CAPE

Looks like its been dumping snow at Frostburg this morning.

Nice thump out in W MD https://www.railey.com/deep-creek-lake-webcams/

Nice to see the forecast rain amounts here are more like 1.5" instead of the 2-3"+ from a couple days ago.

How this storm goes appears to be largely tied to the timing of NS energy and the degree of interaction/phasing. Two of the last 3 GFS runs have a healthy precip shield with moderate snow in the Tenn valley, but a piece of NS vorticity drops down on top and damps the wave, thus we see weaker surface reflection and the precip weakens as it moves eastward. The 2 basic options for a 'good' outcome seem to be- phase the NS energy with the southern wave right around the Mississippi river valley- a lot more dig and more potential, but not too far west where it amplifies too soon and tracks inland; the other option is the southern shortwave slides eastward underneath that NS vorticity ribbon with little to no interaction. A flatter solution but less complicated.

Still 10 days out. The key features exactly as depicted likely are not correct. Plenty of possibilities.

For around the 20th- still a generally favorable h5 look for a significant MA winter storm, but with the vortex in that position in SE Canada the heavier precip is mostly suppressed south/offshore on both the 0z GEFS and EPS. Cold wouldn't be an issue. This would be some light snow over the region verbatim.

EPS is easily the best of the 0z ens suite for that window. Strong signal for a coastal low.

18z GEFS pretty much aligns with the damped wave idea on the op. Less precip as it moves eastward into the MA. Not awful, but defo not the 12z run. Just to reiterate, the 12z GEFS was one of the better runs for the MA for this window. Signal for frozen through our region was quite good for this range.

Chuck..

That's good stuff! Not your typical pilsner. Love the name too.

Damn dude. A tad Jelly.

Close. The NS energy dropping in overtop damps the wave some. We know that vortex is going to be problematic, but with timing this can work.

NS hammer dropping at 168.

Shortwave is weaker at 150 but maintaining separation from that NS vorticity. This has a chance.

Founders CBS. A tad bit more substantial.

And everybody drink!

Pretty much all the runs that have snowed on us have had limited NS interaction with our shortwave of interest, esp early on. That's the main thang to watch on HH run.

This is my general takeaway.

The main fail on the op was the amplifying ridge out west allowed involvement of a significant piece of that NS vorticity ribbon, which amplified the wave too much. 12z EPS looks slightly better than 0z, but still seems to favor frozen to our NW. The 12z GEFS was solid for our area. Not seeing much in the way of suppression on the members of either model, which is a tad worrisome at this range.

That's an impressive vorticity ribbon.

Looks like a wave slides off the SE coast on the 12z run. 6z implied a stronger southern wave and NS interaction/phasing at the right time.

Pretty much what it did last run too.

6z run had something for around the 20th with a great h5 look leading in so lets see

Yes the 12z GEFS looks pretty darn good.