January Medium/Long Range Discussion

[Fozz]

16 minutes ago, Maestrobjwa said:

Glad I don't remember March 2001. My first painful memory of a miss...was when it was supposed to be snowing when I woke up (on a Saturday), and it was clear blue skies instead, lol I cannot remember the year but it had to be in the early 2000s

I think that was December 30, 2000. I don’t remember that one very well either, but I was told it was supposed to be a big one, something like 8-12”. And then it was not even a single flake.

Same winter as March 2001, so a lot of heartbreak that year.

[HighStakes]

1 minute ago, Fozz said:

I think that was December 30, 2000.

Same winter as March 2001 and a few months earlier. I was told that was supposed to be a big one, something like 8-12”.

Heavy snow warning for 6-10. Horrible bust. Personally I had a bad feeling about this one hours before it was obvious to the on air mets this would bust. You could clearly see how things were not coming together by late evening. Radar returns were developing well offshore and heading due north towards New York and New England. Philadelphia was just far enough east to get in on good snow totals as well. Ravens beat Denver in the first round of the playoffs under clear cold skies on the road to their first Superbowl victory.  

[midatlanticweather]

That and boxing day disasters are just awful to talk about. 

[Maestrobjwa]

Wooo boy...this has a psychiatric day for the books. We go from the discussion this morning to memories of disappointment tonight. All colors of the forum on full display, lol

[Chase]

3 minutes ago, Maestrobjwa said:

Wooo boy...this has a psychiatric day for the books. We go from the discussion this morning to memories of disappointment tonight. All colors of the forum on full display, lol

‘Twas the night before our snowpack melts and all through the house…

[SnowenOutThere]

0z GFS with an 384 hour monster.

[TowsonWeather]

1 hour ago, Chase said:

‘Twas the night before our snowpack melts and all through the house…

‘Twas the night before Bustmas, when all through the forum,
Not a poster was stirring—there was short-lived decorum.
The models were hung by the chimney with care,
In hopes that Bob Chill himself soon would be there;
The posters were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of MECS and HECS danced in their heads;
And mappy in her 'kerchief, and I in my cap,
Had just settled down for a long winter's nap,
When all ‘cross the site there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from the bed to see what was the matter.
Away to the laptop I flew like a flash,
Tore open the cover and refreshed my cache.
The light on the page of the brightly-lit screen,
Gave new lustre to ravensrule’s posts (though obscene). 
When, what to my wondering eyes should appear,
But a miniature sleigh, and eight tiny reindeer,
With a little old poster, so wise and so still.
I knew in a moment it must be St. Chill.
More rapid than eagles his coursers they came,
And he whistled, and shouted, and called them by name;
"Now, Mattie! now, Tracker! now, Psuhoffman,
On, Fozz! on Ji! on, Leesburg, and Ian.
To the top of the page! The GFS has us buried!
Now post away! post away! post away, merry!
As dendrites that before the wild nor’wester fly,
When they meet with an obstacle, mount to the sky,
So up to the regional forum they flew,
With a sleigh full of snow maps, and new EURO runs, too.
And then, in a twinkling, I saw that he’d posted.
With humor and insight (and blizzards he’d toasted).
As I clicked on his name, and was turning around,
Down the chimney Bob Chill himself came with a bound.
He was dressed all in white, from his head to his foot,
And his clothes were all tarnished with ashes and soot;
A six pack of beers he had flung on his back,
And he looked like a peddler just opening his pack.
His eyes -- how they twinkled! his dimples how merry!
His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry!
His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow,
And the beard of his chin was as white as the snow;
The stump of a pipe he held tight in his teeth,
And the smoke it encircled his head like a wreath;
He had a broad face and a little round belly,
That shook, when he laughed like a bowlful of jelly.
He was chubby and plump, a right jolly old weenie,
And I laughed when I saw him, and sipped my martini.
A wink of his eye and a click of his mouse,
Soon gave me to know there’d be snow at my house.
He spoke not a word, but went straight to his task,
Posting maps all in pink; and then turned with a gasp.
And laying his finger aside of his nose,
And giving a nod, up the chimney he rose;
He sprang to his sleigh, to his team gave a whistle,
And away they all flew like the down of a thistle.
But I heard him exclaim, as I stood there awestruck:
“HAPPY KUs TO ALL, AND OH YEAH: SHUT UP, CHUCK!”
 

[psuhoffman]

My first two busts were Jan 1987 and Feb 1989 in south Jersey. 1987 they were saying 1-3” changing to rain. Woke up to a couple inches and heavy snow and was excited but KYW radio said it was about to change to rain and school wasn’t even delayed. While at school watched it continue to snow and snow and snow. Around noon they decided to send us home but by then it was a mess and took hours. It was dark by the time I got home. We ended up with about 10”. It did eventually end as some drizzle lol. 
 

Feb 89 was awful. Supposed to get a blizzard. 1-2 feet. Went to bed expecting 4-8” by morning. Woke up to sunshine and wind. Atlantic City 40 miles away for 20” and nothing where I was. Storm had a sharp edge and set up 50 miles east of expected. 

[Ji]

Euro looks wild at least

[Cobalt]

Pretty nice LP mean this far out. Would be more favorable if there wasn't a cluster suggesting the primary takes a route through northern IL, but there's also a (smaller) cluster suggesting the primary tracks through Kentucky. More to be desired but bears watching

 

[Cobalt]

5 minutes ago, Cobalt said:

Pretty nice LP mean this far out. Would be more favorable if there wasn't a cluster suggesting the primary takes a route through northern IL, but there's also a (smaller) cluster suggesting the primary tracks through Kentucky. More to be desired but bears watching

Snow mean responds pretty positively to this, with some big hits mixed in.

I was trying to find if there was any relation between the offshore D5 system and encouraging a more favorable track for our threat (in the circumstance where that D5 storm strengthened while also approaching 50/50 domain and acting as pseudo 50/50 low), but it's hard to view both LPs using the individual member WxBell maps so I gave up on that. 

 

[Weather Will]

WB 0Z EPS….with some luck we are still on track to enter into a cold and snowy period In mid to late January.   I say some luck because the control, not shown,  is the bust scenario.

[Jebman]

Keep on tracking it, keep on believing in it, its gonna evolve for you all!

It just wants to snow in the Mid Atlantic! Old Man Winter said To hell with the Nina! It's STILL going to be a fierce, frigid, very very snowy winter in the Mid Atlantic this winter!

 

[Jebman]

4 hours ago, Maestrobjwa said:

Wooo boy...this has a psychiatric day for the books. We go from the discussion this morning to memories of disappointment tonight. All colors of the forum on full display, lol

The only color that matters is the beautiful blue white of deep snow in the Mid Atlantic. I've been long tellin you you were gonna get annihilated by snow. You got more, A LOT MORE comin this winter!

[brooklynwx99]

It looks like we are finally entering an extremely favorable pattern starting around the 14-16th. The Pacific jet retraction will take place during that time, and the +PNA/-EPO will be able to strengthen and remain stable thanks to a semi-permanent Aleutian ULL:

This pattern is pretty much a complete 180 from what we saw for most of December, as there is cross-polar flow established that continues throughout much, if not all of the month. This pattern is highly reminiscent of the 2013-15 winters, where there were extreme arctic outbreaks as well as increased storminess to go along with it. Now, this pattern is certainly not one that you'd normally see in a Nina, and here's why:

 

Note the negative height anomalies in the S US along with the split flow W of S CA. This signals that the STJ will be open for business, which is rare in -ENSO winters where the northern stream is dominant and the STJ is often nowhere to be found. 

The main reason, at least to me, as to why this pattern is so potent is because of the split flow. There will be highly amplified shortwaves rolling S off of the western ridging that will be able to phase with cutoff lows and other pieces of energy from the southern stream. This is accomplished by the W ridging being a bit more poleward than usual: it allows for significant cross-polar flow, but it also keeps the STJ open. This is often how we get our largest storms.

There is also an immense cold supply here, as our air will be sourced from Siberia. Hints of transient -NAO blocking have also been showing up on the OP runs, and there's some on the ENS means as well. Transient blocks are really all you need when it comes to large storms, as we've seen in the past.

Overall, this is just a loaded pattern and I would honestly be quite surprised if there isn't a MECS (or two!) between the 15th and the end of the month. Our next threat is around the 15th, and there's already a lot of phasing potential there. We will likely have to wait until after the 20th for the pattern to mature a bit, but a KU is certainly on the table.

[Eskimo Joe]

@brooklynwx99 with the early morning dirty talk. 

[nj2va]

Great post to read over my coffee this morning, thanks @brooklynwx99

[Ji]

[mention=9996]brooklynwx99[/mention] with the early morning dirty talk. 

Yep. Sounds exactly like what psu said

[Chris78]

4 hours ago, Weather Will said:

WB 0Z EPS….with some luck we are still on track to enter into a cold and snowy period In mid to late January.   I say some luck because the control, not shown,  is the bust scenario.

You know it's getting serious win WW breaks out the 6" probability maps. 

[Ralph Wiggum]

Pattern ahead Jan 14-28 certainly looks favorable for large storm development....somewhere. The only 2 cons I see looking ahead are 1) we've all been headfaked in years past with epic pattern looks that end up verifying for 12 hours then revert back to the sos. And 2) as has been the case much of Nov and Dec, the mean trof in the East (when it has had the opportunity to dig) has been on an axis just too far to the east. A few big fall storms and 2 Dec storms we missed out on because they were too far off the coast. Not suggesting this hasn't or won't change. Just haven't spent a ton of time salivating over the looks but rather cherry picking what could yield failure. In my older years I've found it wiser to ask what could go wrong or why won't this work as opposed to ens at range as gospel. Though it is nice to see agreement on the cold push. If we get the big cold push, I urge patience as we could be overwhelmed by Siberia and need patience waiting for things to relax before getting the big dog.

Now with that said, let's find a way to luck our way into a KU before this month ends.

[Ravens94]

I still think there is room for the near term Friday storm to come west some. Couple hundred miles is certainly still possible 

[frd]

Impressive decline continues in the SOI. 

Today's value - 27.  Certainly goes with 

@brooklynwx99 awesome post about a 

STJ component to the pattern down the

 line.  

[Scraff]

Good morning! I counted at least 4 opportunity windows on the 6z GFS. Going to be some late nights coming up for model watching. 

[Weather Will]

WB 6Z EPS says be patient.  No storms through Friday.

[Snowchaser]

Eastern Maine seems like the place to be these next couple weeks. 

[jviper]

1 hour ago, Ralph Wiggum said:

Pattern ahead Jan 14-28 certainly looks favorable for large storm development....somewhere. The only 2 cons I see looking ahead are 1) we've all been headfaked in years past with epic pattern looks that end up verifying for 12 hours then revert back to the sos. And 2) as has been the case much of Nov and Dec, the mean trof in the East (when it has had the opportunity to dig) has been on an axis just too far to the east. A few big fall storms and 2 Dec storms we missed out on because they were too far off the coast. Not suggesting this hasn't or won't change. Just haven't spent a ton of time salivating over the looks but rather cherry picking what could yield failure. In my older years I've found it wiser to ask what could go wrong or why won't this work as opposed to ens at range as gospel. Though it is nice to see agreement on the cold push. If we get the big cold push, I urge patience as we could be overwhelmed by Siberia and need patience waiting for things to relax before getting the big dog.

Now with that said, let's find a way to luck our way into a KU before this month ends.

This is reality.  - “ 1) we've all been headfaked in years past with epic pattern looks that end up verifying for 12 hours then revert back to the sos“

[chris21]

3 minutes ago, jviper said:

This is reality.  - “ 1) we've all been headfaked in years past with epic pattern looks that end up verifying for 12 hours then revert back to the sos“

While very true, this pattern has already dropped ten inches of snow on dc one week into January.

[Eskimo Joe]

To be honest, I'd trade a lone 3 foot blizzard for several 6" - 10" events and normal/below normal temps. Getting on big storm and watching it melt in 5 days is boring. Let's get and maintain a snowpack for once.

[WinterWxLuvr]

8 minutes ago, Eskimo Joe said:

To be honest, I'd trade a lone 3 foot blizzard for several 6" - 10" events and normal/below normal temps. Getting on big storm and watching it melt in 5 days is boring. Let's get and maintain a snowpack for once.

This

[Solution Man]

4 minutes ago, WinterWxLuvr said:

This

I take both, blizzard and several 6-10 inchers