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The March Long Range Discussion Thread, Winter's Last Stand


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1 hour ago, cbmclean said:

How are you doing with your seasonal totals?  Are you going to creep your way to the median?

I’m slightly over median and a few inches short of my avg but it’s close. I’m annoyed that it was a nickel and dime year. Even the storm last night fell a little short of expectations here. That was kind of the theme all winter. If I expected 6 I got 4. If I expected 5 I got 3. That kind of leaves me feeling unfulfilled. Also no one big storm. I’ve been spoiled by having a 10”+ storm almost every year since moving up here.  This year was a crap ton of 2-5” snows. And they were spread out. I could totally be happy with a climo year that was nickel and dime if it’s condensed into like 6 weeks and builds up snowpack. 93 was like that here. A lot of 3-5” snows but all packed together so they added to to like 15” on the ground and snowcover for 6 weeks. I could get into that. But a bunch of 3-5” snows spread out with warmth in between so we never had a period with deep snow is less satisfying. All this probably sounds silly to everyone in the dc Baltimore area but I have different climo here. I moved up here for that reason. So my expectations are based on my climo here. 

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1 minute ago, psuhoffman said:

I’m slightly over median and a few inches short of my avg but it’s close. I’m annoyed that it was a nickel and dime year. Even the storm last night fell a little short of expectations here. That was kind of the theme all winter. If I expected 6 I got 4. If I expected 5 I got 3. That kind of leaves me feeling unfulfilled. Also no one big storm. I’ve been spoiled by having a 10”+ storm almost every year since moving up here.  This year was a crap ton of 2-5” snows. And they were spread out. I could totally be happy with a climo year that was nickel and dime if it’s condensed into like 6 weeks and builds up snowpack. 93 was like that here. A lot of 3-5” snows but all packed together so they added to to like 15” on the ground and snowcover for 6 weeks. I could get into that. But a bunch of 3-5” snows spread out with warmth in between so we never had a period with deep snow is less satisfying. All this probably sounds silly to everyone in the dc Baltimore area but I have different climo here. I moved up here for that reason. So my expectations are based on my climo here. 

I didn't realize you had surpassed the median.  That's good I guess.  A challenging year to classify.  Sneakily not bad numbers wise at least for many of you guys, but mostly unsatisfying.   

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4 minutes ago, cbmclean said:

I didn't realize you had surpassed the median.  That's good I guess.  A challenging year to classify.  Sneakily not bad numbers wise at least for many of you guys, but mostly unsatisfying.   

19” did it the last 3 weeks but it was spread out over 5 different fairly minor snowfalls. 

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Originally after casually glancing over the overnight runs I was pretty much Meh on our Fri/Sat possibilities as well as the subsequent Sun/Mon potential. Thought we did see some minor improvements within the Euro/EPS but somewhat of a downgrade on the GFS/GEFS. On the surface I wasn't really impressed for anything more then a possible stats padder for some from the Fri event. And the Mon event was looking pretty bleak as we weren't seeing the ramp up of the Fri system to hopefully knock down heights for potentially seeing some overrunning from the cutter. But after looking a little deeper I think I might reserve my judgement for the time being.

Below I have the 00Z 500's that show the energy streaming through that level leading into the late Fri/Sat period. Now first off the models have a difficult time handling the placement and strength of these features the farther out in time you go and this can be evidenced by comparing the 12z further below.

eps500.gif.2e364490b62d8c93d5cd8c389e56a655.gif

 

Now what I want you to notice is the differences we are seeing with these packets of energy I have circled above and below (these are the same packets of energy they are just being handled differently by the 12z and 00z). With the 12z below they are pretty much out of sync fighting each other more then anything else. Also note that we are seeing greater separation and the two northern pieces have very little dig associated with them so they are farther north. It really isn't a promising look whatsoever. But look what we see with the 00Z above. We are seeing much better dig with both the northern pieces and the northern most piece has slowed down and is much farther westward. Also note that we are seeing less separation with these features. This look shows more promise as now they are in a better position to interact with each other in a positive way instead of dampening each other out. Now what you intimately want to see with multiple packs of energy running together is that any northern piece is running slightly behind the southern piece so that if it digs it will slide into the southern piece giving us a clean phase (this will strengthen the southern feature). Otherwise if it is running over-top or even slightly ahead and it drops down (sloppy phase) there will be much less strengthening and could possible even be detrimental. Now if you notice we see the middle piece of energy is lagging somewhat behind the stream of southern energy which is what we want to see. In fact if you move further in time we see that phase and we can see the result as the Euro is now a little more aggressive with the Fri/Sat system. But at this point (on the 00Z) we see the northern piece is ahead of the middle piece to its south. Not where we want it and it is basically a non-player at this point. BUT notice the difference in timing from the previous run. Slow that feature down a further 6 hours and we are talking a different story. Now how all this will play out is anyone's guess at this point as the models will handle these feature differently from run to run. And this isn't to say they start keying on different energy to boot. 

 

eps500c.gif.24956c805fb42738d5a7a11db1d7c540.gif

 

One other thing I will throw out there are the heights below at 500s. What we have seen on the latest run is that we are seeing less confluence over NE and it is withdrawing a little quicker. Because of this we see the height lines take on a more west to east configuration through our region vs the 12Z which had a more NW to SE alignment. This is the difference between our energy running from the Midwest getting dampened and squashed vs. actually having maybe a little room to work with. Also we are seeing a little better ridging to the west of our energy which is a little more conducive to seeing better dig from the energy which would be a positive for any potential phasing.

 

eps500b.gif.ba36bf768f4a3913349e66105366f01c.gif

 

Now I am not predicting anything above. I am just pointing out what I consider some positives I have seen on the 00Z and how we could possibly win and nothing more. For all I know Fri/Sat could be a whole bunch of nothing. One thing I will say though. Our chances for the Sun/Mon period strongly hinge on what we see occur Fri/Sat. We don't see a strong system that can knock down the heights behind it then our Sun/Mon chances are probably SOL. 

 

 

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17 minutes ago, showmethesnow said:

Originally after casually glancing over the overnight runs I was pretty much Meh on our Fri/Sat possibilities as well as the subsequent Sun/Mon potential. Thought we did see some minor improvements within the Euro/EPS but somewhat of a downgrade on the GFS/GEFS. On the surface I wasn't really impressed for anything more then a possible stats padder for some from the Fri event. And the Mon event was looking pretty bleak as we weren't seeing the ramp up of the Fri system to hopefully knock down heights for potentially seeing some overrunning from the cutter. But after looking a little deeper I think I might reserve my judgement for the time being.

Below I have the 00Z 500's that show the energy streaming through that level leading into the late Fri/Sat period. Now first off the models have a difficult time handling the placement and strength of these features the farther out in time you go and this can be evidenced by comparing the 12z further below.

eps500.gif.2e364490b62d8c93d5cd8c389e56a655.gif

 

Now what I want you to notice is the differences we are seeing with these packets of energy I have circled above and below (these are the same packets of energy they are just being handled differently by the 12z and 00z). With the 12z below they are pretty much out of sync fighting each other more then anything else. Also note that we are seeing greater separation and the two northern pieces have very little dig associated with them so they are farther north. It really isn't a promising look whatsoever. But look what we see with the 00Z above. We are seeing much better dig with both the northern pieces and the northern most piece has slowed down and is much farther westward. Also note that we are seeing less separation with these features. This look shows more promise as now they are in a better position to interact with each other in a positive way instead of dampening each other out. Now what you intimately want to see with multiple packs of energy running together is that any northern piece is running slightly behind the southern piece so that if it digs it will slide into the southern piece giving us a clean phase (this will strengthen the southern feature). Otherwise if it is running over-top or even slightly ahead and it drops down (sloppy phase) there will be much less strengthening and could possible even be detrimental. Now if you notice we see the middle piece of energy is lagging somewhat behind the stream of southern energy which is what we want to see. In fact if you move further in time we see that phase and we can see the result as the Euro is now a little more aggressive with the Fri/Sat system. But at this point (on the 00Z) we see the northern piece is ahead of the middle piece to its south. Not where we want it and it is basically a non-player at this point. BUT notice the difference in timing from the previous run. Slow that feature down a further 6 hours and we are talking a different story. Now how all this will play out is anyone's guess at this point as the models will handle these feature differently from run to run. And this isn't to say they start keying on different energy to boot. 

 

eps500c.gif.24956c805fb42738d5a7a11db1d7c540.gif

 

One other thing I will throw out there are the heights below at 500s. What we have seen on the latest run is that we are seeing less confluence over NE and it is withdrawing a little quicker. Because of this we see the height lines take on a more west to east configuration through our region vs the 12Z which had a more NW to SE alignment. This is the difference between our energy running from the Midwest getting dampened and squashed vs. actually having maybe a little room to work with. Also we are seeing a little better ridging to the west of our energy which is a little more conducive to seeing better dig from the energy which would be a positive for any potential phasing.

 

eps500b.gif.ba36bf768f4a3913349e66105366f01c.gif

 

Now I am not predicting anything above. I am just pointing out what I consider some positives I have seen on the 00Z and how we could possibly win and nothing more. For all I know Fri/Sat could be a whole bunch of nothing. One thing I will say though. Our chances for the Sun/Mon period strongly hinge on what we see occur Fri/Sat. We don't see a strong system that can knock down the heights behind it then our Sun/Mon chances are probably SOL. 

 

 

Why in the hell did you not become a meteorologist? lol  You are fit for it. You could be a great forecast teacher when it comes to synoptics. 

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11 minutes ago, clskinsfan said:

12K NAM looks OK for an inch on Friday. I dont know how well light snow will stick in mid March. But it looks better than yesterdays runs.

Coming off cold spell better than usual I would think.  But certainly nothing too exciting but who knows

 

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1 minute ago, LP08 said:

12z Icon also has light snow for Friday.  Timing isn't terrible.  Mid afternoon start time but temps are near freezing so not much if any accums until after sundown.

never a fan of the retreating airmass but its all we got I guess for some snow TV which I mostly missed out on this past weekend

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2 minutes ago, BristowWx said:

never a fan of the retreating airmass but its all we got I guess for some snow TV which I mostly missed out on this past weekend

Yeah.  Its not a great look but I'd rather look at snow than rain so hopefully that what we will get.  Mulch bed and grass dustings! lol

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2 minutes ago, LP08 said:

Yeah.  Its not a great look but I'd rather look at snow than rain so hopefully that what we will get.  Mulch bed and grass dustings! lol

I’ll take it.  And trash can lids don’t forget about that.  Thickness is good if nothing else.  Should be snow if anything makes it

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not the most enticing gfs run if you like snow.  friday's system looks like possible snow tv, but i wouldn't expect much more than that with marginal temps, though it's chilly leading into it, so who knows.

hints of a storm around march 20, but even that setup doesn't look great.

eh, maybe we can still get a lucky system out of this upcoming period.

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14 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

massive miller a gets suppressed on March 20th LOL

Rumor on social media is that JB willing to sell his soul for an all time record March Miller A with historic snowfall from the Virginia Capes to Maine with howling winds, bitter cold, incredible drifts and severe beach erosion !    

He would die for you,  and I think he means the low pressure area,  he would die just to feel you by my side .....hmm...... I heard those lines before. 

Heard he is a Garbage fan and in the days Manson was Hot ! 

 

 

 

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9 minutes ago, frd said:

Rumor on social media is that JB willing to sell his soul for an all time record March Miller A with historic snowfall from the Virginia Capes to Maine with howling winds, bitter cold, incredible drifts and severe beach erosion !    

He would die for you,  and I think he means the low pressure area,  he would die just to feel you by my side .....hmm...... I heard those lines before. 

Heard he is a Garbage fan and in the days Manson was Hot ! 

 

 

 

Can't sell what you don't have

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For the snowiest date in March for D.C. and Reagan National, March 29, 1942: 11.5 inches of snow coated the District. That storm also brought over 2 feet of snow in some parts of Maryland and northwestern Virginia, according to WTOP.  So it can happen every hundred years or so in late March.....:)

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20 minutes ago, Weather Will said:

For the snowiest date in March for D.C. and Reagan National, March 29, 1942: 11.5 inches of snow coated the District. That storm also brought over 2 feet of snow in some parts of Maryland and northwestern Virginia, according to WTOP.  So it can happen every hundred years or so in late March.....:)

Baltimore recorded 22", which is incredible for being that late.

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