March Medium/Long Range Discussion

[TSSN+]

3 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

Fair it’s not totally dead. But the Gfs coming more in line with other guidance isn’t the trend we need Imo. 

Not like I expected it but, it’s not like we haven’t seen storms shift hundreds of miles even within day 3/4 these past few winters. 

[osfan24]

Yeah we don't need the bleeding to stop. We need a massive shift south.

[stormtracker]

1 minute ago, osfan24 said:

Yeah we don't need the bleeding to stop. We need a massive shift south.

Gotta start somewhere.

[midatlanticweather]

7 minutes ago, TSSN+ said:

Not like I expected it but it’s not like we haven’t seen storms shift hundreds of miles even within day 3/4 these past few winters. 

I am such a downer.. but 9.5 out of 10 times, we usually see that shift north in the shorter lead times. It does happen south when we have a good block, but that just is not really there in this setup. We would need to see some evidence that the models are missing something. I do not think they are in this range. 

 

[TSSN+]

[SomeguyfromTakomaPark]

51 minutes ago, osfan24 said:

Yeah we don't need the bleeding to stop. We need a massive shift south.

This one never had a chance.  Way too warm.  If everything broke just right this was a 34 degree “snowstorm” for dc.  

[Amped]

1 hour ago, brooklynwx99 said:

I wouldn’t consider a threat dead at 5 days out. no need. models often do a horrible job with handling confluence 

I would agree that it’s not looking good, though, but Boston had 12-18” 4 days out for Monday and they’re getting like 2-4” now

We can't even get 2-4" modeled 4 days out.

[Siberian-Snowcover-Myth]

DT told us last week, this storm was “Bull$hit”.  

[Ralph Wiggum]

1 hour ago, psuhoffman said:

An Aleutian ridge -pna combo is a hallmark base state feature of a -pdo. It’s likely going to be that way the vast majority of of the time for the next 30 years. If we can’t offset and snow from a -NAO despite that pac base state we are FUCKED!  

I'll be 80 years old...wonder if there's a market for wheelchair mounted sleds, tubes, or skis? 

[Maestrobjwa]

1 hour ago, psuhoffman said:

An Aleutian ridge -pna combo is a hallmark base state feature of a -pdo. It’s likely going to be that way the vast majority of of the time for the next 30 years. If we can’t offset and snow from a -NAO despite that pac base state we are FUCKED!  

Let me ask ya something...why the frickle does it take 30 years every time?

[brooklynwx99]

Just now, Maestrobjwa said:

Let me ask ya something...why the frickle does it take 30 years every time?

PDO stands for Pacific Decadal Oscillation

[dallen7908]

3 hours ago, frd said:

Every single snow map projection this year and last year, have been totally useless. They have almost zero value based on what has fallen. Most times they simply show  climo snowfall and the other times they are grossly incorrect. 

That's one interpretation.  You could also argue that the median snowfall maps have been pretty revealing this winter.   The interesting question is why are the models consistently underestimating the strength of the east coast riding in the 6-10 day time frame.  Is this a lower boundary condition issue? 

[Ralph Wiggum]

1 hour ago, midatlanticweather said:

I am such a downer.. but 9.5 out of 10 times, we usually see that shift north in the shorter lead times. It does happen south when we have a good block, but that just is not really there in this setup. We would need to see some evidence that the models are missing something. I do not think they are in this range. 

 

Sparse Pacific data. Cmon, I know you've read the weenie handbook before. Remember? System goes to hell 5-6 days out then trends back better at 3 day leads. 

[CAPE]

1 hour ago, psuhoffman said:

@CAPE let me clarify. I’m not saying every winter will be like this one. There will be some winters where the pac is more variable. There will be some rare winter months with a +pdo within the larger -pdo. We will get some +pdo periods. About 15-20% over the next 30 years if the last pdo cycle is any indication. 
 

But not every +pdo is gonna be a snowstravaganza. Some will get ruined by a +AO. Some won’t produce because of bad luck. 
 

so my point is if we’re going to be in a -pdo about 80% of the timr and it can’t snow anymore ever in that base state…yea we will get some snow over the next 3 decades in those rare anomalous periods but what we’ve been experiencing the last 7 years is gonna be the new normal and Baltimore is gonna avg like 10” of snow. 

We really need a run of Ninos. More likely to have a +PDO. Less hostile Pacific overall gives NA blocking a better chance to do what it normally(historically) does.

[psuhoffman]

4 minutes ago, CAPE said:

We really need a run of Ninos. More likely to have a +PDO. Less hostile Pacific overall gives NA blocking a better chance to do what it normally(historically) does.

But during the last -pdo even a fair number of ninos still featured a -pna. More ninos managed to overcome the base state than ninas obviously but overall we had a -pna base state about 80% during the last -pdo cycle.  If this -pdo is anything like that there is no way it’s going to Snow enough during those rare periods to offset no snow the other 80%.  Plus if we’re only gonna get any snow that rarely I don’t even care how much it snows during those rare moments it doesn’t offset the long stretches of dreg  

 

[CAPE]

6 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

But during the last -pdo even a fair number of ninos still featured a -pna. More ninos managed to overcome the base state than ninas obviously but overall we had a -pna base state about 80% during the last -pdo cycle.  If this -pdo is anything like that there is no way it’s going to Snow enough during those rare periods to offset no snow the other 80%.  Plus if we’re only gonna get any snow that rarely I don’t even care how much it snows during those rare moments it doesn’t offset the long stretches of dreg  

 

A -PNA during a Nino has a somewhat different(less hostile) character because we don't see the persistent Aleutian ridge like in a Nina. Much more workable esp with a prominent STJ.

[nj2va]

Is this the “will it ever snow again?”, futility, panic, or LR thread? Asking for a friend. 

[psuhoffman]

10 minutes ago, CAPE said:

A -PNA during a Nino has a somewhat different(less hostile) character because we don't see the persistent Aleutian ridge like in a Nina. Much more workable esp with a prominent STJ.

Little is talked of this but ninos didn’t have the same pacific response during the previous -pdo.  
This has been the mean Nino h5 during the most recent +pdo from 1981-2018 that we are used to and associate with a canonical Nino 

The primary feature is that north pac low. For our purposes it’s simple, we want the Nino centered further west because in years that low is west towards the Aleutians (2003/2010) we get cold/snow and in years it centers too close to the west coast (1998) we get flooded with pac puke and in years it shifts around we get a mix of torch and cold/snowy periods. But that setup put us in the game for big snowy periods. Btw I know you know this just illustrating for everyone. 
 

But the pac response to a Nina during the last -pdo was this…

You have to compensate for the colder base state. But look where the center of the pac anomalies are. Right against western Canada. That’s hostile!  Look at the Aleutians…higher pressure on the means!  There were some ninos during that stretch that had a more +pdo response (1977 and 1978 especially but they came at the tail end of that pdo) but it wasn’t as common. 
 

Look at some of the ninos during that era..,

does that look much better? 

Would that help? 

or this???

This was one of the best ninos of that era and the pac response is closer to a +pdo but look where the low is centered.  Today would that even work or flood too much pac puke?  That’s borderline now imo but was one of our snowiest winters ever. 
 

and look at this…

This was another blockbuster snowy Nino winter. But look at the pac?  Would that work?  
 

So of course I’ll take a Nino v a Nina, but during the last -pdo ninos didn’t cause as good of a north pac response and some of them did absolutely nothing to alter the base state.  
 

I’m telling ya if we can’t snow with an Aleutian high pna trough anymore we’re fucked because that’s going to be the base state the vast majority of the next few decades and during the last -pdo we didn’t snow by getting a better pac, most of our snow came with an atrocious pac by finding ways to overcome it. 

[Weather Will]

Back to looking at model runs, EPS control is a tick south at 18Z.

[psuhoffman]

@CAPE This is the mean h5 from the core of the last -pdo 

again adjust for the colder base state and look at the pac.  That’s just how it’s going to be most of the time for a long long time  

 

[Chris78]

6 minutes ago, Weather Will said:

Back to looking at model runs, EPS control is a tick south at 18Z.

Can you post the 12z control for comparison 

[Ralph Wiggum]

2 hours ago, psuhoffman said:

An Aleutian ridge -pna combo is a hallmark base state feature of a -pdo. It’s likely going to be that way the vast majority of of the time for the next 30 years. If we can’t offset and snow from a -NAO despite that pac base state we are FUCKED!  

Not looking for a debate, but I've done a little reading on the PDO....not a scholar on the subject by any means. I'm genuinely curious where you are seeing data suggesting we are entering a -pdo for the next 3 decades? Or am I misinterpreting what you said as these next 30 years will feature a predominent shit pac base state? I'm not following the 30 years of futility thing or what it is in reference to?

[psuhoffman]

7 minutes ago, Weather Will said:

Back to looking at model runs, EPS control is a tick south at 18Z.

The snow is from a front runner wave. The main show actually trended slightly northwest. Something like that could happen but just pointing out the main event didn’t truly improve Imo. 

[Weather Will]

5 minutes ago, Chris78 said:

Can you post the 12z control for comparison 

 

[psuhoffman]

5 minutes ago, Ralph Wiggum said:

Not looking for a debate, but I've done a little reading on the PDO....not a scholar on the subject by any means. I'm genuinely curious where you are seeing data suggesting we are entering a -pdo for the next 3 decades? Or am I misinterpreting what you said as these next 30 years will feature a predominent shit pac base state? I'm not following the 30 years of futility thing or what it is in reference to?

The PDO seems to run in roughly 25-35 year cycles. After a transition period in the 40s was mostly negative from 1949 to 1976 then in transition again until 1981. From 1982 to 2018 it was positive the vast majority of the time.  Since it’s been negative. 
 

I don’t know for sure but Imo we’ve entered another -pdo cycle. We were about due for a flip. If so we can expect the pdo to be negative most of the next 30 years or so. 

[MD Snow]

The snow is from a front runner wave. The main show actually trended slightly northwest. Something like that could happen but just pointing out the main event didn’t truly improve Imo. 

Front end dump is how we score in this set up. That’s what I’m tracking.


.

[Chris78]

1 minute ago, Weather Will said:

 

Thank you. Definitely a nice improvement.

[WinterWxLuvr]

I’ve never seen the euro control be correct. Unless it was one of those times when virtually every member was a bomb

[Ralph Wiggum]

9 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

The PDO seems to run in roughly 25-35 year cycles. After a transition period in the 40s was mostly negative from 1949 to 1976 then in transition again until 1981. From 1982 to 2018 it was positive the vast majority of the time.  Since it’s been negative. 
 

I don’t know for sure but Imo we’ve entered another -pdo cycle. We were about due for a flip. If so we can expect the pdo to be negative most of the next 30 years or so. 

I don't know....you could also look at this as if we've been in a negative phase overall since 2000 give or take. In the grand scheme, 90 years is a pretty small sample size wrt a decadal oscillation, or even smaller sample size as you are suggesting a tri-decadal oscillation. That would only provide roughly 3 measurement periods since 1930. 

note that is summer pdo I am using^^ not intentionally cherry picking I promise 

[psuhoffman]

4 minutes ago, MD Snow said:

Front end dump is how we score in this set up. That’s what I’m tracking.


.

But that meso band that gets us isn’t a feature we can’t rely on at this range. The NW trend if the storm actually continued. Sorry but Imo it was a worse run in every way except the clown snow map.