CAPE

Perpetual is always good. I would be totally into that choco cherry stout.

No heat pump. Better have a woodstove or a generator.

eta- the sleet/zr up north is from tonight into tomorrow.

This is a pretty flawed set up. Might just get it done. We have seen plenty of textbook ones manage to shit the bed. Pretty typical lol.

Good run, if you ignore the dumb snow maps. Actually took snow away from me and placed it further south. Who cares. Good thump and cold when it counts.

I guess my expectations were so low I just have no reason to hand wring over how this goes. My snowpack died today for the most part, so nothing to protect, and given the hostile look for the coastal plain just a few days ago, whatever frozen I get I am fine with. The NAM might have the right idea, and if it does, so be it. Then I get 90% rain as I expected anyway lol. Given the trends on almost all other guidance though, I think it is most likely the NAM being the NAM at range, and is probably out to lunch.

Back to the Cocoa Loco from Black Flag. I really like this stuff.

Lets face it- this is all about the front end. This is a GOOD look right here.

Pretty big improvement on ICON compared to 12z.

I still need another 50 miles or so on most guidance in general to feel good about a few inches on the front end. On the NAM I need 250.

Nice discussion(as usual) from Mount Holly- Thursday: A rather nice (if you like wintry weather) sfc configuration will be in place over our area on Thursday with a robust cold high positioned north of the area, with the resulting NE flow creating a nice CAD setup. However, the upper-lvls will be a bit less favorable, with the the H5 trough-ridge configuration being shifted a bit west of the "textbook" positioning. This results in a slightly more westward track of the surface/850 lows, with the consensus track of the sfc. low being just offshore of the NJ coast on Thursday night, while the 850 wave would pass overhead. All that being said, the trend over the last couple days has definitely been colder with this system with the east coast ridge trending flatter and the northern High trending stronger with each guidance cycle. Consequently this setup would likely result in a general thump of snow Thursday morning into early Thursday afternoon, before warmer air arrives aloft and we see ptypes transition from S-N to sleet/freezing ran/rain Thursday afternoon into Thursday night. The main questions now are how long-lasting and powerful that initial "thump" of snow is, and also how quickly the column warms . Given a solid 600-700mb FGEN signature in the warm advection regime, along with increasing UL divergence in the right entrance region of the northern jet, would not be surprised if the initial snow-thump packs a punch, and many locations could pick up several inches of snow fairly rapidly on Thursday. Given the robust CAD setup would also not be surprised if many locations NW of I-95 never get above freezing and thus see only frozen precipitation during the entirety of the event. This scenario would also largely alleviate any hydro concerns as the warm temperatures/rain would not fall on the areas with the healthiest snowpack. The one real dissident solution to the general evolution described above is the NAM, which has the system more amplified and further west, and as a result has a howling (70+kt) SWrly 700mb jet moving through the area early Thursday. This results in rapid warm advection aloft, with a very quick transition to sleet and thus limited snow accumulations, with also a fairly pronounced dry slot. The NAM can certainly act as the "canary in the coal mine" for warm nose potential in these setups so it can`t be discounted off hand. However, at the same time feel it is sufficiently at odds with the consensus synoptic evolution that it was largely ignored in this package.

Yesterday they were focused more on rain falling over wet snow pack and flooding concerns, so it seems they are shifting their thinking some with the latest trends.

I need some suppression for it to be good here.

Agree,. Success largely hinges on getting some pretty robust blocking though to keep the SE ridge in check.

Yes.

The pattern looks ok to me going forward, as long as the positive spike in the AO and NAO is temporary. Both the GEFS and EPS have the AO/NAO going negative the last few days of the month and into March. With a significantly -PNA being forecast, we need the blocking.

An evolution like the Euro will still rain on the coastal plain given where the coastal low would develop, but the lowlands probably wont avoid that in this set up. Just give me some snow/sleet on the front end and I am good.

It seems to be moving towards that camp. This is one thing I have noticed on the Euro and Para- more of a focus on that vorticity max out ahead.

Looking upstairs is much more informative than trying to glean the specifics for trends from surface maps.

There has been more of an emphasis on the lead energy out in front of the main trough on the Euro and Para, which gets the coastal going sooner and further south. The last couple runs of the GFS/GEFS took a pretty big step towards that idea.

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