February/March 2020 Winter's Last Chance Thread

[John1122]

Trends have gotten worse for the event 48-60 hours from now. Another decent track but elevation snow system. SWVa might get an inch or two. Looking tough for the rest of us below 2500 feet. 

January is going to close out as one of the worst winter months in the entire history of the sub forum for those who like cold and snow.  Who knew it could be that much worse than the putrid 2019.

[Carvers Gap]

WWAs remain in effect for mountains counties as they received decent snowfall today.

MRX with a great discussion for this weekend.  0z GFS with a great track but marginal temps at best.  Probably still going to keep an eye on it...

Past Thursday, we are still dealing with model uncertainty as there is a lot going on in the atmosphere. We`ve still got a northern and southern stream feature swinging across the Central U.S. at roughly the same time. The ECMWF still has the southern feature further south than the GFS. If this plays out, then we get caught in between the southern and northern stream which would mean little to no precip for our area over the weekend. The GFS continues to be further north and spreads precip in Friday afternoon through Saturday morning. If this is the case then the higher elevations would see some more light snowfall while valley locations see more rain. Model differences exist on Saturday night into Sunday as well with a clipper system potentially affecting our area. It`s too far out at this point to go into much detail other than both the GFS and ECMWF show a good bit of moisture with it. The problem is that the ECMWF is further north and doesn`t bring any precip into our area and the GFS does because its placement is further south. We will see how models handle this as we move forward. Models are signaling strong riding building on Monday. As of now, forecast highs are in the upper 50s to low 60s which would put us around 10 to 12 degrees above normal.

[Carvers Gap]

Looks like the 0z GFS is still on schedule with Feb 5th still moving forward in time for tbe cold front and trough at 500.  Potential is there for snow to fall as that front passes.  You all know the drill at this range.  And it bears repeating, we are looking for a 4-5 day window where we might be able to steal a storm.  

[Carvers Gap]

0z CMC dumps the trough a bit further west, but still moves the trough eastward.  The actual boundary stalls over the forum area.  If true, cold air likely pushes south of that boundary.  That is the overrunning scenario the GFS had earlier.  Just need to make sure that we get on the right side of that boundary.  So, looks like we have a couple of options presented so far at 0z.  Front roars through all of the way to the GOM and a storm spawns on it or the front passage itself has moisture that switches over.  OR the trough stalls and waves run along a front draped over the TN valley.  Long way out there still as we are eight days out.   

[John1122]

Not surprisingly, the Euro was much warmer vs the 12z run at D9/10.  Canada is cold but there's no penetration into the upper midwest that run so our cold source is 10+ degrees warmer than 12z today so we basically get down to near normal. The Euro shows a -10 BN over Nashville the morning of the 7th. But it shows a 2m temp of 24 there during that frame. I believe Nashville's normal low is 28 around this time frame. So the -10 may be a little bit overdone on the anomaly map. But even that is brief, afternoon temp hit the 40s.

The western ridge is south of the PNA region and the heights are lower in Alaska which once again just means the air comes off the Pacific instead of across the pole. 

 

GEFS is awful. Western trough/SE ridge. GFS op will have spring flowers in bloom late in the run.

I'm pretty sure if that takes place into mid February, winter is basically done but we will see if we can get lucky. 

[weathertree4u]

2 hours ago, John1122 said:

Not surprisingly, the Euro was much warmer vs the 12z run at D9/10.  Canada is cold but there's no penetration into the upper midwest that run so our cold source is 10+ degrees warmer than 12z today so we basically get down to near normal. The Euro shows a -10 BN over Nashville the morning of the 7th. But it shows a 2m temp of 24 there during that frame. I believe Nashville's normal low is 28 around this time frame. So the -10 may be a little bit overdone on the anomaly map. But even that is brief, afternoon temp hit the 40s.

The western ridge is south of the PNA region and the heights are lower in Alaska which once again just means the air comes off the Pacific instead of across the pole. 

 

GEFS is awful. Western trough/SE ridge. GFS op will have spring flowers in bloom late in the run.

I'm pretty sure if that takes place into mid February, winter is basically done but we will see if we can get lucky. 

I think we should be looking, not to say that you are not, at the trends that are being portrayed with modeling, for example, what we know seemingly for sure is that it will get colder around the 5th; the pattern is just simply too complex I think at this time to expect modeling to all be on the same page, just my opinion. 

[John1122]

3 minutes ago, weathertree4u said:

I think we should be looking, not to say that you are not, at the trends that are being portrayed with modeling, for example, what we know seemingly for sure is that it will get colder around the 5th; the pattern is just simply too complex I think at this time to expect modeling to all be on the same page, just my opinion. 

Unfortunately the trends aren't great and the season is slipping by fast. I'd say any sustained winter pattern isn't going to happen at this point, our best chance is getting one of those random quick hitters that will likely be melted off within 48 hours. The MJO, except on the GEFS, is staying in unfavorable locations now, never leaving the right side on most modeling. The GEFS has been heading right with it itself, it was low amp 8-1-2-3 recently, now it's middle of the C.O.D into 3. 3 is good for winter hear but it's on an island at this point. Other modeling seems to have it in the C.O.D of 4-5, which are not good for us.  The GFS keeps throwing out big fantasy storms every other run, but so far it's verification rate on them this year is 0.00 percent. We probably have to score something between February 6th and 10th as we get a couple of cold days in that time frame. If we torch up again beyond that, we will have burned away most of low elevation winter. 

This is not what you want to see unless you want some February severe possibilities. -PNA/+EPO/+AO/+NAO with the MJO heading towards phase 4 even on the GFS suite by this time. This is a repeat of the pattern that torched us the first week or two of January. Hopefully it's wildly wrong, but it's handled warmth much better than cold this year.

 

 

[weathertree4u]

1 minute ago, John1122 said:

Unfortunately the trends aren't great and the season is slipping by fast. I'd say any sustained winter pattern isn't going to happen at this point, our best chance is getting one of those random quick hitters that will likely be melted off within 48 hours. The MJO, except on the GEFS, is staying in unfavorable locations now, never leaving the right side on most modeling. The GEFS has been heading right with it itself, it was low amp 8-1-2-3 recently, now it's middle of the C.O.D into 3. 3 is good for winter hear but it's on an island at this point. Other modeling seems to have it in the C.O.D of 4-5, which are not good for us.  The GFS keeps throwing out big fantasy storms every other run, but so far it's verification rate on them this year is 0.00 percent. We probably have to score something between February 6th and 10th as we get a couple of cold days in that time frame. If we torch up again beyond that, we will have burned away most of low elevation winter. 

This is not what you want to see unless you want some February severe possibilities. -PNA/+EPO/+AO/+NAO with the MJO heading towards phase 4 even on the GFS suite by this time. This is a repeat of the pattern that torched us the first week or two of January. Hopefully it's wildly wrong, but it's handled warmth much better than cold this year.

 

 

I would go crazier than I already am if I lived and died by every model run, again trends; personally, I have no expectation that we score 6 weeks of cold and snow - we live in the South after all - however, I am more hopeful than most years that we can score a storm or two in the next two weeks and change. 

[Holston_River_Rambler]

I don't think the overnight Euro looked too bad. If it's gonna dump the cold, gotta have a surge of warmth in front of it. 

SPV looked a little more consolidated on the Euro though. Flipping between the temp anomalies on the Euro between 10 and 50mb, looks like the warming is happening mostly at the top

Even though some levels look consolidated, overall it looks to be under stress in the mid range:

 

[John1122]

3 minutes ago, weathertree4u said:

I would go crazier than I already am if I lived and died by every model run, again trends; personally, I have no expectation that we score 6 weeks of cold and snow - we live in the South after all - however, I am more hopeful than most years that we can score a storm or two in the next two weeks and change. 

It has nothing to do with living any dying with every model run. We are in a hyper warm base state and the pattern for the last 4 winters have mostly stayed there outside of a brief period in 2018 when we had the cold dry weather. No drivers for cold here appear to be trending favorably in the longer range especially with the MJO looking to stay in the 4 or 5 areas even if at low amplitude. The GEFS looks opposite of the OP with the EPO, but due to it's position it also allows the SE Ridge to pop. Unfortunately the GEFS has been verifying about 6 degrees too cold in the LR. Meaning it's almost always too cold which leads to it's extreme snow means that never seem to happen. It's also popped a -EPO about 40 times this winter and I think it's not verified yet on that. We all know that any model that shows a -NAO is a fairy tale too. But that massive +NAO on the GFS wouldn't be a surprise at all.

 

These are the unfortunate realities of the GEFS D6-10 and 11-15 the last few months. Which means the long range cold that crops up there is mostly fools gold this winter. The Euro OP beats all models by far D6-10, including beating it's ensembles and it's still verifying 2 degrees or so to cold D6-10.  So when the GFSENS are showing us at -1 in day 11-15, it's probably going to verify at +3-5 degrees.  I shudder to think how warm we may be if the GFS is right, and it's better day 11-15 than it's Ens on temperature but still verifies too cold by a few degrees the last 90 days.

 

 

[Holston_River_Rambler]

Although I will say the very end of the EPS looked familiar:

[John1122]

Even with that look on the Euro at D10, the air mass is already moderating. It's been verifying about -2 D6-10 this winter, which would mean it's probably going to be basically normal. At this point it appears the SE ridge is on the EPS and GEFS with a displaced -EPO that allows for a western trough. 

[weathertree4u]

4 minutes ago, John1122 said:

It has nothing to do with living any dying with every model run. We are in a hyper warm base state and the pattern for the last 4 winters have mostly stayed there outside of a brief period in 2018 when we had the cold dry weather. No drivers for cold here appear to be trending favorably in the longer range especially with the MJO looking to stay in the 4 or 5 areas even if at low amplitude. The GEFS looks opposite of the OP with the EPO, but due to it's position it also allows the SE Ridge to pop. Unfortunately the GEFS has been verifying about 6 degrees too cold in the LR. Meaning it's almost always too cold which leads to it's extreme snow means that never seem to happen. It's also popped a -EPO about 40 times this winter and I think it's not verified yet on that. We all know that any model that shows a -NAO is a fairy tale too. But that massive +NAO on the GFS wouldn't be a surprise at all.

 

These are the unfortunate realities of the GEFS D6-10 and 11-15 the last few months. Which means the long range cold that crops up there is mostly fools gold this winter. The Euro OP beats all models by far D6-10, including beating it's ensembles and it's still verifying 2 degrees or so to cold D6-10.  So when the GFSENS are showing us at -1 in day 11-15, it's probably going to verify at +3-5 degrees.  I shudder to think how warm we may be if the GFS is right, and it's better day 11-15 than it's Ens on temperature but still verifies too cold by a few degrees the last 90 days.

 

 

My apologies, I referenced the every model run because that was what was posted, the current post that I am replying too is referencing trends. 

[Holston_River_Rambler]

3 minutes ago, John1122 said:

Even with that look on the Euro at D10, the air mass is already moderating. It's been verifying about -2 D6-10 this winter, which would mean it's probably going to be basically normal. At this point it appears the SE ridge is on the EPS and GEFS with a displaced -EPO that allows for a western trough. 

Fair enough

But fire building (high 45, low 25) weather is all I've got to chase at this point, lol:

[Holston_River_Rambler]

13 minutes ago, John1122 said:

especially with the MJO looking to stay in the 4 or 5 areas

Not gonna lie, this made me look at the tropical satellite and it looks awful right now around the phase 4 area:

[John1122]

4 minutes ago, weathertree4u said:

My apologies, I referenced the every model run because that was what was posted, the current post that I am replying too is referencing trends. 

No apologies needed. Unfortunately the GFS has warmed up late the last several runs, which is a trend, and the SE ridge returning on both models is unfortunate. Feb 6th-10th we may get lucky, but if that warmth comes back after like it's being shown, we will probably be looking at late February to turn things around at the earliest, and even that's a crapshoot, since the Euro actually has the MJO climbing into Phase 4 by the 10th. By then we are in bowling ball season, where you hope you score with a ULL or some freak event like the blizzard if you don't live at elevation.

[John1122]

1 minute ago, Holston_River_Rambler said:

Not gonna lie, this made me look at the tropical satellite and it looks awful right now around the phase 4 area:

Unfortunately what looked like favorable times have started to fade. The GEFS is clinging to Phase 3 still, but it's on an island. A week ago things looked much better, seeing the Euro creeping it into Phase 4 is tough.

[weathertree4u]

2 minutes ago, John1122 said:

No apologies needed. Unfortunately the GFS has warmed up late the last several runs, which is a trend, and the SE ridge returning on both models is unfortunate. Feb 6th-10th we may get lucky, but if that warmth comes back after like it's being shown, we will probably be looking at late February to turn things around at the earliest, and even that's a crapshoot, since the Euro actually has the MJO climbing into Phase 4 by the 10th. By then we are in bowling ball season, where you hope you score with a ULL or some freak event like the blizzard if you don't live at elevation.

Guess analysis depends on ones outlook on things. I choose to be more optimistic about our chances going into the next couple of weeks.

[Holston_River_Rambler]

I don't know exactly how the RMMs are calculated, but there is not much convection anywhere else, if I only had satellite, I'd say it was in 4 with an amplitude of 2 - 3. 

[Carvers Gap]

There are plenty of positives from modeling overnight.  Again, we are look at the Feb5-10 time frame with potential a couple of more windows during February.  Nobody is calling for wall-to-wall cold and snow.  Just hunting a window for wintry weather.  Be back in a bit.   Temp trends not he Euro and EPS when compared to 12z are not bad on what I am looking at.  They look cooler in the time frame mentioned.

[AMZ8990]

When we want spring weather in March or early April, then we will all get some snow.  I’m calling it now, lol.  All this moisture is really saturating my golf course btw.  I don’t know if it’s ever gonna dry out.  

[weathertree4u]

35 minutes ago, AMZ8990 said:

When we want spring weather in March or early April, then we will all get some snow.  I’m calling it now, lol.  All this moisture is really saturating my golf course btw.  I don’t know if it’s ever gonna dry out.  

I know it is a little drier here north of Nashville but yea, we could use several weeks without any precip - chances are if it doesnt get it done the next few weeks - as far as snow is concerned - just gets very hard with increasing sun angle as we move into March to get it done; the system depicted on the morning run of the GFS this morning, if just a few hundred miles northwest, we give us all a pretty good snow, it is those chances, those tracking opportunities over the next couple weeks, that will make this interesting in my opinion. 

[Holston_River_Rambler]

I posted that satellite over at southernwx and asked what people thought. Eric Webb responded to me:

"There's almost always convection over the Indo-pacific warmpool, satellite based IR doesn't tell really tell you anything. Plus, the upper level circulation signal tied to the convection hasn't been moving (it's quasi-stationary), thus it's not an MJO.

[weathertree4u]

1 minute ago, Holston_River_Rambler said:

I posted that satellite over at southernwx and asked what people thought. Eric Webb responded to me:

"There's almost always convection over the Indo-pacific warmpool, satellite based IR doesn't tell really tell you anything. Plus, the upper level circulation signal tied to the convection hasn't been moving (it's quasi-stationary), thus it's not an MJO.

So that is good right?

[Carvers Gap]

Option one this winter has always been to take the worst model, and it usually verifies.  LOL.   As noted earlier this winter, I am hunting windows for winter weather.  That is not without its risks and pitfalls.  At this latitude one is going to be wrong more than they are right by doing that, but you all know that.  

My opinion about Feb 5-10  is about the same.  The 6z GFS has a decent pattern during that time frame and the Euro isn't far away.  Ensembles do indeed show a SER sometime around the 10th.  Please reference my Weeklies discussion yesterday.  Looks like the MJO might go into unfavorable phases around that time.  We have noted this in discussion for several days - meaning the SER is a real possibility after the 10th.  What is encouraging is that the Euro Weeklies did show it being beaten back at times.  My guess is that we get cold shots, it warms, cold builds over the front range in MT, and heads south again in pulses after the 10th.  I suspect we have 2-3 windows this month which will last from 3-5 days each with the Feb5-10 window looking closer to 4-5 days and others less.  I think we have done good work balancing the positives and negatives of the upcoming pattern.  Without blocking in the Atlantic, cold windows are going to be short as the Pacific just doesn't stay "right" for weeks on end right now.  So going forward these are the things I am watching:

1.  I think the warm-up around the 10th is likely.  Does it get beaten back by strong fronts?  I think so, but nothing is ever a given.

2.  Where is the MJO heading?  I think the phase 6 region is going to be a fight.  See Weeklies discussion for that progression.

3.  I think we are going to have our chances, but nothing is a guarantee. Others have different opinions on that, and that is ok....prevents group think.

4.  Are we actually going to see blocking in the Atlantic?  Some runs have very strong anomalies in varying places in the Atlantic.  I have seen east based NAOs, Atlantic ridges(those disrupt the PV), and weak AN heights over the Davis Straits.  

5.  Alaska.  Do heights continue to trend AN there?

6.  EPO ridge placement.  Sometimes the EPO ridge is nearly perfect.  At others, it is displaced too far to the West.  

7.  As noted yesterday, solar mins and the easterly QBO phase do favor a positively tilted NA trough w a SER of varying degrees underneath.  That is shown on modeling at long 

8.  The TPV and SPV....bout the time of year that starts to really get disrupted or displaced.  How does that unfold?

Still a ton of fun stuff to discuss from a meteorology standpoint.  We have several more weeks of winter with one pattern change now to d8.  Since I have to wait until next November, going to track as much as I can during February.  And in the event we get blanked, we will still be better at this as we get another month to follow winter wx patterns at this latitude.  

...And I still have my eye on the weekend as the 6z GFS brought heavy snow into the Smokies.  I may be chasing if that happens!

[Holston_River_Rambler]

17 minutes ago, weathertree4u said:

So that is good right?

I would guess so, but he could have thought I was just asking about why the RMM plots didn't show a 4, not necessarily about whether or not that convection has an impact.

[Carvers Gap]

29 minutes ago, Holston_River_Rambler said:

I would guess so, but he could have thought I was just asking about why the RMM plots didn't show a 4, not necessarily about whether or not that convection has an impact.

MJO is all over the place.  The CPC RMM1GEFS MJO does show a four in a couple of weeks which does fit nicely with the GEFS SER.  Looks like everything(so far) is very low amplitude which is why the cold can likely press.  Question is, do we trust the GEFS?  Personally, I go back and forth on this answer.  After doing a good job recently with the MJO, it basically caved to the Euro(from yesterday).  So, makes me think the EPS can be trusted.  The GEFS with that SER and phase 2-3 MJO was out of sync with itself.  I actually think the GFS handles change a bit better.  It takes corners a bit better. The Euro turns slower but has better physics IMHO.  Anyway, do you have a PV update?  Forecasts and trends?

[weathertree4u]

12 minutes ago, Carvers Gap said:

MJO is all over the place.  The CPC RMM1GEFS MJO does show a four in a couple of weeks which does fit nicely with the GEFS SER.  Looks like everything(so far) is very low amplitude which is why the cold can likely press.  Question is, do we trust the GEFS?  Personally, I go back and forth on this answer.  After doing a good job recently with the MJO, it basically caved to the Euro(from yesterday).  So, makes me think the EPS can be trusted.  The GEFS with that SER and phase 2-3 MJO was out of sync with itself.  I actually think the GFS handles change a bit better.  It takes corners a bit better. The Euro turns slower but has better physics IMHO.  Anyway, do you have a PV update?  Forecasts and trends?

That is a good way of expressing the difference between the GFS and the EURO!

[Greyhound]

I willingly admit that I know about 5.82% of all the alphabet soup of teleconnections that is discussed here, but I enjoy reading and following along, and making random comments when warranted (usually in banter/observations).  Recently, @John1122 made a comment that it seems that our area was moved 150-200 miles south and now we can't get any decent weather that many of us remember from our youth.  That got me to thinking, and I remembered last year that there were stories out there about the magnetic North pole shifting rapidly towards Russia.  As I said, I don't know much about the daily alphabet soup menu options, but I think there is possibly some correlation to John's comment, the North pole shifting and our over-abundance of lackluster winters.    

[AMZ8990]

https://twitter.com/CNN/status/1222177223064551424?s=20