January 17-18 Winter Storm

[Snowstorms]

First thread, I hope it's blessing. 

This thread is for a different storm than the 14th-15th event. Models show something for both timeframes.

[Hoosier]

I'm not sure whether wisconsinwx's intent was to cover both systems with his thread.  There's yet another system right after this so this might get a bit confusing. 

[Malacka11]

This is like actually crazy

[snowlover2]

11 minutes ago, Hoosier said:

I'm not sure whether wisconsinwx's intent was to cover both systems with his thread.  There's yet another system right after this so this might get a bit confusing. 

Maybe change this to the 17-18 which I assume is what you are referring to.

[Hoosier]

5 minutes ago, snowlover2 said:

Maybe change this to the 17-18 which I assume is what you are referring to.

Sounds good

[Malacka11]

I swear upon my timberlands, if this system dares to be a rainer, or even a mix, I will move to Cuba.

[michsnowfreak]

Storm signal definitely there on all models, which means there's only about 25 model cycles before some amount of clarity is seen.

[HillsdaleMIWeather]

18Z GFS would dump 5 to 6 inches of snow, a couple hours of freezing rain, then rain, followed by more snow 

[RogueWaves]

14 minutes ago, HillsdaleMIWeather said:

18Z GFS would dump 5 to 6 inches of snow, a couple hours of freezing rain, then rain, followed by more snow 

Story of this non-winter

[Chicago Storm]

3 hours ago, michsnowfreak said:

Storm signal definitely there on all models, which means there's only about 25 model cycles before some amount of clarity is seen.

Clarity is a thing?

[michsnowfreak]

53 minutes ago, RogueWaves said:

Story of this non-winter

Actually here, we have not had that many rainy days. Only December 29-30 and now January 10-11, however both of those were very large rainstorms. Otherwise it's been boring with bits of snow since Snowvember.

[A-L-E-K]

Rainer

[Stebo]

43 minutes ago, michsnowfreak said:

Actually here, we have not had that many rainy days. Only December 29-30 and now January 10-11, however both of those were very large rainstorms. Otherwise it's been boring with bits of snow since Snowvember.

Snowvember, it was one storm and we got incredibly lucky with it, otherwise we'd be chasing futility at this point.

[Snowstorms]

1 hour ago, RogueWaves said:

Story of this non-winter

I feel like it's been a common theme since 2010, maybe even before that. We have prolonged mild spells through the heart of winter and only a few weeks of intense wintry weather.

Let's be honest, since 2010, we've only had 3 maybe 4 appreciable winters. And besides 2010-11 and 2013-14, the other 1-2 good winters featured a decent warm spell. Perhaps this is a result of climate change or maybe it's just a temporary blip. Regardless, we won't know until we see how the next couple of winters perform. 

[Hoosier]

Appears we'll actually have some antecedent cold to dislodge, so I don't think it's wall to wall rain storm locally.  Other than that who knows.

[Stebo]

Just now, Hoosier said:

Appears we'll actually have some antecedent cold to dislodge, so I don't think it's wall to wall rain storm locally.  Other than that who knows.

With the 14-15 storm coming in weaker there will be less cold air in place. That has me concerned.

[michsnowfreak]

48 minutes ago, Stebo said:

Snowvember, it was one storm and we got incredibly lucky with it, otherwise we'd be chasing futility at this point.

Yeah it was mainly the 1 storm but it stayed on the ground for a record number of days for November. We set records for cold, snowfall, snowdepth and length of snowcover. If you want to play the what if game, you could say "if it wasnt for...." in many winters. Although, even if you completely erased November, it's awfully hard to talk about futility one third of the way thru the snow season.

[Hoosier]

14 minutes ago, Stebo said:

With the 14-15 storm coming in weaker there will be less cold air in place. That has me concerned.

The Canadian high is progged around/over 1040 mb.  It is sliding east which isn't good.  Only way I could see all rain would be if the timing is different and it slides east even faster out ahead of the storm. 

[michsnowfreak]

43 minutes ago, Snowstorms said:

I feel like it's been a common theme since 2010, maybe even before that. We have prolonged mild spells through the heart of winter and only a few weeks of intense wintry weather.

Let's be honest, since 2010, we've only had 3 maybe 4 appreciable winters. And besides 2010-11 and 2013-14, the other 1-2 good winters featured a decent warm spell. Perhaps this is a result of climate change or maybe it's just a temporary blip. Regardless, we won't know until we see how the next couple of winters perform. 

Many winters feature warm spells lol. The 2010s were the snowiest decade on record for Detroit and i believe 2nd snowiest for Chicago. I do remember Toronto had a miriad of misses.

[Stebo]

7 minutes ago, michsnowfreak said:

Yeah it was mainly the 1 storm but it stayed on the ground for a record number of days for November. We set records for cold, snowfall, snowdepth and length of snowcover. If you want to play the what if game, you could say "if it wasnt for...." in many winters. Although, even if you completely erased November, it's awfully hard to talk about futility one third of the way thru the snow season.

We would be at 4.8" without that storm so yeah it wouldn't be good at all at this point. 

[Stebo]

7 minutes ago, Hoosier said:

The Canadian high is progged around/over 1040 mb.  It is sliding east which isn't good.  Only way I could see all rain would be if the timing is different and it slides east even faster out ahead of the storm. 

Yeah and if things slow any with the system then the high slides away. The way things have been going, that is probably what will happen. 

[Powerball]

A part of me is interested in seeing you all experience a truly awful winter (talking 1930s or 1990s awful).

Detroit and much of the Midwest hasn't had one since weather forums and social media became a thing. So I can just imagine the meltdowns would be on a whole 'nother level of cringeworthy, especially from normally positive michsnowfreak. 

[beavis1729]

17 minutes ago, Powerball said:

A part of me is interested in seeing you all experience a truly awful winter (talking 1930s or 1990s awful).

Detroit and much of the Midwest hasn't had one since weather forums and social media became a thing. So I can just imagine the meltdowns would be on a whole 'nother level of cringeworthy, especially from normally positive michsnowfreak. 

 We have had several awful winters since the 90s. Off the top of my head: 2001-02, 2005-06, 2011-12, 2015-16...and likely 2019-20 unless we get a major turnaround. Probably more too, just can’t recall the exact winters at the moment.

I continue to be amazed at how low the standards are for winter among people on this forum. 

Back to the Jan 17-18 storm...yeah, definitely worried about the model trends over the last 24-36 hours to erode the cold faster. Not good. But in this dumpster fire of a winter, it doesn’t surprise me. If we had a decent amount of snow cover around here, we could actually hold the cold temps a bit better. I think we have had one day since November 15th with a low temp colder than 20F. Completely laughable and unacceptable. 
 

I wish I wasn’t so pessimistic, but what reason is there to believe otherwise? I’m all ears...

[RogueWaves]

19 minutes ago, Powerball said:

A part of me is interested in seeing you all experience a truly awful winter (talking 1930s or 1990s awful).

Detroit and much of the Midwest hasn't had one since weather forums and social media became a thing. So I can just imagine the meltdowns would be on a whole 'nother level of cringeworthy, especially from normally positive michsnowfreak. 

Not fair to go south just to troll us with worse juju than is already being suffered 

[Chicago Storm]

5 minutes ago, beavis1729 said:

 We have had several awful winters since the 90s. Off the top of my head: 2001-02, 2005-06, 2011-12, 2015-16...and likely 2019-20 unless we get a major turnaround. Probably more too, just can’t recall the exact winters at the moment.

I continue to be amazed at how low the standards are for winter among people on this forum. 

Back to the Jan 17-18 storm...yeah, definitely worried about the model trends over the last 24-36 hours to erode the cold faster. Not good. But in this dumpster fire of a winter, it doesn’t surprise me. If we had a decent amount of snow cover around here, we could actually hold the cold temps a bit better. I think we have had one day since November 15th with a low temp colder than 20F. Completely laughable and unacceptable. 
 

I wish I wasn’t so pessimistic, but what reason is there to believe otherwise? I’m all ears...

You really need to move north.

[RogueWaves]

1 minute ago, Chicago Storm said:

You really need to move north.

Yep. Somewhere that the snowpack survives 52 and sunny. Where it sits OTG from Nov to April

[RyanDe680]

After today’s lousiness I’ll come here instead 

[ChiTownSnow]

16 minutes ago, beavis1729 said:

 We have had several awful winters since the 90s. Off the top of my head: 2001-02, 2005-06, 2011-12, 2015-16...and likely 2019-20 unless we get a major turnaround. Probably more too, just can’t recall the exact winters at the moment.

I continue to be amazed at how low the standards are for winter among people on this forum. 

Back to the Jan 17-18 storm...yeah, definitely worried about the model trends over the last 24-36 hours to erode the cold faster. Not good. But in this dumpster fire of a winter, it doesn’t surprise me. If we had a decent amount of snow cover around here, we could actually hold the cold temps a bit better. I think we have had one day since November 15th with a low temp colder than 20F. Completely laughable and unacceptable. 
 

I wish I wasn’t so pessimistic, but what reason is there to believe otherwise? I’m all ears...

For reference.  We were actually above normal for the last decade in snow 

[michsnowfreak]

42 minutes ago, Stebo said:

We would be at 4.8" without that storm so yeah it wouldn't be good at all at this point. 

Oh, it's been garbage since the start of December. I just meant even if that storm didnt happen, way too early to talk about futility. For what it's worth, 4.8" would rank as 13th least amount of snow on the season to date. The all time lowest to date is 1.1" in 1889-90. As it stands, 2019-20, at 14.0", ranks just below the middle, 63 seasons having less snow to date, 76 having more.

[Ottawa Blizzard]

25 minutes ago, beavis1729 said:

 We have had several awful winters since the 90s. Off the top of my head: 2001-02, 2005-06, 2011-12, 2015-16...and likely 2019-20 unless we get a major turnaround. Probably more too, just can’t recall the exact winters at the moment.

I continue to be amazed at how low the standards are for winter among people on this forum. 

Back to the Jan 17-18 storm...yeah, definitely worried about the model trends over the last 24-36 hours to erode the cold faster. Not good. But in this dumpster fire of a winter, it doesn’t surprise me. If we had a decent amount of snow cover around here, we could actually hold the cold temps a bit better. I think we have had one day since November 15th with a low temp colder than 20F. Completely laughable and unacceptable. 
 

I wish I wasn’t so pessimistic, but what reason is there to believe otherwise? I’m all ears...

A big pattern flip would seem to be on the horizon...from January 17th on it's looking colder than average, at least in Ontario. If we get two solid months of winter, taking us to mid-March, on top of the coldest November since 1976 (for Toronto), I'd say this winter could be more than salvaged.