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January Medium/Long Range: A snowy January ahead?


mappy
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Couple random thoughts 

1) we want the cold. The trough is centered to our NW and there is no blocking. Any amplification that takes place will easily shift the baroclinic boundary north. 
 

There have been lots of examples of similar patters to this. Some were very snowy. Some not. And the difference in most cases was how much cold was in the pattern. Early Feb 2018 was an example of a mostly fail (we did get one 2-4” snow event but the rest were rain) and it’s because we were coming off a 10 day torch and there just wasn’t that much cold injected into the pattern and so each wave easily tracked north regardless of how far south the boundary might have been a day before. 
 

Think of 2015 in comparison when we had arctic air injected into the pattern and we managed a warning snowfall from a wave that tracked way to our west!  Unless we want to be rooting for extremely weak waves we want a very cold airmass in place which will allow amplification to still have a chance to work out. 
 

2) looking even further out I am becoming more convinced we also end this season with a bang in March regardless of what happens between now and then.
 

when I made my seasonal forecast March was a wildcard. But as I start to adjust the analogs for how this season is actually going the years with a warm March have all fallen away and the ones where we had a cold snowy ending are left. 
 

We likely get some kind of relax period between now and then. How lucky we get during this upcoming -epo TNH pattern and then in March plus how long the relax in between is probably determines how good this winter goes down in terms of snowfall. But it’s been and probably will continue to be way more fun than I expected.
 

Unfortunately snowfall is really fluky and doesn’t always align with pattern expectations. There are plenty of years you can look at the longer pattern and say “how did we only get that much snow 2011”

IMG_6833.png.80e9459173400e20fff17de3043630e9.png

or even “how did we get above normal snow in that 2000”

IMG_5115.png.0fcea181ce2c1c09b0f57826ecce4777.png
If you didn’t know the dates and were asked which of those years above was the snowier winter you would never guess it right lol

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25 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

how did we only get that much snow 2011”

One of my top 5 storms was in 2011  Big closed ull bowling ball with some of the craziest dynamic snowfalls we have ever seen.  I got slammed with well over a foot of snow in less than 8 hours… 

Nothing sticks out for 2000… 

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16 minutes ago, MDScienceTeacher said:

One of my top 5 storms was in 2011  Big closed ull bowling ball with some of the craziest dynamic snowfalls we have ever seen.  I got slammed with well over a foot of snow in less than 8 hours… 

Nothing sticks out for 2000… 

Was this the one the LWX down played?

 

Started as heavy rain and quickly turned to a paste bomb?  Basically closed 83 in the city and people were walking home?

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My take a ways from the 0z and now 6z runs is the models are and have continued to show a potential snowstorm for the period January 19th-21st and more to follow I’m totally fine with that at this lead.  Like psuhoffman and others have said good luck with the exact details beyond even day 4 because it will change often.  I think we are in a buckle up phase of model watching and it seems likely to me that our cold dry pattern that we havd been enjoying (crap snow totals) up here in Southeastern Pennsylvania is about to change even if we dance a bit with the baroclinic zone or amplification to allow a northern shift or warm air to intrude it’s how we roll but the forementioned details we will not know until the earliest Thursday or do this week especially in a shifting pattern. 
 

looks like we are entering that South to southwesterly flow aloft regime gotta keep the cold air nearby and hope the southeast ridge directs the storms here and overwhelm us with warmth. 

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1 minute ago, Interstate said:

Was this the one the LWX down played?

 

Started as heavy rain and quickly turned to a paste bomb?  Basically closed 83 in the city and people were walking home?

Yes.  It was a great storm. I made a lucky call on that one from like 7 days out. But it was a below avg snowfall winter despite a great pattern for long stretches. 2000 was an above avg snow year despite a shit the blinds pattern 90% of the time because we hit huge multiple times the one week we had any hope. 

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34 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

Think harder…

You are right .. 2000 was a big January.  Now I realize  why I don’t remember it.. I was in the Caribbean most of the month on an Oceanographic research expedition.  Getting off the plane at bwi with a beard and tan only to get a snow storm a few days later.

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16 minutes ago, Heisy said:

20th time frame is gaining more steam. I thought initially we’d be delayed a few days to wait for the cold air, but the ridge out west has trended East, and things have sped up a bit.


.

Yeah, we might need to try to score early as models have trended drier for the following week 

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35 minutes ago, Interstate said:

Was this the one the LWX down played?

 

Started as heavy rain and quickly turned to a paste bomb?  Basically closed 83 in the city and people were walking home?

Right! It was commutageddon .. lots of cars up and down the 95 corridor were stuck for hours.. some abandoned.. I remember going out with a shovel to help dig people out.  My wife thought I was crazy.

https://wtop.com/weather-news/2015/01/history-disastrous-snow-storms-d-c-area/

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One of my top 5 storms was in 2011  Big closed ull bowling ball with some of the craziest dynamic snowfalls we have ever seen.  I got slammed with well over a foot of snow in less than 8 hours… 
Nothing sticks out for 2000… 

Jan ‘11 might have been my last legit thunder snow. I was living in downtown Bethesda and was on a jebber when lightning struck right overhead of me. Instant loud crack.
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19 minutes ago, Heisy said:

20th time frame is gaining more steam. I thought initially we’d be delayed a few days to wait for the cold air, but the ridge out west has trended East, and things have sped up a bit.


.

For now, the way it looks on the EPS is the storm on the 19-20th may end as snow- but best signal for frozen is to our NW. The following wave for the 21-22 window is by far the stronger signal for frozen in our region.

eta- the 6z GFS has the same idea

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42 minutes ago, Interstate said:

Was this the one the LWX down played?

 

Started as heavy rain and quickly turned to a paste bomb?  Basically closed 83 in the city and people were walking home?

Yeah, Commutageddon on Jan. 26, 2011.  Also known as the "PSU Hoffman Storm" (@psuhoffman alluded to this above with his early call about that event...I even remember the thread for that event, it was labeled with his name!).  I got 8" snow in about 5 hours from that, it was amazing...thunder snow even.  It started as literal chunks of ice falling in the late afternoon that quickly turned into large flakes.

I wouldn't exactly say that LWX "downplayed" the event so much.  There was a sort of predecessor event in the pre-dawn and early morning hours that some areas did well in, prior to a lull, and then the main snow later.  LWX as I recall actually upped the advisories in the area to winter storm warnings by late morning on the 26th, and even highlighted the potential commute issues (since it was to start right around then).  I think most of the problem is that a lot of people figured it won't be too bad by the evening commute, so not many were sent home early.  Or, they were sent home only a little early, but by then it was kind of too late...everyone was out on the roads.  I know of a couple of people who lived a bit north of the DC metro area who were stuck on the roads until like midnight or 2AM! 

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3 minutes ago, CAPE said:

For now, the way it looks on the EPS is the storm on the 19-20th may end as snow- but best signal for frozen is to our NW. The following wave for the 21-22 window is by far the stronger signal for frozen in our region.

It’s hard to differentiate the waves in the means because if timing differences but looking at the individuals it looks like the initial wave with the front on the 18-19 goes west then the follow up wave immediately after actually has shifted south some and on 0z eps the bullseye is right on us. Some members miss NW but an equal number miss SE also now.  
 

After that there is absolutely no consensus with a scattering of waves all over but it looks kinda dry actually for a few days. It looks like out at day 15 there are signs of another wave amplification coming. 

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2 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

It’s hard to differentiate the waves in the means because if timing differences but looking at the individuals it looks like the initial wave with the front on the 18-19 goes west then the follow up wave immediately after actually has shifted south some and on 0z eps the bullseye is right on us. Some members miss NW but an equal number miss SE also now.  
 

After that there is absolutely no consensus with a scattering of waves all over but it looks kinda dry actually for a few days. It looks like out at day 15 there are signs of another wave amplification coming. 

Agree. That's why at range I rely on the mean. Look at the 24 hr precip and temps and 24 hour snow and that gives the best indication of wave timing and ptype, and that's the basis of my earlier posts.

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3 minutes ago, CAPE said:

Agree. That's why at range I rely on the mean. Look at the 24 hr precip and temps and 24 hour snow and that gives the best indication of wave timing and ptype, and that's the basis of my earlier posts.

One good sign is the 50% snowfall continues to increase also. It spiked up from 1.5” to 2.5” at DCA on the 0z EPS. 

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There continues to be ambiguity regarding where the MJO goes after its current traverse of the cold phases. The GEFS and GGEM favor more MC amplitude and less countermanding forcing in the IO or Pacific. The euro and CFS have a much weaker wave into the MC and more conflicting forcing signals. To the point I would even argue the forcing looks more favorable than not on the whole. 

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