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The warm, snowless start to the season in the West is remarkable and highly unusual. Though I do have to say...with a few exceptions, its very rare to have a "good" winter simultaneously in both the east and west. The term "good" being subjective and relative to one's climate of course. No matter what any given winter in southeast Michigan does relative to climo, it will always be a bad winter to a snow weenie in Marquette and a good winter to a snow weenie in DC. The trough/ridge alignment is a huge part of how weather works. I know very little about past winters in the west, but i read a story once about repeated blizzards in the winter of 1948-49. That was a horrid, mild, snowless winter here.

Yes but if they keep winning their pick goes to The Knicks

Pacific Trough Regime 1, January Winter Storm Threats 0 Forecast Early January Pacific Trough Regime Comes Into Focus Guidance Adjusts Accordingly Next Week Last week Eastern Mass Weather discussed how the uncoupling of the intensifying stratospheric polar vortex from the troposphere was allowing for the unanticipated development of a potent west-based negative NAO block. This was a crucial part of the forecast because it was instrumental in allowing forecast guidance to model a potential major east coast snow storm during a period in early January, which represented a deviation from the winter outlook issued last fall that called for a mild, Pacific trough type of pattern in place during this interval. However, guidance has since shifted rather dramatically towards the type of pattern favored for the first half of January, which replaces the storm threat with warm up. Thereafter, the forecast for the balance of January remains unchanged. Colder Turn Around Mid-Month The pattern should remain mild overall through at least the 10th, with any significant snow threats likely related to northern New England, as the MJO tries to emerge into the MC from the neutral circle. However, the pattern will beginning to enter a state of transition, as heights begin to build on the west coast. The MJO will begin to play more of a role towards mid-month, as it enters phase 7 and constructively interferes with strengthening west coast ridging. Note the support for the EPO and WPO to both return negative by mid month. Although support for the development of a +PNA is more tepid, this is likely to correct more aggressively over the course of the next week. Ultimately the culmination of these changes is a full-fledged +TNH pattern that should ensue by approximately January 20th that will include a slew of moderate winter storm targeting the interior. Please stay tuned for more updates this month-

With the mountains picking up several inches of additional snow from our most recent clipper system, the family along with some friends headed up for some holiday season turns at Bolton Valley yesterday. Temperatures were cold – it was in the upper single digits F on the mountain for the start of the day, and it was only expected to get colder as the day went along. With that in mind, we decided to just head up for a quick tour in the morning via the Wilderness Uphill Route before the Wilderness Chair started loading. Up at the resort it was quite windy in exposed areas, and snow was still falling, so here was certainly a January feel. Based on my reconnaissance tour on Wednesday, I recommended we just stick to lower-angle terrain because even with the new snow, I didn’t think there were be enough liquid equivalent to support good turns on anything steeper than that. So the six of us toured up to ~2,700’ on Cougar and descended from there. Despite the additional snow for yesterday’s tour, I think that turns might have been a bit better on Wednesday. We were actually one of the first groups hitting that terrain for the day, so we had access to plenty of untracked snow, but the perceived slight drop in ski conditions might have been due to additional traffic on the earlier snow. Temperatures in the single digits F meant that the snow was somewhat slow as well, so that was kind of a knock against the skiing – you just didn’t glide that well, and that can be important on lower-angle terrain. After our tour, my younger son and his friends decided to hop on the Wilderness Chair for a lift-served run while the rest of us hit the base lodge, and they had fun, but the conditions weren’t good enough that it was worth hanging around to brave more of those cold temperatures and winds. Overall, it was great to get out for the tour, but even with the couple rounds of snow we’ve seen in the past few days, there’s just hasn’t been enough liquid equivalent set down yet to be anywhere near a real resurfacing. That, and the relatively cold temperatures mean that the skiing is there, but it’s just not back to anything great yet. The snowpack is quite robust though, so as soon as we get that resurfacing, the local resorts should be set up for some excellent skiing again.

https://easternmassweather.blogspot.com/2026/01/pacific-trough-regime-1-january-winter.html

https://easternmassweather.blogspot.com/2026/01/pacific-trough-regime-1-january-winter.html

Knives out….

Ice advancing quickly now. Erie more than 1/4 ice covered, as of today, which is 9% higher than the 53-year mean. The thaw next week should trim that back.

This fall/winter in Colorado so far reminds me a lot of 1976-77. That was another brutally dry winter here. One big difference I see is that the '76-77 dry spell did not go on and on. In fact the winter of 1979-80 was the snowiest recorded in Fort Collins. And the decades of the 1980's and '90's were pretty awesome for weather buffs on the front range. Once we hit the year 2000 it seems we've been in and out of drought frequently for 25 years. Anyway, sure hope we see some decent snow at some point this winter/spring - to get some semblance of a snow pack. At this point we're stuck in a weak La Nina and those are generally not good for Colorado and the surrounding region.

I was 15 and remember it like yesterday. It was an incredible storm on the heels of a nearly snowless November/December.

It is weather! One's experienced weather in one's short life or extremely small period of record keeping is just...meh.

Yeah, most of the Time that is the case.

This will only be exacerbated by climate change. The warmth and mild weather for Central, south, and west US this season is incredible. Almost all snow outside of highest elevation has been east of the Dakotas and confined to Midwest and northeast. Very impressive warmth and mild weather. Pattern change isn’t until mid January so this will persist for some time

Sierran Cordillera is looking at yet another major winter storm tonight into Monday as at least four feet of additional pow will fall tonight and over the next few days. Ski Patrol needs to stay super sharp because as much as I hate avalanches, snow slide danger is going to become quite high, what with torrential snow accumulations and wind loading from banshee wind gusts especially at the crests. Snow cornices will be likely to develop with time and can easily break off and start unwanted snow slides that can come at the high cost of Ski Patrol personnel getting caught in them. They piled up 11 to 13 inches of additional pow last night, adding to the base snowpack. Snow will begin tonight and become quite heavy, winds will blow it around and by tomorrow Jan 3 2026 the Mammoth Resort will become a milkshake froth once again. Additional storms will smash right into the Sierra over the coming days. They are gonnabe quite busy in all the ski resorts in January. https://www.mammothmountain.com/on-the-mountain/mammoth-webcam/woolly-cam https://www.mammothmountain.com/on-the-mountain/mammoth-webcam/main-lodge

Do you have a neighbor with a snowmobile?

well in fairness to them, the lottery is rigged so with their record last year, they still got sixth.

Happy anniversary to the greatest snowstorm of my life! Watching the snow pile up that day was something I’ll never forget.

So annoyed 2026 isn't good, first still sick now 2024 trucks 10 speed transmission messed up. Lol please hold off the snow for a little bit while i deal with this mess.

Some town in between Oswego and Syracuse is going to exceed six feet from the event going on there now. Winter storm warnings there tonight for 1-3 feet and snowfall rates 3-5 inches per hour. This is on top of 3-4 feet that has hit this area the last couple of days.

Looks like my high school GPA by semester.

Data collection for December 2025 is complete, so we can see how it played out via the red trace in the updated snowfall progression plot below. Around mid-month, December had accumulated about 30 inches of snow, but the productive bread and butter pattern from the first half of the month slowed down a bit, and we hit that relative lull you can see after the 15th for about a week. That lull broke for the last week of the month though, which delivered roughly another 20 inches and ensured that December snowfall ultimately wound up above average. This season, the combo of November and December delivered between 70 and 80 inches of snow, which is solid, but still at the end of that +1 S.D. range. The plot nicely shows how the last week of the month allowed 2025-2026 to pull away from 2018-2019 (green trace). It looked like it was making a run for some of those top seasons, but it ultimately fell short of surpassing 2008-2009 (orange trace) and well short of catching 2007-2008 (blue trace). Overall though, this season has certainly had a solid start relative to average as the plot shows.

ATL 15 coldest winters since 1950-1/SN 1957-8 2.7” incl IP 1960-1 0.1” 1962-3 T + major ZR 1963-4 3.6” 1965-6 0.7” 1967-8 4.2” + major ZR 1968-9 2.2” 1969-70 0.6” 1976-7 1.0” + ZR 1977-8 0.3” 1978-9 4.6” IP + major ZR 1981-2 7.7” incl. IP + ZR 1983-4 1.3” 2009-10 5.3” 2010-1 7.1” Avg 2.8” SN/IP + ~avg ZR 2.8”/1.9” = 1.5 times the 1.9” normal ————— Mild winters with 2”+: only 5 (~20% of them) 1951-2 3.9” 1990-1 2.1” 1991-2 5.0” 2001-2 4.6” 2017-8 4.7” NN to cold winters with 2”+: 26 (~50% of them) NN and BN similar chance for 2”+ So, for ATL, having a mild winter (2+ F AN) significantly cuts down on the chance for normal SN. But NN doesn’t at all. Keep in mind that often much of ATL’s snow in a season comes from just one storm.

I just do not buy Phase 6 being cold

Was hoping for a David Bowie gif

Still will be the third biggest snowfall in Methuen this season