bubba hotep

Forecast high today was 26. Sitting at 21 with snow.

Your strategy of get the cold in place first works out again!

487 FXUS64 KFWD 061955 AFDFWD Area Forecast Discussion National Weather Service Fort Worth TX 145 PM CST Fri Jan 6 2017 .MESOSCALE UPDATE... Clear case of CSI enhanced snowfall occurring over the northern half of the DFW metroplex with radar showing the classic banded appearance. The enhanced instability across the DFW area is forecast to rapidly diminish and shift eastward by 3 pm, but these bands are going to drop near a quarter inch of accumulating snowfall across the northern half of the DFW Metroplex and into Hunt and Hopkins counties and have updated the forecast to reflect that. So far impacts from this snow have been minimal in the DFW area, as cold pavement temperatures are allowing the light fluffy snow to blow to the sides of the street. With the increasing stability and decreasing moisture in the snow production layer, the intensity of this snow will wane to just flurries over the DFW area and end altogether by mid-late afternoon. TR.92

This band is looking decent, the graupel could be an indication that instability is increasing as the base of the trough swings through. We officially have a dusting at my place.

902 FXUS64 KFWD 061745 AFDFWD Area Forecast Discussion National Weather Service Fort Worth TX 1145 AM CST Fri Jan 6 2017 .MESOSCALE UPDATE... This section is a technical discussion of the dynamics for winter precipitation to point out the features we are watching closely through the afternoon. The forecast remains on track. See earlier update for that type of forecast information. Precipitation is continuing north of I-20 as the upper level shortwave trough approaches. This is causing frontogenetical lift to increase near 700 mb which is the critical layer for precipitation in this event. Parcels lifted near 700 mb are in a region characterized by weak convective instability (CI) or conditional symmetric instability (CSI) as depicted by EPV* charts. The strongest frontogenesis at 700 mb coincides very well with the location of a band of heavier snow from roughly Lawton, OK to Hobbs, NM. This band is tracking southeast, along with the best frontogenesis forcing, and therefore we can use 700 mb frontogenesis forecasts as a proxy for the location of heavier snows. While a radar loop would imply that this band will be tracking through North Texas around mid afternoon, there a couple of factors that will cause this precipitation to weaken. The first being that all models forecast the frontogenetical lift at 700 mb will begin to weaken by mid to late afternoon. The second more important reason is that rapid drying is forecast to occur near and above 700 mb around 2 or 3 pm from west to east over North Texas. This will obviously limit the moisture for significant precipitation but it will also result in increasing stability aloft that will end potential for CI/CSI. We should see the impact of this dry air with radar echoes clearing out rapidly from west to east across the CWA between 2 pm and 5 pm. If we don't start seeing an erosion of these echoes by 3 pm in our western counties, it will be because the models likely have miss-diagnosed the amount of dry air. This would result in slightly higher amounts of snow along and north of I-20, but even in this case we're talking only a half inch more than currently forecast. TR.92

Latest HRRR run is trying to get some snow for DFW, esp. the northern burbs:

Anyone getting flurries? NWS Fort Worth ‏@NWSFortWorth 6m6 minutes ago 7:55 AM: Getting several reports of snow flurries scattered across the Metroplex, and a few reports of drizzle in the south. #dfwwx #ctxwx

Ratios will be great. I would rather watch flurries than watch rain while waiting for the warm layer to give up.

Last year was obviously a massive bust but the last few years prior we always seemed to have at least one system that wasn't supposed to do anything turn out to be an 1" or more. I remember one that ended up being thunder snow and nearly 2", forecast the night before was for cold and cloudy.

Don't fail me now HRRR!

Hard to argue with FWD, but they are probably playing the conservative side. I would move the Trace - 0.5" line down to b/w McKinney and Dallas

Pretty nice shift in the SREF this evening. I like to use a SREF blend of DFW and PRX for MBY. The trend at DFW today and the 21z PRX plume both look encouraging:

Looking at the Euro a bit more, it is slower to dry out the low levels. It looks a lot like the Texas Tech WRF were the flow at H7 is slower to turn allowing for better moisture to be in place as the better dynamics appear.

One trend in N. Texas this past week or so has been for the models to be too dry in the lower levels. Does that hold for tomorrow?

00z Euro was 0.5" area wide with some locals up to 1" depending on ratios.

I'm going to DC at the end of January and to Santa Fe in February. I hope that I luck out on snow on one of those trips, dial this storm up again in February!

It really wouldn't take much of a shift in the thermal gradient to get that banding down to N. Texas

18z GFS with that oh so close 1" band

WPC has us almost in the 10% probability of 1" or greater band. 18z GFS was encouraging and Euro was a slight improvement. I'm thinking "car topper" to 0.5" for us.

I prefer the JISAO data and see it widely used, honestly, I rarely see anyone use the NOAA numbers for PDO. It's not surprising that this La Nina event failed given how warm the overall Pacific was. I don't think there were any analogs with a strongly positive PDO and a medium/strong La Nina. However, the atmospheric response has certainly been more ninaish than I expected given the weak and short lived look. MEI rose from -0.379 to -0.212 and the corresponding '98 numbers were -0.973 and -1.05. Hopefully, this a sign that a wetter Spring might set in.

IMBY or bust! We've scored on some of these marginal setups in the recent past. I still think we'll see plenty of model shifting, with two of the main players still several days away. It's just that the shifting will probably be between nothing and maybe an inch, not a lot of room

Basically all models showing measurable snow for N. Texas except... The Euro. We've seen this battle before and seen the Euro win. Still, pretty tricky setup and we could see plenty of more shifts over the next couple of days.

We got lit up pretty good by the storms this morning, first real thunderstorm action in a long while IMBY. Ended up with a little less than 1/2" to add to the rain from yesterday morning, not a soaker but better than the last few systems.

Looks like the 1st watch will snag Ft. Worth but Dallas and areas east of I35 will have to wait until later: Mesoscale Discussion 0002 NWS Storm Prediction Center Norman OK 1011 PM CST Sun Jan 01 2017 Areas affected...Much of Central Texas Concerning...Severe potential...Watch possible Valid 020411Z - 020645Z Probability of Watch Issuance...60 percent SUMMARY...Thunderstorms will increase in coverage and intensity later tonight, with damaging winds and hail expected. A watch may be needed prior to 06Z. DISCUSSION...A rapidly moving cold front continues to move eastward across West TX, with several wind gusts in excess of 40-50 kts measured and only sporadic lightning. This front will gradually interact with an increasingly unstable air mass, still well to the east as of 04Z. However, increasing flow in the low levels just above the surface will help transport mid to upper 50s dewpoints northward out of South TX, with a rapid uptick in storms along the front expected as MUCAPE of 500-1000 j/kg develops. This in turn should allow for a line of storms along the front, with both wind and hail possible. ..Jewell/Hart.. 01/02/2017

At this point, I'll just be glad to see some rain.