January 2023

[LibertyBell]

Something I did find interesting which they just said (don't laugh) was on the weather channel.  "It's weird they're getting so much rain in California, you usually don't see this in a La Nina."

 

[MJO812]

We got cold in the favorable MJO phases in December but nothing to show for it but then we are now in the unfavorable phases.

The mjo is forecasted to go back into the favorable phases mid month which should bring the cold air back along with storm chances.

We shall see but that's our best bet for wintry weather.

[EastonSN+]

15 minutes ago, LibertyBell said:

That map actually proves it was mostly  a New England storm.  Most of us in the light blue were in the 10-12 inch range.  That's MECS.

This is a much better map from NWS

[Allsnow]

3 minutes ago, MJO812 said:

We got cold in the favorable MJO phases in December but nothing to show for it but then we are now in the unfavorable phases.

The mjo is forecasted to go back into the favorable phases mid month which should bring the cold air back along with storm chances.

We shall see but that's our best bet for wintry weather.

We were not in the cold phases this past December 

[North and West]

We've seen this so many times I feel like it's a rerun.
Did people really forget 1989-90, 1997-98, 2001-02 and 2011-2012 so quickly lol.
 

Because of age, IMO.


.

[North and West]

How have the normal temps worked this week? 

Now I’m thinking you’re a couple with the way you playfully and lovingly bicker.


.

[donsutherland1]

It has been a long and increasingly demoralizing march across the calendar through December into early January in wait for measurable snow in New York City and Philadelphia. Social Media has periodically lit up whenever a stray operational run popped a big snowstorm into existence (when subsequent runs popped it back out of existence, there was silence). That the event was depicted well beyond 7 days seemed to have no impact whatsoever in a seeming scramble to be "first" not "right."

Reality is sobering. Model skill scores show that the extended range remains shrouded in the fog of uncertainty despite advances in the modeling.

Objective conclusions respect uncertainty. They are not beholden to preconceived beliefs about future outcomes, much less desires for future outcomes.

Where do we stand now?

Without measurable snowfall today, Winter 2022-2023 will be among just 11 winters that saw no measurable snowfall through January 5th at Central Park. The wait will go on.
Is there potential?

The January 13-15 timeframe suggests some potential exists to break the measurable snow drought.

1. Guidance has shifted toward a brief period of colder weather leading up to mid-month. A larger share of time with readings near or below freezing offers a window for accumulating snow. If, of course, there is a system to bring precipitation.

2. Discrete systems cannot be identified much less pinned down with any degree of reliability at long timeframes. But ensembles can provide insight. Just over one-third (14/51 or 35%) of members on the 1/5 0z cycle of the EPS ensembles had 1" or more snowfall in New York City during the broad timeframe mentioned above. 1" or above is useful proxy for measurable snowfall at this range, because that amount rises above the general "noise" of variability in scenarios with lesser amounts.

3. Adjusting key teleconnections for potential error (widening ranges) and then looking at the 1950-2022 period can also provide some insight (not enough for firm predictions given sample size issues and the importance of synoptic features). At long ranges, scenarios must suffice. Looking at January cases where the AO ranged from -1 to +1 and the PNA ranged from -0.5 to +0.5, there were three storms that delivered 10" or more snow to at least one of the following cities: Boston, New York City, Philadelphia, or Washington, DC. The biggest was the January 1978 snowstorm. The others occurred in January 1954 and January 1987. The number of 10"+ cases for that teleconnection range during January 1950-2022 were as follows: Boston: 1; New York City: 1; Philadelphia: 2; Washington, DC: 1. The number of 4"+ cases were: Boston: 12; New York City: 8; Philadelphia: 7; Washington, DC: 5. This would imply low potential for a 10" or greater snowfall and very low potential for a widespread 10" or above snowfall on coastal plain.

However, all of the 10" cases occurred when El Niño conditions were present. Currently, La Niña prevails. The biggest snowfalls during La Niñas for the above constraints on time and teleconnections were: Boston: 6.5"; New York City: 6.3"; Philadelphia: 6.6"; and Washington, DC: 4.1".

Potential spoiler alert: None of the 500 mb patterns preceding the above storms were a close match to what is currently forecast (EPS) 192-240 hours out. January 1987 is almost a complete opposite with its ridge-trough positions.

4. History is an imperfect guide to the future. A historical approach has limitations. It says nothing about synoptic systems. What do the ensembles say? Just 3/51 (6%) members showed 10" or more snowfall in New York City. All three were widespread big snowfalls, though.

History + Ensembles can provide value when agreement exists.

From the above, one can cautiously conclude that January 13-15 offers a window of opportunity to break the measurable snow drought. If things go really well, there might be a small chance of a big snowfall. Much can still change given the timeframe involved. There remain no guarantees. Chatter about big amounts on Twitter or Instagram or Facebook (with or without the posting of long-range snow maps) is pure speculation, as it goes far beyond the bounds of objectivity, regardless of the author.

[North and West]

This is a much better map from NWS

You know this winter is boring as all hell when we’re fighting over a storm from ten years ago.


.

[forkyfork]

40 minutes ago, Allsnow said:

Nobody is saying that…..but with a strong polar vortex it seems that it won’t matter that the mjo is in the cold phases. IMO too much is made of the cold phases of the mjo. Lately we haven’t been cold when they have been in the ideal phases. 

shrinking hemispheric cold air pool due to climate change is hurting us

[CIK62]

Another wind gust Fail coming?        So far this a snowstorm Fail.       Gusts are from the east, unfortunately.      Snow in western PA.

Note to EastonSN+

January 1916 was a mixed bag.     Two  single digit days mixed in with the 60's.      In fact, February/March had single digit days too and snow on the ground was continuous from Feb. 02-Mar. 24---except for late February.

Highlights;   Jan. 5,6   58,58        Jan. 22    61      Jan. 26,27,28     60,69,66          Jan. 31, Feb. 01      63, 60     The cold/snowy period began here, Feb. 02.

 

[LibertyBell]

25 minutes ago, EastonSN+ said:

This is a much better map from NWS

I see the 12-24 range but I can only assume the higher ends of that range were well east of here.  It wasn't anywhere close to 16 here let alone 20.  This was a latitude and longitude storm where you had to be NE of the city to get the highest totals.

Half of this storm was actually rain here.

The February 2010 storm was far superior to this (the one at the end of February).

[JTA66]

1 hour ago, Volcanic Winter said:

Again I don’t know atmospheric physics well enough to answer this, but could the unprecedented stratospheric water vapor injection from Hunga Tonga last Jan be altering the tropical forcing in unexpected ways? Most large eruptions do NOT output as much water vapor, it’s unprecedented in the historical era. 

IF that has any hand, I would be somewhat concerned as the water vapor stays lofted longer than the 2-3 years of volcanic aerosols. 

It's a great question. I know some back in the summer were suggesting it was a warm signal for this winter, including HM. I'm sure lots of papers will be written on it in the years to come.

[LibertyBell]

23 minutes ago, donsutherland1 said:

It has been a long and increasingly demoralizing march across the calendar through December into early January in wait for measurable snow in New York City and Philadelphia. Social Media has periodically lit up whenever a stray operational run popped a big snowstorm into existence (when subsequent runs popped it back out of existence, there was silence). That the event was depicted well beyond 7 days seemed to have no impact whatsoever in a seeming scramble to be "first" not "right."

Reality is sobering. Model skill scores show that the extended range remains shrouded in the fog of uncertainty despite advances in the modeling.

Objective conclusions respect uncertainty. They are not beholden to preconceived beliefs about future outcomes, much less desires for future outcomes.

Where do we stand now?

Without measurable snowfall today, Winter 2022-2023 will be among just 11 winters that saw no measurable snowfall through January 5th at Central Park. The wait will go on.
Is there potential?

The January 13-15 timeframe suggests some potential exists to break the measurable snow drought.

1. Guidance has shifted toward a brief period of colder weather leading up to mid-month. A larger share of time with readings near or below freezing offers a window for accumulating snow. If, of course, there is a system to bring precipitation.

2. Discrete systems cannot be identified much less pinned down with any degree of reliability at long timeframes. But ensembles can provide insight. Just over one-third (14/51 or 35%) of members on the 1/5 0z cycle of the EPS ensembles had 1" or more snowfall in New York City during the broad timeframe mentioned above. 1" or above is useful proxy for measurable snowfall at this range, because that amount rises above the general "noise" of variability in scenarios with lesser amounts.

3. Adjusting key teleconnections for potential error (widening ranges) and then looking at the 1950-2022 period can also provide some insight (not enough for firm predictions given sample size issues and the importance of synoptic features). At long ranges, scenarios must suffice. Looking at January cases where the AO ranged from -1 to +1 and the PNA ranged from -0.5 to +0.5, there were three storms that delivered 10" or more snow to at least one of the following cities: Boston, New York City, Philadelphia, or Washington, DC. The biggest was the January 1978 snowstorm. The others occurred in January 1954 and January 1987. The number of 10"+ cases for that teleconnection range during January 1950-2022 were as follows: Boston: 1; New York City: 1; Philadelphia: 2; Washington, DC: 1. The number of 4"+ cases were: Boston: 12; New York City: 8; Philadelphia: 7; Washington, DC: 5. This would imply low potential for a 10" or greater snowfall and very low potential for a widespread 10" or above snowfall on coastal plain.

However, all of the 10" cases occurred when El Niño conditions were present. Currently, La Niña prevails. The biggest snowfalls during La Niñas for the above constraints on time and teleconnections were: Boston: 6.5"; New York City: 6.3"; Philadelphia: 6.6"; and Washington, DC: 4.1".

Potential spoiler alert: None of the 500 mb patterns preceding the above storms were a close match to what is currently forecast (EPS) 192-240 hours out. January 1987 is almost a complete opposite with its ridge-trough positions.

4. History is an imperfect guide to the future. A historical approach has limitations. It says nothing about synoptic systems. What do the ensembles say? Just 3/51 (6%) members showed 10" or more snowfall in New York City. All three were widespread big snowfalls, though.

History + Ensembles can provide value when agreement exists.

From the above, one can cautiously conclude that January 13-15 offers a window of opportunity to break the measurable snow drought. If things go really well, there might be a small chance of a big snowfall. Much can still change given the timeframe involved. There remain no guarantees. Chatter about big amounts on Twitter or Instagram or Facebook (with or without the posting of long-range snow maps) is pure speculation, as it goes far beyond the bounds of objectivity, regardless of the author.

I have read elsewhere that la ninas and neutral phases need to be grouped together (for our weather purposes anyway)-- do you agree with this Don?  The thinking is for winter weather purposes, it's either an el nino or not.  If we do group la ninas and neutral phases together then winters like 2001-02 come into play-- that's the only one I can think of which has been like this.  1989-90 too if you take out the November storm though.  What's your thinking on this, Don?  Also, this Friday the 13th potential storm, is this a coastal storm if it does happen?  Is it currently offshore on the models?  Do we have a chance mainly because storms tend to move west and north with time? Another question is even if the storm takes  a benchmark track would there even be enough cold air around to snow? Thanks!

[donsutherland1]

1 hour ago, EastonSN+ said:

Do you have 1916? Curious as BDR had back to back days of 65.

1916-01-01	37	23
1916-01-02	38	31
1916-01-03	38	21
1916-01-04	33	22
1916-01-05	46	M
1916-01-06	52	24
1916-01-07	52	20
1916-01-08	25	11
1916-01-09	27	12
1916-01-10	42	21
1916-01-11	49	35
1916-01-12	36	29
1916-01-13	48	29
1916-01-14	36	11
1916-01-15	26	6
1916-01-16	35	23
1916-01-17	33	12
1916-01-18	23	9
1916-01-19	30	14
1916-01-20	38	19
1916-01-21	52	37
1916-01-22	54	37
1916-01-23	50	34
1916-01-24	40	25
1916-01-25	53	29
1916-01-26	56	38
1916-01-27	65	44
1916-01-28	65	M
1916-01-29	40	23
1916-01-30	39	26
1916-01-31	51	36

[EastonSN+]

7 minutes ago, LibertyBell said:

I see the 12-24 range but I can only assume the higher ends of that range were well east of here.  It wasn't anywhere close to 16 here let alone 20.  This was a latitude and longitude storm where you had to be NE of the city to get the highest totals.

Half of this storm was actually rain here.

The February 2010 storm was far superior to this (the one at the end of February).

That's funny, for February 2010 I was rain for most of the storm only getting 8 at the very end. Not a top 20 for me.

[donsutherland1]

2 minutes ago, LibertyBell said:

I have read elsewhere that la ninas and neutral phases need to be grouped together (for our weather purposes anyway)-- do you agree with this Don?  The thinking is for winter weather purposes, it's either an el nino or not.  If we do group la ninas and neutral phases together then winters like 2001-02 come into play-- that's the only one I can think of which has been like this.  1989-90 too if you take out the November storm though.  What's your thinking on this, Don?  Also, this Friday the 13th potential storm, is this a coastal storm if it does happen?  Is it currently offshore on the models?  Do we have a chance mainly because storms tend to move west and north with time? Another question is even if the storm takes  a benchmark track would there even be enough cold air around to snow? Thanks!

Neutral phases had even lower maximum snow amounts for the teleconnection range. Cluster analysis hinted that an offshore outcome was somewhat more likely than some of the other possible scenarios. There may be more cold air earlier in the timeframe than afterward.

[Volcanic Winter]

21 minutes ago, JTA66 said:

It's a great question. I know some back in the summer were suggesting it was a warm signal for this winter, including HM. I'm sure lots of papers will be written on it in the years to come.

Yup, likely to be the first large eruption known to feature surface warming tied back to it. The only other exceptions are flood basalt eruptions, which are entirely different and separated temporally by millions of years.

I had some fleeting hopes other elements could win out and produce some favorability, but in reality that water vapor signal might be completely overpowering. You can’t deduce this stuff regionally as even severe volcanic-affected climate years have significant regional variability, but looking at what’s going on with Europe (although Eastern Europe is going to freeze soon) makes me wonder. 

Can’t wait until more is published about this. 

Edit: Just found this which I actually haven’t read before:

Might be illuminating with respect to this topic, though they’re using Krakatoa 1883 as a baseline. That eruption was significantly larger (roughly 3x) and injected an extreme amount of typical volcanic aerosols that produce cooling, unlike HTHH which most notably injected water vapor. So the conclusion may be based off an entirely different type of eruption. Still interesting. 

[EastonSN+]

26 minutes ago, North and West said:

You know this winter is boring as all hell when we’re fighting over a storm from ten years ago.


.

Not fighting on this one but my point was more to show that in a la Nina the northern stream dominates, so we get more "cutters" due to that fact. Was just using an extreme example to show what can happen when the southern stream dominates.

[MJO812]

2 minutes ago, EastonSN+ said:

That's funny, for February 2010 I was rain for most of the storm only getting 8 at the very end. Not a top 20 for me.

Which storm ?

[LibertyBell]

5 minutes ago, EastonSN+ said:

That's funny, for February 2010 I was rain for most of the storm only getting 8 at the very end. Not a top 20 for me.

I know haha New England got screwed like they did in the Blizzard of 1888.  We had heavy rain for the first half and heavy snow for the second half.  I think the amounts were about the same as for the Feb 2013 event here

[LibertyBell]

7 minutes ago, MJO812 said:

Which storm ?

Snowicane, you got 20" in that.

 

[LibertyBell]

8 minutes ago, EastonSN+ said:

Not fighting on this one but my point was more to show that in a la Nina the northern stream dominates, so we get more "cutters" due to that fact. Was just using an extreme example to show what can happen when the southern stream dominates.

if you want to use la nina big snowstorms, they usually happen in la ninas that happen after el ninos we have some prime examples of them in December 1995, January 1996, February 1996, December 2010 and January 2011.  I loved those storms.

Wow 1995-96 had three of them and 2010-11 had two of them....

 

 

[MJO812]

7 minutes ago, LibertyBell said:

Snowicane, you got 20" in that.

 

That was awesome 

4 inches in the morning then drizzle then 16 inches at night with thundersnow.

[LibertyBell]

13 minutes ago, MJO812 said:

That was awesome 

4 inches in the morning then drizzle then 16 inches at night with thundersnow.

Night time was the best part, it stuck to the sides of the houses because the wind was blowing so hard.

 

[snowman19]

These are not warm phases in Janaury. Can we stop saying that already. 

.

[MJO812]

Snowman19 is back

Matter of time 

[Brian5671]

Just now, MJO812 said:

Snowman19 is back

Matter of time 

Monster cutter, no cold air and basically an endless run of the same ol pattern....

[Volcanic Winter]

It sucks that the MJO may not be a magic bullet, but I’m grateful to continue learning about how it influences our weather. We can’t deny that if a decently strong amplitude cold phase of the MJO isn’t starting to register on the models in the form of even normal temps, that maybe it’s not capable of driving the pattern at the moment. 

Of course I’m hoping this changes. I want to break my good down parka back out I put away after Xmas in exchange for dry fit polos. 

[LibertyBell]

16 minutes ago, snowman19 said:

 

 

 

.

 

Good to see you back, man.  We got worried about you being gone for so long.

[LibertyBell]

6 minutes ago, Volcanic Winter said:

It sucks that the MJO may not be a magic bullet, but I’m grateful to continue learning about how it influences our weather. We can’t deny that if a decently strong amplitude cold phase of the MJO isn’t starting to register on the models in the form of even normal temps, that maybe it’s not capable of driving the pattern at the moment. 

Of course I’m hoping this changes. I want to break my good down parka back out I put away after Xmas in exchange for dry fit polos. 

Might need to take another trip to Iceland to see some snow lol

One thing that is clear-- there is never a guarantee of snow around here, no matter the pattern or signal lol.

I think the closest we can ever come to a guarantee anywhere in the East is that there will always be lake effect snow lol.