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Pittsburgh PA Winter 2016-2017


north pgh

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I'm still bearish on tonight's event for the southern zones (say south of Washington).  I'm guessing in Greene/Mon counties we are going to have rain for a little while at the onset, and the GFS may still be overdoing the precip amounts based on the setup.  Anything over an inch locally would be a surprise to me.

If the events next week end up being Miller B systems, then chances are good we'll miss the best stuff.  We're too far West to get good influence from a true Miller B unless it is absolutely huge, but development is almost always too late and too far East for us to really benefit.  We really need a Miller A or something more southern-stream dominant for a bigger event.  As of right now it looks like all these storms are northern stream only.

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.SHORT TERM /6 PM THIS EVENING THROUGH SUNDAY/...
Though swift in its eastward progression, the aforementioned
shortwave has the potential to produce significant snow amounts
tonight into Friday morning. This scenario is supported by
favorable mid and upper level dynamics with a coupled jet
streak progged to set up over the region, and this feature will
be accompanied by moderate to strong low and mid level
convergence. Of course, highest the amounts of snow would be
where the strongest frontogenesis develops; but this is also
predicated on the timing of the colder air sinking down from the
north. The thermal profile will obviously have a huge effect on
what type of precipitation falls and whether that will line up
with the previously mentioned synoptic and mesoscale features.
Initially, most of the atmospheric energy will be used to cool
the lower atmosphere as a 2000 to 3000ft warm layer will be in
place across much of the region. The ultimate outcome will
depend on how strong and fast dynamic cooling takes place and
how much QPF the system is able to produce. This is also a place
to hedge our bets, as these synoptic setups often lead to
models over forecasting QPF. Models have been somewhat
consistent in the outcome of rain changing over to snow, leading
to accumulations. Will use a blend of HPC/RFC QPF for the
forecast and also a blend of thermal profiles.
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7 minutes ago, Rd9108 said:

Lol I'm hearing people say winters over and I even argued with a guy about tonight's snow. People are in for a rude awakening if this verifies. 

I am all of a sudden having people in my office ask me if it really will snow tonight.  What? how can it snow... I am telling them expect 2 inches but could be up to 6 inches.

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33 minutes ago, colonel717 said:

6+ Tuesday

gfs.PNG

For Tuesday we may have to rely on the Northern stream piece for any snow if the low is going to be out over the coast. UKMET is a coastal huger it looks like, we need the phase to happen much quicker and or the northern stream to speed up or southern to slow down. Sooner that happens the further west I think it would track. Either way, its going to take resolving Sundays storm to really get any concrete ideas, but we have tonight storm to focus on anyways.

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Forgot to add I think we have a domino effect in place that will change all outcomes down the line.  Each successive wave can rob energy from the one preceding and following it.  Right now the GFS shows a huge bomb for what is presently Wave 3 but I don't buy it based on the look.  A shortwave coming out of the Midwest basically merges with the coastal low, which is actually Wave 2 that has hung around and somehow gets pulled up the coast.  There might be a 50/50 low in place but I think by the time Wave 3 comes around, that's gone.  Stronger Wave 2 means weaker Wave 3.  Perhaps no energy transfer at all and just a bowling ball effect.

I think the GFS outcome at this time is wonky.  We should certainly know more based on what happens with Wave 1 tonight and Wave 2 Sunday.  A stronger Wave 1 may actually benefit Wave 3 for us.

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