Feb Long Range Discussion (Day 3 and beyond) - MERGED

[jaydreb]

It’s too bad we couldn’t get a decent pattern this winter.  
 

[clskinsfan]

Wrong thread.

[ravensrule]

15 minutes ago, clskinsfan said:

What. Nobody interested in the 12Z CMC for Monday?

All jokes aside when was the last time the CMC was right. I would sooner trust the ICON or the JMA or even JI. 

[clskinsfan]

Just now, ravensrule said:

All jokes aside when was the last time the CMC was right. I would sooner trust the ICON or the JMA or even JI. 

Personally I think the RGEM won todays event by a wide margin. But what do I know?

[ravensrule]

Just now, clskinsfan said:

Personally I think the RGEM won todays event by a wide margin. But what do I know?

That isn’t the CMC though from 4 days out. Wait, you are saying we have a chance?. 

[jayyy]

Come on friends. Don’t go begging for the torch yet! Sure, we mainly lose the favorable 500mb/h5 setup next week, but ask feb 2015 if you need a -NAO/-AO to get good snows in a marginal setup. We can all name solid storms that occurred in late feb into March or storms that have threaded the needle during less than ideal setups. IE: an overnight thump, a perfectly timed/placed high and SLP track to our SE, or a nicely placed/timed ridge out west. 
 

Strong gulf lows (Miller A potential) begin firing up in the GOM this time of year and we could get lucky with one or two throwing moisture our way with decent cold air in place or overnight. I know things haven’t gone as expected for many closer to the metros, and folks have every right to be pessimistic about a marginal setup after what’s happened all winter, including last night / this morning, but It ain’t over til the fat lady sings. 

After 40” IMBY STD and a bunch of very near misses in and near the metros, I still think this winter season isn’t over quite yet. Think 95 - especially the immediate suburbs gets a warning level event before all is said and done. Likely occurring at the tail end of a cold shot (transition period) - especially as we begin to see larger temperature gradients in the coming weeks and more dynamic storms making their way through the SJS. 
 

I may very well be wrong, but I think one of these storms at the end goes right for a large majority of the area. 

PS - a NC bullseye this far out is perfect lmao

[clskinsfan]

Just now, ravensrule said:

That isn’t the CMC though from 4 days out. Wait, you are saying we have a chance?. 

Hell no. The storm is gonna track to our north. We are getting drizzle if anything at all IMO. 

[jayyy]

22 minutes ago, clskinsfan said:

What. Nobody interested in the 12Z CMC for Monday?

It’s been fairly consistent with this too. Bears watching.

My rule of thump regarding storms 3-4 days out in an active pattern is to let the current storm completely exit the area and wait until at least 12z or 0z the following day to see if the threat is still there in general. If so, great. Feel as though models don’t get the best picture of what’s coming in the medium range until then. Screw it, let’s track 3-5” for Monday until it fades away on us 

[blizzardmeiser]

10 minutes ago, clskinsfan said:

Personally I think the RGEM won todays event by a wide margin. But what do I know?

Need that graph of total snow by model with final grades. 

[Maestrobjwa]

1 hour ago, jaydreb said:

It’s too bad we couldn’t get a decent pattern this winter.  
 

I'm gonna go out on a limb here...could it be we got a little unlucky with two things?

1) Cold air trapped on the other side of the globe from November, leading to no real cold air source

2) TPV settling in a bad spot earlier this month, when we finally did have a cold air source

Too simplistic? (feel free to weigh in red taggers and others)

[jayyy]

Just now, Maestrobjwa said:

I'm gonna go out on a limb here...could it be we got a little unlucky with two things?

1) Cold air trapped on the other side of the globe from November, leading to real cold air source

2) TPV settling in a bad spot earlier this month, when we finally did have a cold air source

Too simplistic? (feel free to weigh in red taggers and others)

Yep. The TPV placement absolutely screwed our area out of getting multiple big snows in the past 10 days - potentially 4 high end advisory and/or warning level events. If it rolled east ahead of that 3 wave storm, instead of getting caught up in the upper Midwest / Plains, we would have seen both epic cold and an epic run of snowfall. Of course, if 0-10 degree temps made it here, we may have been worrying about something entirely different as far as storm track is concerned #PSUFringed 

[jaydreb]

18 minutes ago, Maestrobjwa said:

I'm gonna go out on a limb here...could it be we got a little unlucky with two things?

1) Cold air trapped on the other side of the globe from November, leading to real cold air source

2) TPV settling in a bad spot earlier this month, when we finally did have a cold air source

Too simplistic? (feel free to weigh in red taggers and others)

I’ll let @psuhoffman and the other experts weigh in but I think it’s a bunch of things.  It just seemed like even though the overall pattern was good, the little things just didn’t line up quite right when it counted.  At least not for the DC metro area.
 

1. We just missed a good snow in December.  I forget what went wrong there but it was close for us.  

2. We also just missed a MECS/HECS at the end of January when the coastal formed just a bit too late for our latitude.  That storm ended up dumping 30” of snow in NJ.  
 

3. We had the weird storm last week where one wave went north and the second wave went south, leaving DC in a snowhole.  It could have easily been a nice 3-6” event for us. 
 

I think there was also a storm that ended up suppressed when a Vort came out of nowhere to our NE to suppress the flow.  I don’t recall the details.  

If we hit one or two of these then suddenly this becomes a pretty good winter.  Seems like a combination of terrible luck and perhaps a slightly too warm background state.  
 

[clskinsfan]

22 minutes ago, Maestrobjwa said:

I'm gonna go out on a limb here...could it be we got a little unlucky with two things?

1) Cold air trapped on the other side of the globe from November, leading to real cold air source

2) TPV settling in a bad spot earlier this month, when we finally did have a cold air source

Too simplistic? (feel free to weigh in red taggers and others)

I think point number one was the biggest factor in the early winter fail. Pure bad luck. If the cold air had been trapped on our side of the hemisphere we would have had an entirely different January IMO.

[jayyy]

8 minutes ago, jaydreb said:

I’ll let @psuhoffman and the other experts weigh in but I think it’s a bunch of things.  It just seemed like even though the overall pattern was good, the little things just didn’t line up quite right when it counted.  At least not for the DC metro area.
 

1. We just missed a good snow in December.  I forget what went wrong there but it was close for us.  

2. We also just missed a MECS/HECS at the end of January when the coastal formed just a bit too late for our latitude.  That storm ended up dumping 30” of snow in NJ.  
 

3. We had the weird storm last week where one wave went north and the second wave went south, leaving DC in a snowhole.  It could have easily been a nice 3-6” event for us. 
 

I think there was also a storm that ended up suppressed when a Vort came out of nowhere to our NE to suppress the flow.  I don’t recall the details.  

If we hit one or two of these then suddenly this becomes a pretty good winter.  Seems like a combination of terrible luck and perhaps a slightly too warm background state.  
 

Exactly. 3 razor thin marginal events where I got 10”, 10”,’and 8.5” and DC saw under 3” makes the difference between an above avg winter and a lackluster / disappointing winter  

[howrdcounty snow]

 

 

Judah Cohen

 

@judah47

 

"March, in like a lion out like a lamb." GFS predicting the first part should be correct as blocking shifts from Europe closer to Greenland allowing relatively colder temperatures to return to both Europe & the Eastern US. Still just a forecast but impressive expanse of cold air!

 

 

 

[Miss Pixee]

4 hours ago, NorthArlington101 said:

This is the one. Sure that max will stay right where it is for 219 more hours.

Just enough time for it to tick north!!!!

[CAPE]

1 hour ago, howrdcounty snow said:

 

 

Judah Cohen

 

@judah47

 

"March, in like a lion out like a lamb." GFS predicting the first part should be correct as blocking shifts from Europe closer to Greenland allowing relatively colder temperatures to return to both Europe & the Eastern US. Still just a forecast but impressive expanse of cold air!

 

 

 

Lookin good.

[SchvoniWx]

1 hour ago, Pixee said:

Just enough time for it to tick north!!!!

Look, I have not yet recovered from this morning, this is bad for my mental health. 

[paulythegun]

LOL. Latest Para-GFS is more suppressed than 12z for next Friday/saturday. Comparison (18z left, 12z right)

 

Here's how that plays out: 

[osfan24]

1 hour ago, SchvoniWx said:

Look, I have not yet recovered from this morning, this is bad for my mental health. 

I'm ready to be hurt again, lol.

In all seriousness, I wouldn't say Monday has no shot. Look at what has happened this year. Everything looks like it doesn't have much of a chance 4-5 days out and then suddenly it starts trending south and east.

Now, unfortunately, the other trend is that, once we have it in a good spot 1-2 days out, it trends north and we get screwed, so I'm also not really going to buy anything until it's actually happening. I've been fooled way too many times this year. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me six times, shame on me.

[WinterWxLuvr]

We’re gonna get hit Monday and next Friday. Book it

[PCT_ATC]

1 hour ago, SchvoniWx said:

Look, I have not yet recovered from this morning WINTER, this is bad for my mental health. 

Fixed it for ya

[Bob Chill]

38 minutes ago, WinterWxLuvr said:

We’re gonna get hit Monday and next Friday. Book it

18z gfs agrees. But it also says there's an ice storm coming in 6 hours so prob best to never trust it again for any reason whatsoever. 

[WxUSAF]

48 minutes ago, WinterWxLuvr said:

We’re gonna get hit Monday and next Friday. Book it

“We” is doing a lot of work in this post

[Cobalt]

10 minutes ago, Bob Chill said:

18z gfs agrees. But it also says there's an ice storm coming in 6 hours so prob best to never trust it again for any reason whatsoever. 

It's not a good day for the GFS bros. Checked WxBell and all the Para GFS runs before 12z today were completely wiped. Hiding the evidence much??? 

[howrdcounty snow]

Arctic heating near the Barents-Kara Seas is related to a cold Asia, heating in the Chukchi Sea is related to cold North America but heating near Greenland brings equal opportunity cold to Asia, Europe & North America, consistent with latest GFS forecast: https://rdcu.be/bZAqO

 

 

 

9:27 AM · Feb 18, 2021·Twitter W

[WinterWxLuvr]

54 minutes ago, WxUSAF said:

“We” is doing a lot of work in this post

Ok. I’ll concede that one. I’ll go we for all of us next Friday.

[psuhoffman]

3 hours ago, osfan24 said:

I'm ready to be hurt again, lol.

In all seriousness, I wouldn't say Monday has no shot. Look at what has happened this year. Everything looks like it doesn't have much of a chance 4-5 days out and then suddenly it starts trending south and east.

Now, unfortunately, the other trend is that, once we have it in a good spot 1-2 days out, it trends north and we get screwed, so I'm also not really going to buy anything until it's actually happening. I've been fooled way too many times this year. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me six times, shame on me.

But the sad thing is they haven’t really all trended north they just trended warmer.  One did notably the Jan 31-Feb 2 HECS storm.  However even that one suppression was part of the problem. We got split. The WAA wave was suppressed. Parts of SW VA got 6-10” from that. Then the coastal developed too late but part of that was because of the warm layer disrupting the secondary process.  That relates in a way to what am about to point out.  But think of all the other waves.

The weak wave just before the big storm in December was a perfect track but the boundary was torched and only the highest elevations on the northern fringe got any snow.  That was the storm I got 3” and the valley I can see below me got a slushy coating.

The Dec HECS storm didn’t trend north the mid levels just trended warmer.  The NAMs advertised some crazy up the bay track but that was wrong.  The storm tracked over VA beach and NNE up just east of the Delmarva.  That’s a pretty good track, maybe not to get HUGE totals but certainly to get more snow then they did.

That WAA wave in January that turned into a nothing burger trended south. DC was on the northern fringe of any precip. It just wasn’t snow anywhere because at the same time the wave trended south it also trended warmer until no one anywhere got snow with it!  

The super bowl storm I was the northern fringe of precip. Again there just wasn’t much snow anywhere with the system because DC was in what should have been the NW snow zone.  Perfect track. Just rain pretty much everywhere except the very NW fringe where places had elevation or some localized spots on the eastern shore that got under extreme banding. 
 

The WAA wave after that, the one that split, didn’t trend north.  I was still fringed up here.  Only got 3” and just north of me only 1-2”!  It just trended warmer until only an incredibly narrow 30 mile zone got any appreciable snow.

This storm today again look at PA. They barely got any snow north of me. DC was in the NW periphery of the precip it was just too warm. Only a very narrow strip got any snow. 
 

 I wish it was as simple as we needed storms to track further south.  Even when storms tracked perfect “something” still went wrong and that “something” seemed to have a common theme  

 

 

[Ji]

Nam is hot?

[Maestrobjwa]

5 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

But the sad thing is they haven’t really all trended north they just trended warmer.  One did notably the Jan 31-Feb 2 HECS storm.  However even that one suppression was part of the problem. We got split. The WAA wave was suppressed. Parts of SW VA got 6-10” from that. Then the coastal developed too late but part of that was because of the warm layer disrupting the secondary process.  That relates in a way to what am about to point out.  But think of all the other waves.

The weak wave just before the big storm in December was a perfect track but the boundary was torched and only the highest elevations on the northern fringe got any snow.  That was the storm I got 3” and the valley I can see below me got a slushy coating.

The Dec HECS storm didn’t trend north the mid levels just trended warmer.  The NAMs advertised some crazy up the bay track but that was wrong.  The storm tracked over VA beach and NNE up just east of the Delmarva.  That’s a pretty good track, maybe not to get HUGE totals but certainly to get more snow then they did.

That WAA wave in January that turned into a nothing burger trended south. DC was on the northern fringe of any precip. It just wasn’t snow anywhere because at the same time the wave trended south it also trended warmer until no one anywhere got snow with it!  

The super bowl storm I was the northern fringe of precip. Again there just wasn’t much snow anywhere with the system because DC was in what should have been the NW snow zone.  Perfect track. Just rain pretty much everywhere except the very NE fringe where places had elevation or some localized spots on the eastern shore that got under extreme banding. 
 

The WAA wave after that, the one that split, didn’t trend north.  I was still fringed up here.  Only got 3” and just north of me only 1-2”!  It just trended warmer until only an incredibly narrow 30 mile zone got any appreciable snow.

This storm today again look at PA. They barely got any snow north of me. DC was in the NW periphery of the precip it was just too warm. Only a very narrow strip got any snow. 
 

 I wish it was as simple as we needed storms to track further south.  Even when storms tracked perfect “something” still went wrong and that “something” seemed to have a common theme  

 

 

Maybe I'm not ready to accept that it's more difficult to get snow now, but...Was not having any cold air on our side of the globe during Dec/Jan not a big part of the problem? And what about what happened with the TPV this month? And I don't get that if the problem is the "something"...how is it that Texas and Arkansas have more cold and snow than we do? What about Seattle? How can we know for sure unless we give it some more time to see if this repeats in a future winter? 

If it weren't for the two problems I just mentioned (no cold in the source region, followed by the unfortunate TPV placement this month), I'd give it more weight, but...I'm not sure I wanna give up on snow chances still being decent here.