MAG5035

Yea ground could be part of it to a degree. I do think the combo of the solar and the LSV temps (a degree or two either side of freezing this afternoon) is the main culprit with the light fluffy snow. Guess we can call it a combo of all three. If temps were about 5-10 degrees colder I don’t think the snow would be disappearing as easy. Solar is getting into that part of February where it becomes a good bit more noticeable going into the second half of the month but it’s not going to do much to an established pack if temps are cold. I hope so, missing these events going east is getting old.. although I did overachieve with my T last night haha.

@canderson is going to be mulching the garden today after all lol.

Light snow here currently, which is already more than I was expecting to see from this. 29ºF

Still some pretty big differences with the 3k vs 12k NAM, given upstream radar trends at PIT,RLX (Charleston), and JKL (Jackson, KY) I’d say the more filled in presentation of the 3k is more on track. I wonder if the GFS is going to ever see this event before it starts in the LSV.

Nah not really, the warm day yesterday relegated it to being pretty patchy. The only area nearby that likely has any solid pack left is the higher elevations in the Laurels. Despite holding on to a half decent pack for about a month or so, our snow averages back here aren’t much better than the LSV percentage wise. I consider a winter in the 45-55” range to be average in this specific location.. I’m just under 20” at the moment. In the Laurel’s, Blue Knob Ski Resort has noted a season to date total of about 44”, while Seven Springs has 54”. Laurel Summit’s (near the 7 Springs Resort) average is over 150” and Blue Knob is in the same ballpark with it’s seasonal average.

Nah I’m just joking haha

Between all the Sixers talk and the talk about daffodils and getting the garden going the last couple days I was wondering if I was still in central PA lol.

High was 52ºF after a low of 16ºF this morning, so quite the diurnal range of temps (+36º). Also pretty dry with dewpoints mostly in the mid 20s this afternoon, so not a complete meltdown…but open areas did melt off pretty good today. Yea at this point I just want a straight-up 5-10” snowstorm with no baggage (mixing), preferably this month. I haven’t looked super hard past the next couple weeks but I feel like if we have a total pattern change and more extended warm spell towards the end of the month, we’re likely to have another potential cold/wintry period sometime in March probably about the time when everyone starts really getting spring fling in here.

Currently 17ºF/15ºF outside. This is the current situation just down the street… another busted water line. Fortunately my water comes from the other way. That’s the 3rd one I’ve come across around the city in the last 5 nights. This cold stretch has done a number on that and the roads (bulges, pot holes, etc).

Here’s the member plots for MDT on 24 hr snow for both 18z Euro and GFS. I mean it’s still a good majority with not much but there’s definitely a signal there on both ensembles. The GEFS mean is showing roughly the evolution of what the last couple runs of the GFS op has been doing while there appears to be some Euro members (about 6-8 on rough count) that manage to yank this thing up the coast (even one or two cut and had the snow swath in western PA). 18z Euro EPS 18z GEFS Will say these ensemble meteograms looked nothing like this at around this range when we were trying to reel in the 1/28-29 storm. It took a while into the game before they finally started locking in on that one. So we’ll see if the better signal earlier can continue to improve. This is definitely worth watching the next couple days. Like I’ve said, we have the pattern alignment we need showing in this timeframe with a great western ridge. The key is how the features interact and their timing.

18z GFS pretty close to making a decent event with the potential Valentine’s Day-ish storm. Actually for the forum majority (LSV) it’s pretty good H-burg south. An improvement from 12z which had a lighter area of snow run the Mid-Atlantic but not getting into southern PA. Looks like it’s generated from the northern stream energy attempted to interact with the southern. Canadian today also had this (pretty light) while the Euro was a nothing burger. Definitely don’t think this threat is dead. The pattern alignment is there in that timeframe that if we can get good interaction/phase in time, this can be the type of event we’ve been looking for. This could also turn into another 1/29 (in terms of placement of best snow) if this comes back toward the storm scenario but not in time for us. Or… it could be nothing, but I think we’re already aware of that possibility. Either way this is still D5-6, which has felt like the limit this winter for the models starting to consistently start dialing in on something. Not that they ever are consistent at that range and beyond but models have seemed to have more trouble than usual in the mid range this winter. Likely due to the progressive pattern and many moving parts.

Some updated thoughts on the pattern. The quoted above was the large post I made back on Jan 28th for reference and review. First off that was at the time, in the 5-7 day range of what was for most in here our messy waste of QPF last week…but it did remind me that the event at that range had started on most modeling as a mostly rain event and a more pronounced warm-up. And while it did end up mostly rain for roughly SE half of PA, it did end up being more focused on the second wave and cold did get into western/northern PA to make for a half decent ice and snow event by the end. And western PA cleaned up some Friday with the remaining deform snow. Anyways, main focus on this post is the pattern going forward. There’s really no big changes to my overall thoughts, especially the portions of my quoted post I bolded. We really are going as the Pac goes in terms of the teleconnections with a +NAO/AO. This week, we have troughing over Alaska which cuts the Siberian connection and also turns the source region a bit more Pacific-ish even though there is still solid Pac ridging. Additionally. we have a pretty established +AO. Both of these things will act to evacuate true arctic air out of the CONUS. Still, our region will have seasonable chilly weather with a couple bouts of days with somewhat above average temps. Other issue with these points is the storm track. Clearly a northern branch dominated week with several clipper waves running it. However, the pattern alignment has the mean storm track taking the clipper lows fairly well north of PA. The result of this becomes the aforementioned bouts of above average surface temps with the milder temperature pattern and W/SW flow ahead of the clipper systems. This also usually presents downsloping issues east of the mountains in said W/SW flow with precip. Definitely a week we could have benefited from even just a little bit of help from the NAO/AO realm. Next chance of a bigger system appears to be roughly near Valentines Day, but there’s several issues to overcome there. Lot’s of different moving pieces is one issue, especially in the northern branch. That has been a theme for the last month or so since we’ve established the colder regime back in early January. Timing a phase with a less robust southern stream and associated issues with ejecting energy out of the SW US/Mexico is another. Still a chance to be be watched though as we do set up a western ridge/eastern trough for this timeframe, but currently it looks too progressive and not enough dig and interaction of features… with progression likely enhanced more given +NAO/AO. These are common Nina issues which by the way, we are still in presently (NDJ ONI average was -1.0ºC). Despite that, some of the US precip patterns have been very non Nina-like, especially in the Pac NW. A drier California is a pretty common thing but the Pac NW usually has above average precip in a Nina. They’ve been shut out the past month just like California has. I suspect that has had to do with the anomalous and very persistent northern Pac/western US ridging.. which has helped us stay in the game for systems (with not a lot of luck locally) and have provided us with the colder Eastern US version of the La Niña state temp-wise. The MJO has indeed tended more towards Phase 2/3 in the last week, and is forecast to remain in that realm at least in the interim.. esp on NCEP guidance. Those phases are “colder” phases, and the trend has staved off my worry of a renewed pulse running 4-5-6 during the business end of February. Something like that would have likely helped move along the type of wholesale pattern change in the Pacific that would have taken us out of commission in the East. The Pacific teleconnections still look workable, with the EPO/WPO trending back negative. Those two tellys are starting out neutral (WPO) to positive (EPO) this week as part of what had been a forecasted brief reversal from both being persistently negative. And you can see how we quickly lose the really cold air out of the pattern in the CONUS with that brief reversal. The cons are no help from the NAO/AO (pegged at a solid positive), and some trending toward a negative PNA toward week two (esp on Euro and CMC ensembles). So that’ll be interesting to see what that does if it comes to fruition. I suspect a negative PNA would instigate more storminess and precip across the CONUS but could put us on the wrong side of it if it’s too strong given +NAO/AO. This all boils down to me having the opinion that the second half of the month could be a good bit more active than what the first half is presently shaping up to be (sans the Feb 4th event).. but with that could come more swings in temp anomalies and less persistent cold. That’s nothing really groundbreaking for how the second half of February typically goes, but the chance should be there to cash in on something.

Yup, there’s also part 1-9 of coverage of this on Youtube, since you guys have been reminiscing about old school TWC. Jeff Morrow traveled west from H-burg to Breezewood to cover the snow. This was a huge storm, especially between here and Pittsburgh but this area had about 2 feet. State College had 18” despite turning to mix/rain mid-storm.

This area back here usually does mix and ice events like I’d imagine Worcester, MA does New England nor’easters. Even with how quiet the next week looks you’ll probably see some more snow up on the plateau with the NW flow.

My totals were approx 0.1” of ice, a T of sleet and a T of snow… oh and 2.02” of regular rain. State of the snowpack, that snow hole can stay on my neighbor’s side of the tree line haha.

One thing I forgot to mention last night was Penn State Main Campus actually cancelled classes today for this event. You could imagine all the “back in my day” comments that came from that decision.

Woke up a bit ago to freezing rain and sleet here and temp down to 31ºF. Never thought I’d be so glad to hear the pingers. Driveway, deck, and cars are pretty froze up. There doesn’t appear to be a big amount of ice in the trees. Rain gauge is at 2.02”, this was one heck of a rain event. Looks like the local rivers are going to just barely miss flood stage. I think the only thing that kept this from being a full fledge flooding event was a lot of the snow pack staying in tact.

Yea that’s quite a difference, just using the official stations you can see that stations like LNS and THV have a pretty decent southerly breeze and that even extends up to Reading too. If I’m being honest I think York, Lancaster, possibly Adams, and those few LWX counties Hagerstown east are probably the rest of the way cooked for this event and I wouldn’t be surprised if they get dropped from the advisory. Ice accruals reaching a tenth and more I think likely stays Harrisburg north and west and probably more so out of the city. The issue in the LSV is if the precip shuts off before the cold air can get down there, which is looking more likely. HRRR shuts off precip there there by about 17-18z and the cold’s too late. NAM hangs a few hours longer and does get some measurable mixed down into the southern counties. The new 0z HREF still supports the advisory as well but it may end up being too cold overnight vs the current ground truth with the warmer temps that snuck up into the southern tier.

Down to 34ºF, moderate rain. The rainfall portion has definitely exceeded my expectations today around here in terms of totals. Gauge is at 1.42” for the event now.

Looking at the Mesowest obs, the 32ºF line is starting to ooze under the I-80 corridor from the north. About an hour or two ago the nearest <32ºF ob I saw from that direction was Coffin Rock haha. The temp here is now near 35ºF and the NNE breeze has ramped up some gusting up to 15mph, so the low level cold air advection is in action. Been watching the HRRR and I think temps could be to a point to start supporting ZR here a couple hours before it’s been advertising it here (by about 10pm or so vs after midnight). Guess we’ll see.

Temp has been slowly starting to fall, down to right at 36ºF currently. Since midnight it has only ranged from 34.3 - 37.4ºF today. Winds are light NNE. About the only good thing from this whole mess is I’m finally getting to see how my rain gauge is working. That’s at 0.89” for the event so far.

I could certainly at least see a few flood advisories pop up this evening for the smaller tributary and poor drainage type stuff. From what I saw around here before dark there was a pretty good response with run-off and most of the small streams and drainage channels are snow/ice clogged. It’s either doing that or just absorbing into the snowpack.. but definitely not into the frozen ground. Unless there’s any ice jam type issue I think the bigger streams/rivers will be okay, although all those rivers you mention are forecast to get at or near caution stage. Main stem Susquehanna looks to be only a modest rise.

This is pretty much the condition of every non-paved driveway around here today despite mid 30s temps, and we haven’t even got to the actual winter storm part of the system yet haha.

That was out of part of CTP’s morning discussion. I agree to a point, you have to be careful with modeled freezing rain as actual observed ice accrual is very sensitive to drop size, rain intensity, surface temps, etc etc. 0.75” of conditional freezing rain QPF on x model doesn’t often translate to 0.75” thick ice on the trees. With all that said, my big thing about this particular event the last couple days is I feel there has been sufficient support to reach 0.25” ice in a good portion of this swath of the CWA mentioned above on that AFD snippet. I honestly expected watches to be issued yesterday on all the counties at least down to I-80 given that support plus this being a multi-faceted potential high impact event between the combo of near warning to warning level ice plus sleet and snow..And they’re still worried about this rain to heavy sleet thing too. As far as surface and road temps, I agree with that in the Sus Valley but most of the interior 2/3rd of the CWA between US 6 and US 22 has a snowpack and frozen ground from the long stretch of cold weather. Some of the secondary roads around here froze up early this morning despite temps above 32 since about mid day yesterday. Plus if sleet does in fact mix in sooner, that’s just going to cool surfaces faster anyways. And further down in the Sus Valley I was surprised first thing this morning that it initially wasn’t included when advisories finally did get issued. I guess I don’t understand why it took so long. A T of ice warrants an advisory, and that has looked likely even in the further reaches of the LSV for awhile. Just my thoughts, I’m not hating on the NWS by any means. Moral of the story is this type of event is very difficult and frustrating to forecast.

Haha I normally keep heat around 68ºF or so in the main parts of the house and I can fire up the wood pellet fireplace to warm it up more without bumping up the regular heat.