January/February Mid/Long Range Disco IV: A New Hope

[psuhoffman]

3 minutes ago, Chris78 said:

I don't think the north trend is weenie fallacy lol. We've seen southern VA/NC  hits a week out turn into hits for our area many of times over the years. Ussually there's incremental shifts north the last 48 hours. 

I can't remember 1 time when it looked like a  Pittsburgh hit 4 days out that ended up trending into a hit for us.

I remember plenty of central VA hits 4 days out that turned into PSU land bullseye at game time.

just off the top of my head

PD2 was north for a few runs around day 5. Then it went south then back north but not as far. I remember about a week out worrying about rain at Penn State. 

Late Feb 2007 there was a wave supposed to go through PA and ended up a DC area bullseye with 3-6”.  

March 2014 there were 2 storms that ended up south from where they were 4-5 days out  

The Feb 2015 4-8” to ice storm trended south

A wave in Feb 2018 trended south from 4 days out  

Dec 2018 ugh even ended up missing most of us south after looking great 5 days out 

Even the storm last weekend trended southeast after looking like a cutter into a perfect track coastal it just didn’t matter, gave me 1.7” so celebration lol 

But your point is valid in that it’s more common the other way. I’d guess 75/25 But it can happen.  I think the reason we don’t think about those as much is more often a south trend ends up a hit here so we don’t care about the bust.  That’s simple geography.  There is only so far south any mid lat amplified wave of significant can end up.  We’re way closer to the southern envelope of possible tracks than the north. So a north trend is way more likely to screw us than a south  one. 

 

[midatlanticweather]

12 minutes ago, Chris78 said:

I don't think the north trend is weenie fallacy lol. We've seen southern VA/NC  hits a week out turn into hits for our area many of times over the years. Ussually there's incremental shifts north the last 48 hours. 

I can't remember 1 time when it looked like a  Pittsburgh hit 4 days out that ended up trending into a hit for us.

I remember plenty of central VA hits 4 days out that turned into PSU land bullseye at game time.

Go back to 2013 - 2014 for trends that moved south! It was a very odd year and we just seemed to be in the right place balancing cold and the SE Ridge. Rare and unlike anything I had ever seen! 

[SnowenOutThere]

Euro is out and running, hopefully it doesn’t shit the blinds 

[Benjamn3]

8 minutes ago, midatlanticweather said:

Go back to 2013 - 2014 for trends that moved south! It was a very odd year and we just seemed to be in the right place balancing cold and the SE Ridge. Rare and unlike anything I had ever seen! 

As a resident of western VA this statement saddens me. Lmao 

[ryanconway63]

No Notable differences in the Euro through hour 90....maybe a tic colder?

[stormtracker]

So far, 111 hr  no huge differences in the Euro vs 0z 

[psuhoffman]

Well yes won by 14-1 so here it is... but I will do everyone a solid.  I am going to start with the positives and if you would rather stop reading there and sleep well tonight you can.  I will warn you before I get into the negatives.  

Positives: 

For the first time since December there will be cold air around, that at least makes a good result possible.  Everything else we've been tracking for a month just had no chance, it was DOA with nothing but +10 thermals all around.  Even the last perfect track storm could barely manage some snow in the coldest highest NW fringes of this sub.  And that was with EVERYTHING going perfectly right lol.  This time if we get a perfect track it will snow.  

This is also how we have managed to get most of our snow over the last 7 years or so, with these progressive boundary waves, so there is precedence for this.  I think we have 2 opportunities.  The first is the wave as the cold is pressing.  This has limited upside potential but I think it is actually the more likely to drop some snow somewhere in our region.  The second threat would be with whatever energy gets left behind forming a wave that attacks the cold after the TPV slides by.  This has higher upside but a lower probability.  

Together these 2 waves are likely our best chance at snow so far this winter.  

The negatives: 

Unfortunately the first wave is likely to be relatively weak, very progressive, and might have temperature issues.  But the reason I actually think that is the bigger threat is the second wave has an even bigger problem.  

We are kind of stuck between a rock and a hard place with this setup.  The reason the snow probabilities for 3" are only around 10-20" across our area despite what looks like fairly favorable precip/temp plots are the details.  A good looking plot like that means nothing if it got there by 1/2 the members with a warm wet solution and 1/2 with a cold dry one.  And that is what we have here.  

I know it's tempting to see some runs south and some runs cutting and thing...that puts us in a good place in between, but unfortunately the reason the vast majority of runs are one or the other with very few in between is because the in between solution is the least likely.  Once again there seems to be 2 big problems, very little interaction between the streams and no mechanism for the cold to resist if a wave starts to amplify, other then for the short period where the TPV is directly overhead compressing the flow.   

The problem with that setup is...if the TPV is directly overhead compressing it will suppress the wave.  But even in that scenario look at those runs...its not like there is some big area of snow to our south on most runs...there is actually almost no frozen precip on the northern edge of the storm on the southern solution members.  Again, no interaction between the cold and moisture.  IF the wave comes by before the TPV has exited and the flow relaxes it will simply slide south of us.  If it waits until the flow relaxes and phases it will cut.  There is a very very narrow timing window for the in between solution.  There are barely any members on the EPS/GEFS/GEPS with that in between solution for a reason.  

The analogs to the day 8 ensembles are mostly bad results.  There are a few dates we got a mixed event in our area from a wave that had significant snow to our north.  There are no big hits in the analog set.  This isn't a good look for a big snowstorm here. 

What I would want to see to feel more optimistic in future runs would be for there to be a healthy snowfall depiction on the north side of these waves at or south of our latitude, regardless of the exact track.  I don't care if it misses south...but if it does miss south I want to see some big snow dump in NC not some wave that is mostly rain everywhere. What good does it do us if that trends north...because the thermals will trend north with it and we just get rain.  I want to see some evidence that the STJ wave and the cold will have more interaction without phasing, because we won't survive a phase in this setup.  With out that there is very little path to a win here.  

[stormtracker]

Euro is a bit more suppressive/colder so far @129

[stormtracker]

No sign of the GFS's mini snow thing at @135

[Ji]

7 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

Well yes won by 14-1 so here it is... but I will do everyone a solid.  I am going to start with the positives and if you would rather stop reading there and sleep well tonight you can.  I will warn you before I get into the negatives.  

Positives: 

For the first time since December there will be cold air around, that at least makes a good result possible.  Everything else we've been tracking for a month just had no chance, it was DOA with nothing but +10 thermals all around.  Even the last perfect track storm could barely manage some snow in the coldest highest NW fringes of this sub.  And that was with EVERYTHING going perfectly right lol.  This time if we get a perfect track it will snow.  

This is also how we have managed to get most of our snow over the last 7 years or so, with these progressive boundary waves, so there is precedence for this.  I think we have 2 opportunities.  The first is the wave as the cold is pressing.  This has limited upside potential but I think it is actually the more likely to drop some snow somewhere in our region.  The second threat would be with whatever energy gets left behind forming a wave that attacks the cold after the TPV slides by.  This has higher upside but a lower probability.  

Together these 2 waves are likely our best chance at snow so far this winter.  

The negatives: 

Unfortunately the first wave is likely to be relatively weak, very progressive, and might have temperature issues.  But the reason I actually think that is the bigger threat is the second wave has an even bigger problem.  

We are kind of stuck between a rock and a hard place with this setup.  The reason the snow probabilities for 3" are only around 10-20" across our area despite what looks like fairly favorable precip/temp plots are the details.  A good looking plot like that means nothing if it got there by 1/2 the members with a warm wet solution and 1/2 with a cold dry one.  And that is what we have here.  

I know it's tempting to see some runs south and some runs cutting and thing...that puts us in a good place in between, but unfortunately the reason the vast majority of runs are one or the other with very few in between is because the in between solution is the least likely.  Once again there seems to be 2 big problems, very little interaction between the streams and no mechanism for the cold to resist if a wave starts to amplify, other then for the short period where the TPV is directly overhead compressing the flow.   

The problem with that setup is...if the TPV is directly overhead compressing it will suppress the wave.  But even in that scenario look at those runs...its not like there is some big area of snow to our south on most runs...there is actually almost no frozen precip on the northern edge of the storm on the southern solution members.  Again, no interaction between the cold and moisture.  IF the wave comes by before the TPV has exited and the flow relaxes it will simply slide south of us.  If it waits until the flow relaxes and phases it will cut.  There is a very very narrow timing window for the in between solution.  There are barely any members on the EPS/GEFS/GEPS with that in between solution for a reason.  

The analogs to the day 8 ensembles are mostly bad results.  There are a few dates we got a mixed event in our area from a wave that had significant snow to our north.  There are no big hits in the analog set.  This isn't a good look for a big snowstorm here. 

What I would want to see to feel more optimistic in future runs would be for there to be a healthy snowfall depiction on the north side of these waves at or south of our latitude, regardless of the exact track.  I don't care if it misses south...but if it does miss south I want to see some big snow dump in NC not some wave that is mostly rain everywhere. What good does it do us if that trends north...because the thermals will trend north with it and we just get rain.  I want to see some evidence that the STJ wave and the cold will have more interaction without phasing, because we won't survive a phase in this setup.  With out that there is very little path to a win here.  

when the negative paragraph is 1452 words and the positive one is 680

[stormtracker]

SNow starts at 138 on the euro

[psuhoffman]

Just now, Ji said:

when the negative paragraph is 1452 words and the positive one is 680

and you have no snow on January 26...what do you want? 

[stormtracker]

Still going (light) at 144.  So looks like the GFS event, just a bit later

[H2O]

snow is snow

[ryanconway63]

im stuck at hour 108 on pivotal

 

[Ji]

1 minute ago, psuhoffman said:

and you have no snow on January 26...what do you want? 

snow

[Ji]

1 minute ago, stormtracker said:

Still going (light) at 144.  So looks like the GFS event, just a bit later

this aint the 18 inch event the euro had at 00z right?

[psuhoffman]

1 minute ago, stormtracker said:

Still going (light) at 144.  So looks like the GFS event, just a bit later

That's the wave I think has a decent chance to at least bring something to our area.  

[stormtracker]

Clears the area before 150hr

[stormtracker]

Just now, Ji said:

this aint the 18 inch event the euro had at 00z right?

That's at 240

[stormtracker]

Also notice that the TPV is further south on the Euro as well

[Amped]

I like how the only thing similar to yesterday's 12z run at 144 on the Euro is the SE ridge.

[Ji]

6 minutes ago, ryanconway63 said:

im stuck at hour 108 on pivotal

 

pay you cheap

[Ji]

5 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

That's the wave I think has a decent chance to at least bring something to our area.  

we dont do dustings to an inch. remember?

[stormtracker]

Euro vs GFS at 180 are definitely different.  GFS dampened out the wave, the Euro still has a pretty solid wave over Texas

[brooklynwx99]

Just now, stormtracker said:

Euro vs GFS at 180 are definitely different.  GFS dampened out the wave, the Euro still has a pretty solid wave over Texas

here she comes

[Ji]

1 minute ago, stormtracker said:

Euro vs GFS at 180 are definitely different.  GFS dampened out the wave, the Euro still has a pretty solid wave over Texas

usually that would excite me but the only time i have seen the euro lock in from days 7-9 is for Cutters. If the euro was showing a cutter...it would not budge for 8 straight days

[stormtracker]

Euro and GFS couldn't be more different at 192 at H5.  Euro looks interesting.  Just hope that wave doesn't get crushed or amplifies too much/quick

[psuhoffman]

The euro at 0z had the only way we get a big snow. Exact perfect timing between an amplified wave and a high. Look how they literally collide at the same time.

That’s the only way to get a big snow from this setup.  The 0z op euro showed its within the realm of possibilities but the full scope of guidance suggests it’s a low probability solution.

 

 

[Ji]

3 minutes ago, stormtracker said:

Euro and GFS couldn't be more different at 192 at H5.  Euro looks interesting.  Just hope that wave doesn't get crushed or amplifies too much/quick

at this point, i would take a 6-10 inch front end dump before it turns into a historic ice storm