this winter: 48.1F. Long term average (1931-32 to 2017-18) is 49.5F. More recent average (1988-89 to 2017-18) is 50.5F, so pretty cold. I think fifth or sixth coldest high in winter in the last 30 years for us.

[raindancewx]

Canadian sees the Kelvin Wave and went stronger for the El Nino in Spring. It is backing off the La Nina look for next winter now.

[aggiegeog]

34 here this morning. We may see the low 40s today with drizzle, a long cry from the near 70 and sunny predicted a couple days ago. Tomorrow may reach 50 with showers. Sunday looks like temps falling into the 30s but little to no post frontal precip on any model. 30s to low 40s and cloudy Monday. Best shot I see for precip late Monday is for the GL upper low to be weaker and shift west. This would keep us in more zonal flow vs NW fow and it would allow the shortwave a chance to not fully shear out. The cold stays around through Wed before a warm-up Thu ahead of the next cold front next Friday.

[raindancewx]

For Dec-Jan, snowfall, and precipitation overall, I'm pretty happy with what I had this winter, it was the analogs +1F generally for Dec-Jan.

 

February is super different though - it went to the +9 SOI map you'd expect. Overall, still close for highs in most parts of the US outside the Dakotas, Montana, and coastal SE.

 

[raindancewx]

That's a tornado pattern. Also, the storm depicted on 3/11-3/12 is the most precipitation I've ever seen a model show for March in New Mexico. The Euro has had over an inch of precipitation for several runs now, and the start of the event would be Monday morning. I'm sure it would find a way to snow even toward El Paso if the storm verified as depicted.

[wxmx]

Just like in last November, and last winter as well, strato snow (low level cold dome, with overrunning warm, relatively moist air) was seen at around 1300m+ a couple of days ago. Pretty uncommon occurrences, that have become more frequent these last 2 winters. By Saturday we expect highs in the mid 90s. Not even Vivaldi executed his Four Seasons so fast.

[aggiegeog]

15 hours ago, raindancewx said:

That's a tornado pattern. Also, the storm depicted on 3/11-3/12 is the most precipitation I've ever seen a model show for March in New Mexico. The Euro has had over an inch of precipitation for several runs now, and the start of the event would be Monday morning. I'm sure it would find a way to snow even toward El Paso if the storm verified as depicted.

The mountains will likely see the heaviest snow totals in a good long while. These big March snow storms used to be more common. Hope this is a return of that trend. 

[raindancewx]

The Euro is still much higher than the other models for the Mon-Tue event, and some hints now it may begin Sunday Night or linger into mid-week. As a blend, I usually weight the NAM 3-km, Euro, GFS, at 2:1, 2:1, 1:1, once we're within 48 hours of an event. At this range, the Euro is still better than the NAM. So the current weighting would be something like 1.25" x2, 0.4" x2, 0.3" x1, for 0.75". But I think anything from 0.25" to 1.50" is possible for total precipitation in much of NM from Mon-Wed. The NWS radar beam is down, so I'm sure they are going to some weird things to try to forecast this event.

[raindancewx]

Albuquerque is up to 0.50" as of 8 pm with this storm. Wettest March since 2007. My Spring Forecast had 0.75" for March, so that looks...not bad. At least for now. There were two big SOI crashes 3/8-3/10, and 3/9-3/11 that support some kind of big storm around 3/21 or 3/22 in the SW. We'll see

I ended up going with these amounts for Mon/Tue/Weds in the city:

Monday: 0.05"-0.40" - 0.21" actual

Tuesday: 0.30"-0.70" - 0.29" actual through 8 pm. (Maybe a bit as snow very late)

Wednesday: 0.05-0.40" - ?? (Maybe some as snow)

[raindancewx]

Pretty substantial snowpack recovery in NM the past few days.

[raindancewx]

I'm continually amazed at how strong this blend has been for Albuquerque since I started using it in October. The El Nino ended up only a 27.4C event, but for highs it has nonetheless remained a strong blend in all months since October.

[aggiegeog]

Maybe a late season freeze for northern Texas Monday morning. Sunday and Monday look to be chilly days, maybe not out of the 40s.

[raindancewx]

March ended up with a high of 62.2F here, but that is the coldest March since 2010 in Albuquerque.

Rains today (trying valiantly to go over to snow, but it is 35F) also make March 2019 the wettest March in the city since 2005.

My Spring Forecast had 59.8F / 0.75" for Albuquerque in March, we'll end up at 62.2F / and at least 0.67".

[aggiegeog]

Got down to 31 here this morning.

[raindancewx]

Albuquerque is at 97 lows of 32F or less since 10/1 - pretty high by recent standards and even by longer term historical standards.

[Sydney Claridge]

The GFS-based models (GFS and GFS-FV3) are placing the warm front with the Saturday system just south of DFW on the 0z runs.  Those models do seem to have moved the front's location slightly further north with each of the last few runs.  The 0z runs puts DFW in the upper-50s for dewpoints with mid-to-upper 60s dewpoints just to the south and SE.

It will be interesting to see how far north the warm front can come, as well as what the NAM has to say about it as it comes into range.

[aggiegeog]

Tomorrow night could feature some strong storms for N TX and Saturday afternoon in E & SE TX looks volatile with tornados possible. As the system exits Sat night into Sun morning there will likely be some snow on the backside. It is questionable how much will wrap around south of the Red River though. Upper Levels will be plenty cold down to I-20 and surface will be in the upper 30s most likely all depends on how far south the moisture can wrap around. Maybe somewhere like Denison gets a dusting.

[canderson]

I’m back home in Longview this weekend. Saturday afternoon looks to be rocking around here. 

[David Reimer]

The high risk 'bust' of 2017 is flashing in my mind in regards to Saturday. Conditions certainly do set up to support a significant severe weather event, but I'm not sure which mode will be dominant. A QLCS would result in plenty of damaging winds, hail, and brief tornadoes while a semi-discrete supercellular mode would probably have a substantial tornado threat. Lousiana is pretty much doomed at this point since timing is set up to support both modes out that way. I'm just not sure we'll get it done in East Texas before we veer or have VBV issues. Hopefully, we get more answers than questions with the 0Z model suite. We'll also have to see how far west the threat sets up on Saturday considering the slowing trend in data over the last day.