December Medium/Long Range Discussion

[Ji]

Dude we all know JYO isn't a real airport 

Try living behind it

[psuhoffman]

Lots of interesting looks around Christmas on the gfs and Fv3 

[CAPE]

5 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

Lots of interesting looks around Christmas on the gfs and Fv3 

GEFS continues to advertise a generally cold look for Xmas and beyond, in contrast to the EPS, which is jumpy, but generally wants to dump a trough out west for awhile with weak ridging over the east. GFS/GEFS look would indeed be quite interesting.

[psuhoffman]

Just now, C.A.P.E. said:

GEFS continues to advertise a generally cold look for Xmas and beyond, in contrast to the EPS, which is jumpy, but generally wants to dump a trough out west for awhile with weak ridging over the east. GFS/GEFS look would indeed be quite interesting.

I'm actually betting on a gefs win here. Seems like typical EPS bias error at play. 

[Maestrobjwa]

19 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

Lots of interesting looks around Christmas on the gfs and Fv3 

Definitely seems like the weather dice will be rolling...now let's see what we land on (hey, just having a frozen option even ON the dice around that time of year is a bit of a bonus, lol)

[Bob Chill]

A couple legit white Xmas solutions. One moved through on Xmas eve so 3 total. Best gefs run in a while. Need the eps to cave at 0z.

 

 

[psuhoffman]

22 minutes ago, Bob Chill said:

A couple legit white Xmas solutions. One moved through on Xmas eve so 3 total. Best gefs run in a while. Need the eps to cave at 0z.

 

 

Fv3 just missed but is setting up a hecs the week after lol. I think the EPS is already starting to cave. Last couple runs it's doing weird things. Elongating the trough SW to NE. Splitting a part off then rebuilding the eastern ridge.  But it's not sending the whole trough into the southwest anymore. Still looks like the usual euro error in the long range. I don't mind the euro bias through because its consistent and easy to correct for. When a model is jumpy and inconsistent in how it's wrong it's more annoying. 

[CaryWx]

2 hours ago, leesburg 04 said:

Dude we all know JYO isn't a real airport 

[frd]

50 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

Fv3 just missed but is setting up a hecs the week after lol. I think the EPS is already starting to cave. Last couple runs it's doing weird things. Elongating the trough SW to NE. Splitting a part off then rebuilding the eastern ridge.  But it's not sending the whole trough into the southwest anymore. Still looks like the usual euro error in the long range. I don't mind the euro bias through because its consistent and easy to correct for. When a model is jumpy and inconsistent in how it's wrong it's more annoying. 

  

I look forward to reaching for my Droid and looking for @showmethesnow update super early in the morning and maybe over night tonight the Euro/EPS  will start to cave even more and and showme can write about it .... (hint hint )  ha.  Silly me, but it is a bit boring now.    

On  serious note are the warm blob temps, they are looking very impressive,  and I see the ocean temps are diving off the Mid Atlantic.           

[Bob Chill]

43 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

Fv3 just missed but is setting up a hecs the week after lol. I think the EPS is already starting to cave. Last couple runs it's doing weird things. Elongating the trough SW to NE. Splitting a part off then rebuilding the eastern ridge.  But it's not sending the whole trough into the southwest anymore. Still looks like the usual euro error in the long range. I don't mind the euro bias through because its consistent and easy to correct for. When a model is jumpy and inconsistent in how it's wrong it's more annoying. 

The thing I'm watching is the ridge axis off the west coast. Eps shifted that east a little today but a lot of looks we're getting has it too far west for my liking. Without a legit neg ao/nao it's going to be tough to get a storm track under us unless the axis is at least along the west coast. Progressive flow with a dominant northern stream is hard enough to score in even with a favorable ridge/trough config. 

[PrinceFrederickWx]

I was wondering how often we’ve actually had a verified WSW event at all three airports in December- 2009, 2002, and...? Probably have to go back to the 80’s at that point? It’s probably a lot less common than people realize.

[psuhoffman]

1 hour ago, Bob Chill said:

The thing I'm watching is the ridge axis off the west coast. Eps shifted that east a little today but a lot of looks we're getting has it too far west for my liking. Without a legit neg ao/nao it's going to be tough to get a storm track under us unless the axis is at least along the west coast. Progressive flow with a dominant northern stream is hard enough to score in even with a favorable ridge/trough config. 

It's far from an ideal look. But it's workable. And I don't think this is THE pattern we are waiting for. I strongly believe the meat will come sometime after January 15th as blocking times up with a favorable Pacific. Until then anything is bonus imo. 

[Ji]

It's far from an ideal look. But it's workable. And I don't think this is THE pattern we are waiting for. I strongly believe the meat will come sometime after January 15th as blocking times up with a favorable Pacific. Until then anything is bonus imo. 

15th is towards the end of winter. Way too far off

[Maestrobjwa]

3 minutes ago, Ji said:

3 hours ago, psuhoffman said:

It's far from an ideal look. But it's workable. And I don't think this is THE pattern we are waiting for. I strongly believe the meat will come sometime after January 15th as blocking times up with a favorable Pacific. Until then anything is bonus imo. 

15th is towards the end of winter. Way too far off

Man, seriously? C'mon...that's called the start of prime climo, for cryin' out loud!!

[yoda]

9 minutes ago, Ji said:

3 hours ago, psuhoffman said:

It's far from an ideal look. But it's workable. And I don't think this is THE pattern we are waiting for. I strongly believe the meat will come sometime after January 15th as blocking times up with a favorable Pacific. Until then anything is bonus imo. 

15th is towards the end of winter. Way too far off

How did you survive the 15-16 winter?

[showmethesnow]

7 hours ago, frd said:

  

I look forward to reaching for my Droid and looking for @showmethesnow update super early in the morning and maybe over night tonight the Euro/EPS  will start to cave even more and and showme can write about it .... (hint hint )  ha.  Silly me, but it is a bit boring now.    

On  serious note are the warm blob temps, they are looking very impressive,  and I see the ocean temps are diving off the Mid Atlantic.           

Sorry frd. No long winded novel with pics today.  With this setup being outside of 10 days it isn't worth diving deep into each individual run. I will probably just sit back and see how the models trend for the next few days unless something noteworthy pops up.

Couple quick comments on my thoughts on the overnight runs. Even though the the EPS has been back and forth on the runs through the Christmas time period it still has slowly but surely moved away from the initial full SW dump it was displaying and is being more progressive with the NS. We do see at the end of the run though that it is once again trying to dump followup NS energy full throttle into the Southwest following the Christmas period. As with the first dump it was initially keying on I am not so sure I buy this secondary dump as well. And until I see this feature the EPS  favors move inside 10 days on the runs I am going to for the most part dismiss it and attribute it to known EPS bias. So basically what we are seeing is that the EPS continues to move towards the GEFS during the Christmas period.

The GEFS on the other hand has moved towards the compromise solution of yesterdays 00Z EPS/GEFS runs that I favor at this time. We are seeing the NS a little less aggressive as a little more of its energy is being diverted into the SW. Before anyone panics, this is probably a good thing. Kind of underplayed it in my discussion yesterday but the look yesterday's run displayed looked suppressive. Can anyone say congrats NC? But with a little stronger Southwest trough from the extra energy from the NS we are seeing better heights to the south which would shift the boundary northward in a more favorable local for the N VA/Md region. The GEFS is also seeing the second piece of NS energy at the end of the run and though it does dump a little energy into the southwest it is once again progressive with the NS vs. the EPS. One thing I did note is that the GEFS does still show the possibility of an over running event but not to the extent of some previous runs. The look has slowly shifted to where the pattern being able to support the possibility of southern energy amplifying and moving northward somewhere on the east coast may be coming onto the table.

 

[frd]

2 hours ago, showmethesnow said:

Sorry frd. No long winded novel with pics today.  With this setup being outside of 10 days it isn't worth diving deep into each individual run. I will probably just sit back and see how the models trend for the next few days unless something noteworthy pops up.

Thanks as always showme. I always appreciate your time with these updates !    

[frd]

Its coming 

 

Sure seems like the trends are starting to indicate the return of the pattern of cold 

 

 

[Bob Chill]

Looking at the big picture of overnight guidance and I honestly don't see much to get excited about. The good news is it does look like a front will clear for Christmas so hopefully no shorts but beyond that the setup looks pretty crappy to me for winter wx. 

[aldie 22]

22 minutes ago, Bob Chill said:

Looking at the big picture of overnight guidance and I honestly don't see much to get excited about. The good news is it does look like a front will clear for Christmas so hopefully no shorts but beyond that the setup looks pretty crappy to me for winter wx. 

It's a gradual transition...whether a few weeks or years who knows 

[Bob Chill]

Here's the EPS 5day H5 mean in the LR. Looks like a northern stream dominated pattern in general but even if there is a southern wave, the most probable track is too far west or north to work here. The h5 pattern doesn't show much chance at a northern stream system tracking underneath us. Pretty common this early in the year though. Northern stream storms generally happen in JFM when the jet is displaced south more easily. 

If a southern wave tracks towards us the pattern favors a west track of anything organized. There is no sign of the stable features that can suppress a storm. Not saying it can't happen because any well timed departing low can force a trailing one underneath us but this panel doesn't show a -NAO, 50/50, or displaced PV. Without one of those 3 features we're going to struggle here. 

 

 

GEFS looks a little better than the EPS but not by much. 

[pasnownut]

10 minutes ago, leesburg 04 said:

It's a gradual transition...whether a few weeks or years who knows 

While there is nothing major to talk about for the next week, at least it’s no toaster bath look either. Something can sneak up on us. I’ll take it...for now. 

[psuhoffman]

25 minutes ago, Bob Chill said:

Looking at the big picture of overnight guidance and I honestly don't see much to get excited about. The good news is it does look like a front will clear for Christmas so hopefully no shorts but beyond that the setup looks pretty crappy to me for winter wx. 

Depends what you think is more right...the GEFS/GEPS both advertise a very workable pattern.  Not a big ticket item pattern but a cold active look with multiple waves.  The EPS, if it were to verify, is a shutout bar the doors for a while look.  I am skeptical of the EPS look, it tried to dump the pre xmas trough into the west a few days ago...then backed off and now has that initial cold shot coming into the Midwest and east.  Now it is dumping the next shot down into the southwest.  It does this again and again.  Usually it's overdone.  Perhaps a compromise here is best, as showmethesnow suggests.

What such a pattern would look like...probably not some snowfest HECS looking thing that some are itching for.  Clippers and progressive waves would be favored.  Anything that amps up too much or phases would likely cut.  But if such a pattern had legs we would likely luck our way into a snow event.  A 1-3" type thing is more likely then a warning event.  I guess expectations here matter a lot.  One is whether one is buying the euro...if you are then yea it looks awful.  I am not.  The other is if your bar is a big ticket item.  I am very hopeful we get more than one warning event this winter...but I have said I think that comes post January 15th.  All the analogs suggest that is when to look for it.  Before that I just want to see some snow.  One of the things that separated some of the truly epic years from the just ok to good ones was that we managed to get some snow and build numbers even during the less than ideal periods.  If we can luck our way into a couple clippers and overrunning events and we are all sitting around 6-10" going into mid January that is a great sign that this winter could end up in the epic category imo.  

[psuhoffman]

9 hours ago, Ji said:

12 hours ago, psuhoffman said:

It's far from an ideal look. But it's workable. And I don't think this is THE pattern we are waiting for. I strongly believe the meat will come sometime after January 15th as blocking times up with a favorable Pacific. Until then anything is bonus imo. 

15th is towards the end of winter. Way too far off

Then why were you itching for a nino the last few years when you know darn well that nino climo is for a back loaded winter?  Actually our climo in general is for snow to be centered in the second half.  Snow before January is pretty fluky in every base state and seems to be a long shot and random no matter the pattern.  We do this every year.  Its getting old.  I remember this same exact conversation in January of 2015...when we only had a couple minor snow events so far and several people, Mitch being primary among them, were cancelling winter and swearing that we don't turn around when we get to February without a big snow...and I was pointing out nino climo and years that we did turn around in February in very similar years...and then....  or in 2016 when everyone was freaking out early January and then we had one of our biggest snowstorms every.  I would love for us to be dumped with snow in December...but it's just not likely around here.  That isn't our climo.  So why do we have to go through this same game every year?

[Bob Chill]

@psuhoffman

GEFS really doesn't look much different with the 5 day mean than the EPS. I agree that the EPS is probably overdoing the big dig in the west late but even if the GEFS has it more right I still see it as a low probability pattern. I never said shutout because it's workable. But the amount of things that need to break right far exceed the leeway we have for things to go wrong. Just imho. Need that ridge axis in the west 500 miles to the east before things would get "easier".

You know if a timing setup appears I'll be breaking out the laser. lol. From an odds perspective it looks like less than a 25% chance of accum snow over the next to weeks in my eyes.  

[WxUSAF]

@psuhoffman/ @Bob Chill:  I think even if a more EPS like pattern develops, where west tracks are favored, it looks like cold air would be around with the -AO/-EPO, so you can imagine some front-end thump scenarios as well.  And even as is, with the trough axis wandering around as s/w's traverse the CONUS, you can also imagine a cutter followed by a wave to our south along a stalled boundary.  I'm sticking with my at least one snow between Xmas and New Years forecast.  

[WxUSAF]

GFS/GEFS still bullish on Strat mayhem around or just after Xmas.  

Keep in mind this doesn't have an immediate impact on the troposphere. 

 

 

[psuhoffman]

1 minute ago, Bob Chill said:

@psuhoffman

GEFS really doesn't look much different with the 5 day mean than the EPS. I agree that the EPS is probably overdoing the big dig in the west late but even if the GEFS has it more right I still see it as a low probability pattern. I never said shutout because it's workable. But the amount of things that need to break right far exceed the leeway we have for things to go wrong. Just imho. Need that ridge axis in the west 500 miles to the east before things would get "easier".

You know if a timing setup appears I'll be breaking out the laser. lol. From an odds perspective it looks like less than a 25% chance of accum snow over the next to weeks in my eyes.  

I don't think we actually disagree much on the actual pattern... I just think our chances of some minor events (like 1" here or there on the front or back end of waves) is a bit higher but its definitely not a big snowstorm look.  But I am ok with getting a few small events to keep padding our numbers until things "get right" for something bigger.  Hopefully we start to see signs of that soon... My guess based on analogs is that blocking starts to become more likely mid January on and the timing of some of the strat stuff happening now seems to suggest that this year too.  The MJO should be getting back into more favorable territory in January also...or at least fading so that the warm phases aren't hurting us.  

[psuhoffman]

1 minute ago, WxUSAF said:

GFS/GEFS still bullish on Strat mayhem around or just after Xmas.  

Keep in mind this doesn't have an immediate impact on the troposphere. 

 

 

I remember in 2010 around mid January people were freaking out...Ji was saying Dec 19th was a fluke and some were cancelling winter...and I was looking at the NAO about to tank and thinking...huh.  I will admit I will feel even better once guidance starts to pick up on what I expect will be a transition into a very favorable look sometime in January but I see nothing to indicate that won't happen so I have faith in the analogs and pattern progression.  

[WxUSAF]

2 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

I remember in 2010 around mid January people were freaking out...Ji was saying Dec 19th was a fluke and some were cancelling winter...and I was looking at the NAO about to tank and thinking...huh.  I will admit I will feel even better once guidance starts to pick up on what I expect will be a transition into a very favorable look sometime in January but I see nothing to indicate that won't happen so I have faith in the analogs and pattern progression.  

IF a SSW happens (big IF) and IF it results in wobbling the cold air to our hemisphere, it should start impacting us right as the MJO also starts passing back through the good phases 8-1-2.  Could make the January ~10-30 period pretty fun.  But I don't think we wait one month before our next accumulation.