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Mid to Long Term Discussion 2017

buckeyefan1

By buckeyefan1,
in Southeastern States

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Cold Rain

Cold Rain

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Posted

You know it's bad when even LC is on the verge of giving up:


The GFS and GGEM ensemble packages show extensive ridging over the western third of the continent in the 11 - 15 day period. The Madden-Julian Oscillation is flaring big-time and shifting eastward from its perch over Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines. And analog forecasts strongly suggest much colder profiles for the eastern two-thirds of the U.S. What possibly could go wrong?

As it turns out, plenty! The quandary of many synopticians was that the January Thaw was longer and stronger than forecast, as the trough complex stayed, on average, along the West Coast. While there was, in fact, extensive cases of high-latitude blocking (Rex signatures northern Canada and just below Greenland), the mostly west-to-east flow through the nation never allowed for anything more than transient Arctic intrusions, many of which never settled below Interstate 40! Snow cover was not an issue (at one point reaching the Interstate 10 corridor). But that "knockout blow" which would drag the Dixie and Eastern Seaboard states into the chill and keep them there never happened. And at this late date, you have to wonder if ever will. At least for this season.

For the record, I called for a volatile, up-and-down pattern with eastward shift of the cold in February and the first half of March, before the "Hounds Of Spring" barked the end of the cold season. It all comes down to the 500MB longwave pattern over the central/eastern Pacific Ocean on and after February 14. If, as the GFS and GGEM ensemble members proclaim, a deep closed low aloft gets stuck below the Aleutian Islands, people living east of the Mississippi River may squeeze out a month or so of winter storm threats with cold air. But, should the broad cold disturbance head for the West Coast or Gulf of Alaska, as the European variant package from 12z shows, snow lovers in places like Mena AR, Louisville KY and Kenilworth NJ are doomed to that sad refrain, "wait until next year". Because a negative atmospheric height anomaly in that shoreline location (see that January 500MB mean chart as proof....) can only mean a "more of the same" scenario, with California and Oregon seeing more heaps of snow and flooding rain/thunder. Areas to the right of the Rocky Mountains, in the European panel estimation, would get more mild/dry pulses in the last two weeks of the month.

Let me put it this way. If the latest European ensemble series is correct, winter is effectively over to the right of the Continental Divide. I will close this discussion of the longer term by saying that (as a winter weather lover), my spirits sank when I saw the ECMWF panels past the ten day mark. Maybe I can play devil's advocate and say "winter cancel", and magically a monster 970MB low will crank out of the Gulf Coast and blast Appalachia and the Eastern Seaboard!

But more likely, I can console myself by saying, this being a neutral ENSO spring coming up, many of the favored thunderstorm alleys will activate between March 15 and June 1. Maybe that will get my mind off this stinking lack of winter weather. Grrr....

Prepared by Meteorologist LARRY COSGROVE on
Saturday, February 4, 2017 at 6:30 P.M. CT

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