MAG5035

The next run in the HRRR cycle will be an extended one (0z) so we’ll have a look at the full event with that run. The last few regular ones have been pretty aggressive with the lead precip shield, which is needed if we’re going to get a meaningful period of snow/frozen up front. 

850mb temps actually are a bit above zero prior to precip arrival, so it’s important to have that heavier precip to get the column cooled before warm advection eventually wins out later tomorrow.

Here’s 850mb at Hr 12 right before precip arrives and hour 16 when it has gotten into a large portion of C-PA

I think the big takeaway from that potential system a couple days after New Years is that it looks like it finally might be a catalyst of a much awaited reshuffling of the pattern that could get cold air more consistently on this side of the country. I don’t think we’ll be well positioned for the system itself however at that point with the southeast ridge still raging leading up to that.. unless we see the evolution with the follow up wave. That typically is a long shot of actually working well for us but it’s certainly possible. This system in general is definitely strongly agreed upon by all the models, though. 

In the nearer term, we have the first widespread advisory products of the season issued:

Merry Christmas everyone!

It’s been a pretty rainy morning here. We need the rain but it’s pretty blah that we’re getting it on Christmas Day. It also was in the upper 30s til about mid morning, then temps rocketed into the mid 50s. Also had this happen briefly while I was making this post if anyone had Christmas rainbow in their bets for random holiday weather. It’s already now cloudy and raining again. 

Not sure what to think of this Monday system, I’ve been keeping an eye on it. Seems like we’re going to have two cutting waves in quick succession Mon and Wed. Monday’s has some surface high support for a time, while Wednesday probably ends up rainier (though models have had some different takes on the beginning of that one as well). Gonna concentrate on Monday for now. I tend to think the potential snow burst is going to be brief with this. The column starts marginal, especially at 850mb.. and it’s going to quickly get advected above zero. Could we get a quick inch or two in spots? Perhaps, if it comes in fast with heavier precip and we wetbulb the column down briefly. The upper Sus Valley MDT north seems best positioned for that possibility. 

This seems like more of a potential several hour period of sleet/freezing rain though, with the best icing potential where it always is.. in the interior central counties of the ridge and valley. NAM had been extremely disinterested in any organized precip at all but the 12z 12k run looked more like the other models. NAM has been warmer in terms of the column though, esp at 850mb. There’s a big time difference between 850 and 925mb in the central counties. For instance Hr 54 at KAOO has -2ºC at 925mb and +9ºC at 850mb. That indicates to me more of a straight ZR scenario. The globals have been colder, which allow for the period of snow and/or sleet. The NAM’s warmer column actually seems like the better bet in this setup IMO,  but we shall see. I do think this is going to merit the first widespread advisory event of the season for CTP’s CWA. 

Now officially Christmas Eve this is probably about as good as this Christmas is gonna get in the snow department. A dusting of snow and a semi-caved street.

Plot twist, it’s snowing here right now. 

I think the detriments of our general pattern are quite clear at this point. You have the PNA forecast to dip to like -6 or even lower on all guidance the next few days (older Euro shown). Tonight’s GEFS pretty much the same magnitude

That’s getting into stupid negative territory.. and it only pulls back up to -3ish in the longer range. This is currently the dominant teleconnection signal for us IMO. The decent -NAO developing isn’t enough to counteract something like that on this side of the country. I went pretty in depth into this in my last post a few days ago on page 63 (24 pages ago already!). So that brings the MJO…

Euro is being shown again, but the GFS/GEFS has the same general theme. That’s a whole 15 day forecast stuck in phase 7. Several days ago we had more movement towards or into 8. Now we don’t.. which I think plays into the whole seeing the pattern change 10+ days out “never getting closer”  in range on the operational guidance. Phase 7 for the east isn’t the blowtorch phase that 4-6 is this time of the year, but it is not ideal. I’m applying the DJF average since we are getting close to January… and quite frankly it just fits the current situation better.

Look familiar? 

To refresh on these maps, the one circled on the right is a correlation map. Basically, places on the blue and purple end of the spectrum show a high correlation to the what the temperature pattern shows whereas the reds and oranges indicate a lot of variability. So you can see the east is mostly warm in this phase but not to the extent of 4-6. 

As I see it, I believe the MJO is having a pretty big influence on the overall pattern given that it has been at a pretty decent magnitude.. especially driving that Pac Ridge into Alaska. If you loop through the 500mb on ensemble guidance (like tonight’s 0z GEFS for instance) you’ll see how remarkably stable the significant features are (Pac ridge, western trough, NAO blocking, etc). To me it just sort of all lines up that these things aren’t shifting along with the tropical forcing (MJO) being stuck in Phase 7 and continuing to be forecast to remain there at magnitude. These are pretty anomalous features too, especially on the Pacific side. The NWS in San Diego forecasting 1.5-2” of rain in San Diego metro with 3-4”+ in the surrounding hills from later today through Friday eve is generally not how you run a Nina down in southern Cal. The unsettled and very wet pattern is definitely greatly needed out there although that much rain is going to cause flooding problems in that particular region. 

It’s just how the playing field ended up setting up and there’s not much you can really do about it. If the MJO would’ve decided to take a seat for a month in Phase 8/1 I’d wager we would be having a way different discussion right now. I don’t see us as completely shut out on opportunities, but we’re going to be limited until this pattern gets jolted in some fashion. Even just relaxing the West Coast trough (aka neutralizing the PNA some) would likely help a lot if we keep the -NAO/AO/EPO, which has also been showing longevity in the longer range ensemble forecasts as well. 

4 hours ago, TimB84 said:

But beyond that, it’s frustrating. First the pattern was changing the week before Christmas, then right around Christmas, then right after Christmas, but now we’re on the precipice of losing New Year’s too. That said, I love what things are showing after New Year’s, but I just can’t trust any of that. But all will be forgiven between me and the weather gods if it happens. 
 

I won’t go and quote the posts from around this time in 2019 (I wasn’t here then), but that thread is an interesting read and, without the timestamps, I’d think it was from this month. All sorts of hope for January and we all know how that turned out.

Well I started the thread that year starting right at this time of December haha. I know it doesn’t mean squat if the goods don’t start piling up in everyone’s yards but fundamentally we’re way different than 2019-2020 so far. The dominant thing that completely derailed pretty much that whole winter (really starting in January) was a relentless record positive +AO and +NAO that in the case of the former with a record strong PV, kept cold locked up well north a majority of the time. That ugly prognosis was starting to become evident on longer range modeling about this time in December and especially the last week or so of the month that year.

At any rate, I said right at the beginning of the month when it was looking like things we’re going to backtrack during the mid-month timeframe that this taking til after the holidays was on the table dependent on the MJO. Looking at todays forecast, we’re still stuck in 7 for at least several more days. I’ve also mentioned that even though that phase for NDJ skews a bit cold for the northeastern US, there’s not a high correlation to it definitely being cold.. or at least significantly so. This transitions to skewing towards a warmer eastern US and cold western US when applying the DJF three month average. Basically, what I’m seeing in terms of modeling the next 7-10 days or so makes sense to me with regards to that, and the following discussion is speaking most directly towards the next 7-10 days. 

The big issue I see is this, and it’s kinda being somewhat overlooked in here.. or least it feels that way.

I’m using the Euro ensemble there but it’s like that on all the major ensembles. That’s a pretty strong -PNA. The good thing is we should have the -NAO and -AO blocking, as well an -EPO although it looked like the Euro EPS and GEFS differed a bit on magnitude. The -EPO is good (the ridging into Alaska) because that turns the source region of air away from Pacific origin to being of Canadian origin and also allows the colder air to press. Unfortunately with a -PNA/low heights in the western US the way it is.. the main part of that cold at least initially presses there and not so much on this side of the country. The NAO/AO blocking is going to help though, which is why we’re going to at least be seasonable for Christmas week but probably not really super cold. From a storm standpoint I see there being a disadvantage of separate streams (weaker systems) or if one amplifies some that we get cut… which is what the operational models are showing. We could get some kind of winter event but it’s probably going to be a weaker one. As I see it we need to obviously keep some -NAO/AO and either shift the PAC ridge axis east or build the ridge to the West Coast… which I think happens when we finally boot the MJO out of phase 7. Overall, I still remain optimistic we’ll get a period of what we’re looking for. If I wasn’t optimistic about it you guys would know. 

5 hours ago, canderson said:

Anyone know the record number of days highs were above 40 at MDT in winter? We are gonna be near 15 at least soon. Insanity. 

Yea I mean as @Blizzard of 93 said, MDT’s average high temperature is still in the 40s and it doesn’t drop below 40ºF till December 31. And then 12/31 - 2/4 is the period of the year where MDT averages under 40 for a high, dipping to about 38ºF at the coldest. So # of 40ºF+ days isn’t really going to tell one much in December. Maybe the # of days of 60+ for a high or something like that, which we’re going to have at least one of those tomorrow. 

I know it seems like we always have high expectations for deep winter in December but more often than not it really doesn’t go that way.. or if we do have a wintry period it’s often offset by a significant warm spell somewhere in the month. It’s definitely been mostly mild this month so far but nothing I would consider historically warm… and alot of us have had dry and chilly nights as well. We certainly haven’t had say a Dec ‘98 type warm spell. For comparison, UNV was in the mid-high 60s 7 out of the first 10 days of the month that year, with two of those days cracking 70ºF. MDT had FIVE STRAIGHT DAYS of 70+ for a high from 12/3 to 12/7 with 75ºF being the peak on the 7th. 

On the other hand while our weather here in C-PA hasn’t been particularly crazy this month at least so far, the tornado outbreak last Friday in the Midwest and todays severe line of storms in the Plains (warning statements with 95mph storm motion) along with hurricane force wind gusts in a handful of mid-upper plains states (triggering wildfires in Kansas) is absolutely insane. This was a very extreme past week in weather for portions of the US. 

Also insane.. super typhoon Rai. Why’s that matter here? That’s likely what’s currently screwing the MJO up… “stalling” it instead of progressing where we want it go (through 7 into 8 preferably) 

The big issue I see with the overall pattern getting into the second half of the month is despite nice trending on teleconnection forecasts with the EPO in the process of flipping negative,an eventual development of a -NAO (though looked more east based) and a AO being neutral/somewhat negative (more negative as time goes on with GEFS), the PNA is forecast to stay really negative throughout the period on all models/ensembles.

The EPO going negative will take away the overwhelming Pacific air source region and allow the cold air to push into the US, but the western trough (-PNA) implies southeast ridging in response. For us, the opportunity is there for a well timed system to give us maybe our first decent event of the season (such as what the 18z GFS has near the 21st). It could also not materialize at all or it could and get wiped out by a warmer system as the aforementioned pattern alignment probably puts the storm track pretty close to us. We need west based negative NAO/eastern Canadian blocking to force significant cold into our area if we’re going to work with a -PNA. MJO plays into all this as well, forecasts “backtrack” the MJO towards or even back into a 6 for a time before making the move to 8. Not a very big MJO expert but tropical forcing/convection takes time to make a pattern response in the mid-latitudes.

I do read JB here and there when I’m using the Weatherbell stuff and he did point out the typhoon tracking towards the Philippines. That extra source of convection (in the Phase 6 region I believe) is the cause of the MJO chart showing that “backtracking” toward 6. With regards to the MJO I think we need to see the definitive move to 8 before we see some more significant cold in the pattern for us, and that could take some time. Again like I said the other day, I think the pattern we’re looking for is coming but it could come after Christmas. 

10 minutes ago, Blizzard of 93 said:

@MAG5035

Any chance of severe in CTP today?

The biggest severe threat is likely to be the gusty winds with the frontal passage and associated narrow band of heavy rain/thunder that is currently just west of Pittsburgh. SPC only has a marginal threat in western PA and SE PA. A lot of central PA east of the Alleghenies with the exception of the southern tier LSV has remained stable and cool air dammed all day. SPC does have a 2% tornado threat in SE PA.. which is probably the best area to advect in warmer, humid air and tap what will probably be really meager (if any) CAPE to go with the increased shearing  near the frontal passage. Something to watch maybe York/Lancaster. Otherwise, I’m not super concerned other than just the general high winds we’re going to see late today.

41 minutes ago, Itstrainingtime said:

CTP's summary of today's snowstorm:

PUBLIC INFORMATION STATEMENT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE STATE COLLEGE PA
1120 AM EST WED DEC 8 2021

...SNOWFALL REPORTS...

LOCATION                     AMOUNT    TIME/DATE       PROVIDER             

...PENNSYLVANIA...

...CAMBRIA COUNTY...
EBENSBURG                     T IN     0800 AM 12/08   COOP                 
GEISTOWN                      T IN     0700 AM 12/08   COCORAHS             

...CAMERON COUNTY...
EMPORIUM 2.6 S                T IN     0845 AM 12/08   COCORAHS             

...CENTRE COUNTY...
PORT MATILDA 2.2 ESE          T IN     0700 AM 12/08   COCORAHS             

...CLINTON COUNTY...
RENOVO                        T IN     0700 AM 12/08   COOP                 

...ELK COUNTY...
ST. MARYS 1.7 SE              T IN     0600 AM 12/08   COCORAHS             

...MCKEAN COUNTY...
PORT ALLEGANY                0.2 IN    0800 AM 12/08   COOP                 
BRADFORD 5SW                  T IN     0800 AM 12/08   COOP                 

...POTTER COUNTY...
COUDERSPORT 7SE              0.3 IN    0700 AM 12/08   COOP                 
1.4 W COUDERSPORT             T IN     0700 AM 12/08   COOP                 

...SOMERSET COUNTY...
GLENCOE 1 E                  0.4 IN    0700 AM 12/08   COOP                 
SOMERSET                     0.4 IN    0800 AM 12/08   COOP                 
CONFLUENCE 1 SW              0.2 IN    0800 AM 12/08   COOP                 
HIDDEN VALLEY                0.2 IN    0800 AM 12/08   COOP                 
WINDBER 7SE                  0.2 IN    0700 AM 12/08   COOP                 

...SULLIVAN COUNTY...
LAPORTE                       T IN     0553 AM 12/08   COOP                 

...TIOGA COUNTY...
COWANESQUE DAM                T IN     0700 AM 12/08   COOP                 

...WARREN COUNTY...
WARREN                       0.2 IN    0700 AM 12/08   COOP                 

...YORK COUNTY...
DOVER 4.2 WSW                 T IN     0900 AM 12/08   COCORAHS             

Lol, definitely an elevational component to this storm with the Laurels cashing in on the huge jackpot. 

Crushed

Heavy flurries and 31°F

The NAM appears to continue to be leading the way with the Wednesday system having much substance in terms of snow amounts across PA. The 3k version even has the 1-3” swath running more NW across northern PA. Today’s Euro does actually jive with the NAM with the swath placement, there’s just not a lot of QPF. More of a T-1” event with focus above the southern tier and LSV. GFS/Canadian pull the focus to the developing weak coastal low taking best precip and potential snow through the northern Mid-Atlantic/DC folks. 

Given the pattern I could see the cold not pressing south as much with todays frontal passage and seeing an eventual result more towards the northern solutions being presented, which I suppose is good in the short term and getting some kind of minor + snowfall in C-PA but unfortunately this overall pattern we’re facing going into at least mid month is not looking good for everyone’s cold December forecasts. I was also one that expected a quick start, though we did have some cold weather and a bit snow in the latter parts of November. Teleconnections looks atrocious with pretty much all of them opposing what we need (-PNA/+EPO/+NAO/+AO etc). One of the key things I mentioned in a previous longer post about the pattern is we need the PAC to be more supportive this winter as we can’t depend on the kind of extreme -NAO/-AO blocking that helped counteract a Pacific pattern that often wasn’t very supportive. So mid month is looking pretty toasted save for maybe that weekend system providing some kind of changeover thing behind it. Regardless, any cold isn’t sticking around in this pattern. 

How long this lasts probably depends on what the MJO does, as it is becoming of a stronger magnitude that should be a more significant driver in the overall pattern…especially in the alignment that’s being forecast teleconnections wise. Some models have been wanting to mire that in the Phase 6 or Phase 6/7 border range before maybe starting to shoot into 7 towards the end of the medium range (basically getting near X-mas week). As it’s been talked about here and elsewhere, Phase 7 for the NDJ three month avg period is a colder phase for most of the lower 48, in stark contrast to Phase 6.. which is NEVER a good phase for the eastern CONUS at any point in the late fall or winter. Also an aside on Phase 7 around our part of the country, a deeper look into those significance %  maps that go with the phase temp maps suggests a lot of variability in the eastern US vs say like the north central. Basically what I’m trying to explain is a flip to cold isn’t necessarily the slam dunk here that it probably is in the northern plains. A lower percentage on the significance map (the blues and purples) are stronger correlations to the temp pattern presented for each phase, which are based on historical cases. Phase 6 always presents basically the strongest case of “if it’s in this phase, the eastern US is toast”. 

So the MJO has been into Phase 6 for the last few days, which we are going to be seeing the influence of later this week as the EPO goes way positive to go with a pretty negative PNA. It seems the GFS/GEFS get it into 7 faster than the Euro/EPS, which is the one that keeps it mired in the 6/7 border longer. The latter is probably not going to flip our pattern to cold and you’d probably want to see it start steadily progressing 7 heading towards or into 8 (a better NDJ cold phase for the NE) to actually see what the 12-15 day range of the GFS has been showing. For the record I do still think we’re going to get the cold/wintry period we’re looking for down the road but we’re going to have to navigate this lousy period and however long it lasts first. Hopefully we won’t have to wait til after X-mas but that’s unfortunately a possibility on the table at the moment. 

14 minutes ago, canderson said:

Heavy snow hitting the mountains headers toward Mifflin and Juanita and Perry counties. Looks like some real whiteout stuff actually.   
 

@MAG5035you in this band?

Yea it’s a pretty robust band coming. There were actually some lightning strikes detected with it when it was near Cambria/Blair counties. I’m not home the next day or so but It looks like it’s delivering a fresh coating of snow over in Altoona. Here in NW Huntingdon County there’s not much going on at camp. The elevation here is only about 800ft or so and I think it’s just a bit warm. Just a few miles away towards US 22 at Water Street it’s trying to lay on the road looking at 511PA cams. 

I’m sure up the mountain where we hunt is a different story, here was a pic from this morning up there. Measured about 1.2”. My cameras at home looked like they had a similar amount (which mostly had melted this afternoon).

From this morning:

Just mainly some light snow so far with a light coating. Nice to be back in action with the winter events.

I’ll be reporting here and there overnight and tomorrow on the proceedings tonight, just from camp in NW Huntingdon County. I’m expecting a general 1-2” here and over at home in Altoona. 511 cams already have snow covered roads up in Cambria (219 corridor near Johnstown). 

1 hour ago, Atomixwx said:

Feels weird looking at WGAL's forecast no longer having any skin in that game.

 

I am now at the mercy of... Joe Murgo...

 

Shid.

He just did his wintercast the other day that I just watched through. Top three analogs, 05-06, 08-09, 11-12 with 05-06 being the strongest. Calling for the cold December like most and meh the rest of the winter. It’s a 20 min video, he starts into the actual forecast part at about the 16 min mark lol. 

https://www.wearecentralpa.com/weather/weathercast/wintering-weather-a-your-weather-authority-special/

I think there’s light snow chances to be had in this short-medium range pattern that sets up behind the main shortwave and attending frontal passage Thurs night into Fri. Temp wise it looks like we’re going to have a solidly below average regime at least into the middle of next week after Thanksgiving. Models imply a northern branch dominated storm pattern and have shown that one or more of these fast moving shortwaves could produce some kind of a light event. Case in point today’s 12z Euro/12z Canadian for the period around Sunday/Sunday night, which both showed a weak northern branch low redeveloping on the coast (Euro was a bit south of the area and Canadian tracked the low across a little high). Something to keep an eye on…. Not really a big hitter look for us by any means but a 1-3” type deal that runs through with one of those embedded shortwaves is easily within the realm of realistic possibility.

Regardless, I think we’re in a okay spot as it’s only late November. I mentioned in my last post several days ago I didn’t think we were ready for any kind of established deep winter pattern yet and it seems like it’ll be a work in progress getting into the early part of December (teleconnections don’t look as great after mid week next week). Nothing that’s really out of the ordinary, though. This time of the year is often a transitional and very changeable period. 

2 hours ago, Bubbler86 said:

The losetoa 2021 Storm

https://www.cnn.com/2021/11/16/weather/thanksgiving-travel-weather-forecast-storm/index.html

 

Haha I was gonna post that CNN already has a hype article on this possibility but you beat me to it. 

This was the timeframe that the one GFS run a few days ago had a monster with like 20-30”+ of snow over a large part of PA. The Euro has also occasionally had wound up coastal runs that had interior PA snow. It’s definitely a timeframe with potential with what looks to be a pretty significant amplification of the pattern and favorable trending of pretty much all the major teleconnections going into next week (NAO/AO going negative and nice Greenland block, EPO/PNA going positive). Big takeaway regardless of the eventual evolution of the features that may or may not deliver a coastal is the Thanksgiving holiday and the couple days either side look like they could be pretty cold. Some of you guys might even have to turn the AC off haha. 
 

I’m not sure if a straight up winter pattern sticks quite yet. Kinda looking more into the start of December or so for the possibility of that. The early stratwarm events and Nina ENSO state are lending support to what has seemed to be a general theme of a quick start and cold December in most prognosticators winter forecasts. Lining up the teleconnections and keeping them in the direction they appear to be heading next week will def go a long way to giving the east a cold pattern right off the bat kicking off meteorological winter. The return of significant blocking in the NAO/AO realm really saved us last winter against a pattern on the Pac/western US side that was rarely favorable. So one thing I’m looking for as a key to success of consistent cold winter weather this winter is having the favorable Pacific/Western US pattern as I wouldn’t trust depending on seeing the kind of long lasting anomalous -NAO we saw last year. 

Some lingering light snow falling and 35ºF. Wasn’t home for the heavier precip earlier but it looked to have been a light car topper here.

I did get my first official “roads caved” pic of the year at the top of Wopsy Mountain. Didn’t have a ruler with me but probably about 1.5” or so of wet snow up there in the grassy spots. Seemed like about 1500’ was where the switch flipped from a car topper to a coating+. There’s some light accumulation on the ridges east of Altoona as well. IMBY was just a couple hundred feet elevation too low for this one. Either way, good to see a wintry type event fairly early just getting to Mid-November. There was even some light WAA snow falling first thing this morning as well but temps were too warm. 

Seeing the first flakes of the season mixing in up here at my hunting area on Tussey Mountain (NW Huntingdon Co)

Some thoughts on Sunday evening’s system.. It’s been a pretty consistent feature on modeling the last several days. This has a pretty good chance at delivering the first widespread bout of snow in the western half of PA and maybe into some of the central counties. It could have been for the rest of PA as well but the trend has been for models taking the low pressure through the lower lakes.. which will spell downsloping issues east of the Alleghenies and in general take the primary slug of precip up through western PA. I don’t think accumulations will be anything too significant, maybe up to a couple inches in the higher terrain. At any rate, winter is definitely upon us soon.

On a related note, how bout that 0z GFS coming in? I’ll take 36” of snow on the ground for Thanksgiving lol. 

There’s some kind of fire up to the north of here today, visible on the regional satellite as well as from my house here. Looks like at the top of the Allegheny front somewhere above Tyrone or maybe a bit further north. Unsure if it’s an actual brush fire or controlled burn, haven’t seen anything on the news.

Shortwave IR

Visible

5 hours ago, Itstrainingtime said:

Honest question  - who's the worst game day coach? Franklin or Tomlin?

 

I don’t usually get super fired up like the Facebook/Twitter coaching staff gets when either team doesn’t do well but I was def mad about having Boswell run a fake in a close game like that. Let your pro bowl caliber kicker do what he does best. 

With regards to this week, I think the big story is going to be the marked change from October’s persistent warmth with this new pattern finally bringing C-PA a below average regime temp wise. As I mentioned last week, it appears we will be addressing the fact we haven’t had a widespread frost or freeze pretty directly to open up November. A weak disturbance Tuesday will likely deliver the regions first snowflakes at elevation as well. 

I know there were some rumblings on the models of an end of week coastal but I think pattern’s a bit progressive to give us much from whatever materializes. Thus I think dry and chilly will be the general theme this week. Considering how far behind the leaves are I don’t know if I’d want an early season snowstorm quite yet. 

Already some early strat-warming going on and associated disturbing of the PV. So that’s going to be interesting to see how it factors into how we open up the first part of the winter, specifically after say Nov 15-20th or so into December where snow threats become more doable if the appropriate pattern and cold are available.