March 2023 Mid-Long Range Discussion thread

[Silas Lang]

Sorry, I need post this happy hour end of run storm here to show the potential. My sophisticated analysis for this storm is that it is still spring break when it occurs. 

 

[PowellVolz]

Anyone feel like this is a 2016 repeat?


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[Itryatgolf70]

I was hoping for one last horrah but don't look like I will get it lol. Hopefully next winter will give us a few more opportunities. Imo, the key is if the niño is central based, it will typically be pretty cold here and with the right blocking of course. Long ways to go

[Carvers Gap]

13 minutes ago, PowellVolz said:

Anyone feel like this is a 2016 repeat?


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Remind me what happened during that March?

[Matthew70]

6 hours ago, Carvers Gap said:

Van Gough had a time when he painted only in blue.  In honor of @tnweathernut, I call this "Spring Before Winter."

 

I hope I bought enough propane to make it through all the soccer games of March. 

[Matthew70]

As of right now the lowest daytime temp I see is 52. 31 the lowest nighttime temp. That is about average for March so either the forecast temps  is wrong or the pics above are wrong. Will be interesting to see what actually happens. 6 days away is a long time in todays times with these models. 

[snowmaker]

5 hours ago, Silas Lang said:

Sorry, I need post this happy hour end of run storm here to show the potential. My sophisticated analysis for this storm is that it is still spring break when it occurs. 

 

Let’s see that inside 5 days instead of 10-15days out. LOL

[Carvers Gap]

If you are here looking for a professional forecast, I suggest you have come to the wrong place.  If you are not laying out your own ideas and just going, “I told you so,” you have definitely come to the wrong place.  But if you are here to learn, to take risks, have fun , and enjoy weather...you have come to the right place. This is a place where we risk being wrong in order to get better - that is the only way to get better.  The “I told you so” stuff needs to go in banter.  Otherwise, we are going to have unreadable threads - go look at the MA.
 

As for the cold, still looks highly likely as the long wave pattern which will deliver it looks reasonably locked in.  The question is which storm brings it?  At 18z, the GFS cut the storm on the 10th too far to the West.  It jumped on the next system.  IMO, this is just a matter of “when” and not “if.”  You won’t hear me say that often.  The December cold had the same issue.   And that can all change as we don’t control any aspect of the weather.  We can only predict.  Shoulder seasons are easily the most difficult times for modeling.
 

I won’t be posting a ton today as Saturday has its own responsibilities for me.  So, don’t mistake my absence for a change in tune.

[Carvers Gap]

For those willing to do some digging, the Euro control run at 0z....that was interesting.

[matt9697]

18 minutes ago, Carvers Gap said:

For those willing to do some digging, the Euro control run at 0z....that was interesting.

That will no doubt be on social media soon. Make a good screen saver.

[tnweathernut]

2 minutes ago, matt9697 said:

That will no doubt be on social media soon. Make a good screen saver.

I don't even know where to find the control run, but the OP was interesting in giving the mountains over 24 hours of snow showers and a stalled low in the MA.

 

[matt9697]

10 minutes ago, tnweathernut said:

I don't even know where to find the control run, but the OP was interesting in giving the mountains over 24 hours of snow showers and a stalled low in the MA.

 

[Uncle Nasty]

If this belongs in Banter I'll move it. Every year the blizzard gets brought up nearing the anniversary
We are approaching the 30 year on the 12th. Here is a great write up by Morristown about the storm and the 30 year anniversary.


https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/0563d35d1eeb4d4082dd4687686000dd

Sent from my moto z4 using Tapatalk

[snowmaker]

The cold or very cool will eventually come East, but the SER continues to flex as well. This was my worry for a snow especially in west and middle Tennessee. That by the time cold gets here we will be on the backside of March and  the cold period will be modified or shortened. I love winter weather and I hope I am wrong. But it will do what it is going to do, I am a hard core snow and winter weather lover but here we are at the 4th of March. I just don’t see enough cold getting established outside of the mountains. Again hope I am very wrong, I would love one more snow. But hey there is always next year if it doesn’t. If we had something showing up consistently inside 10 days I would be a little more optimistic but we can’t seem to get there. Sorry so long guys, and good luck to all. I will step away and keep up from afar, bring it home guys!

[BuCoVaWx]

1 hour ago, Uncle Nasty said:

If this belongs in Banter I'll move it. Every year the blizzard gets brought up nearing the anniversary
We are approaching the 30 year on the 12th. Here is a great write up by Morristown about the storm and the 30 year anniversary.


https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/0563d35d1eeb4d4082dd4687686000dd

Sent from my moto z4 using Tapatalk
 

Thank you for the link. This storm is single handedly responsible for my obsession with winter weather, arguably weather as a whole. I was 8 years old and my family and I were without power and "snowed in" for about 4 days. I mostly remember spending as much time as possible outside with my brother and neighborhood kids in a winter wonderland. We had the time of our lives playing out in the blizzard, then thawing out by our wood and coal stove, which was our only source of heat, light and cooking at the time. I've been chasing that storm ever since. Of course the chances of that happening again are super slim to almost none, it's still fun to track these storms and dream a little from time to time.

[PowellVolz]

Remind me what happened during that March?

We had a few weeks of 75-80 degrees. Everything was blooming, even Bermuda was coming in. Then we went extremely cold right before Easter. I replaced 80 Crept Myrtles that summer. Then we had the end of summer drought that led to the Gathering fires.


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[Daniel Boone]

11 hours ago, Uncle Nasty said:

If this belongs in Banter I'll move it. Every year the blizzard gets brought up nearing the anniversary
We are approaching the 30 year on the 12th. Here is a great write up by Morristown about the storm and the 30 year anniversary.


https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/0563d35d1eeb4d4082dd4687686000dd

Sent from my moto z4 using Tapatalk
 

I remember the Blizzard well. One thing they mentioned was wrong, as far as here in Lee County is concerned. The Storm didn't begin as Rain. Snow began to fall in Pennington gap at 1:13 Friday Afternoon with a Temp. of 36 . The Temp rapidly fell below freezing as Snow began to accumulate quickly. 

[Carvers Gap]

6 hours ago, PowellVolz said:

We had a few weeks of 75-80 degrees. Everything was blooming, even Bermuda was coming in. Then we went extremely cold right before Easter. I replaced 80 Crept Myrtles that summer. Then we had the end of summer drought that led to the Gathering fires.


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That is the driest fall I ever remember.  You could have walked across the North Fork of the Holston up here w/out getting your feet wet. (Today it is nearly at flash flood stage).   I was sitting at a youth basketball game, and someone told me Gatlinburg had embers dropping into the middle of the city.  I thought, "No way."  I hustled home and watched Knoxville TV channels that night.  I was just stunned.  

[Carvers Gap]

The 6z GFS looks like a winter time pattern with HL blocking.  If I didn’t know the date, I would be more excited as I know seasonal climatology is going to be fighting us.  That said, it is worth nothing that March can bring surprises and storms often over perform compared to modeling output.  I would be pretty fired up if I lived in tbe mountains.  Models still look solidly on board for a 10+ day period of cold whining just before mid month.  It could be longer than that.  Modeling has tended to overestimate staying power for cold during the past several months, so I am starting with that timeframe.  The potential is there that this pattern is base cold w/ warm interludes for much of the second half of March through mid-April.  This is a pretty big pattern shakeup at 500mp.  If this was mid-winter, this would be the golden ticket....but again, seasonal climatology is going to fight this every step of the way(must be important if I say that twice.  LOL).  Still this is likely going to be a sharp change from the early summer temps that we have experienced.  If a storm cranks, a killing freeze is easily on the table.     As we noted earlier...whatever is most miserable is likely.

[snowmaker]

Climatology and the SER seem to be kicking in, it is looking more like cool side than cold side. It’s okay it’s just one of them years the long range pattern to cold is either shorter or not nearly as bad as advertised. Would love to see a quick change but mid month is now looking warmer at the moment. But I am sure we will have a few cold nights but I am having serious doubts we have any below freezing days, things are already starting to push back toward more the 20th timeframe now. I am ready for mowing season. Not throwing the towel on winter yet. But I got it in my back pocket.

[Carvers Gap]

The mid-term cold is less of a question for me know.   The 500mb is on schedule to change as are temps around the 11th.  The can kicking has been hours instead of days/weeks.  The question for me is whether this is a 10-14 day cold shot or a true 4-6 pattern shift.   I lean slight towards long term pattern shift.  Why?  Nino climatology supports the colder SE for spring.  The CPC maps have changed little from the ones I posted earlier.  So, the cold has support from pro forecasters and not folks who do this as a hobby.   I wish I had better news for people who need a warmer spring, including me.  Maybe that will change, and we will see a balance of warm and cold says vs base cold.  

[Carvers Gap]

From the MRX afternoon disco:

Midweek another system will begin moving across the center of the country, and increasing moisture return brings richer moisture into our region. This equates to low rain chances on Wednesday in the southern valley and then more widespread on Thursday afternoon. Precipitation amounts are expected to be light but steady from Thursday going into Saturday, so no impacts are expected. Early look at storm total rainfall is a half inch to an inch. Differing guidance solutions over placement of the rain and evolution of this weekend`s synoptic pattern change leave plenty of uncertainty. However, there is building confidence in cooler weather and frost/freeze issues beginning at the end of this period.

[Matthew70]

This was shared on another forum by a very good poster.  Definitely interesting!  

https://www.usanpn.org/news/spring

 

[Carvers Gap]

Cold weather looks on schedule.  For now, we will say 10-14 days in duration.  This is going to likely come in waves as the spring season is going to send warmth north after each cold air mass grows stale.  As I mentioned before, it will be interesting to see if the cold can erase the AN departures of the first few days.  Again, the real question for me is whether this cold snap is a long term pattern change at our latitude.  I lean 55/45 that it is, maybe 60/40.  I do think that the air mass will be less extreme than originally modeled, but still likely to be very cod.  Honestly, I am not a huge fan of winter in March.  So, I will gladly take the less extreme version if that is the hand we are dealt.  The coldest days could be 8-12 degrees BN.  Temps should be around normal by the weekend w/ next week likely being the coldest (roughly around the 15th).  Winter wx is not off the table, but cold rain is more likely!

[Carvers Gap]

I should add that medium-range modeling is signaling a higher elevation, upslope snow event around the 15th.  Something to keep an eye on.

[Carvers Gap]

Of note, the 0z Euro control does continue its recent daily tradition of a NE TN paste storm around mid-month.  The operational was close.  Nothing set in stone.  Again, higher elevations, SE KY, the Plateau, SW VA, NE TN, and W NC....have better climatology for spring snow.  

[Carvers Gap]

The MJO is almost off the charts in phase 8.   Crazy look this morning.

[Carvers Gap]

Pretty big changes by the 12z GFS.  Interesting.

[PowellVolz]

Pretty big changes by the 12z GFS.  Interesting.

Which way? I haven’t looked the last couple of days.


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[Carvers Gap]

9 minutes ago, PowellVolz said:

Which way? I haven’t looked the last couple of days.


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Broke towards cold after being in conflict with its own ensemble for 10-11th.