MountainGeek

24 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

The Sunday system would be a nice snowstorm if this were a month later.  

I'm going with "winter showing its hand" as to the the base state and storm track....this is just a pre-season warmup for the main show! 

16 hours ago, UniversesBelowNormal said:

Not a big fan of the Pacific this Winter. 

Why?

6 minutes ago, WxUSAF said:

Super  look on the GEPS. Seems biggest variability in the ensembles over the last couple days is in the Aleutian low and associated EPO and PNA domains. Yesterday’s 12z EPS looked a lot like that GEPS plot, then it weakened the ridging in the west coast and NAO region overnight. But even in a weakened state, the looks are still good. They’re varying between “solid/decent” and “pants tent”, which is a pretty good regime to be in. I wish it was December...

Yeah I really would like to know whether Nov is merely a "head fake" before we torch through half our prime climo in Dec/Jan, or a glimpse into perhaps the base state setting up for winter. Guess we'll find out in a few weeks......

5 minutes ago, Bob Chill said:

GEFS/GEPS both pop an -EPO last week of the month. GEPS signal is so strong it's a closed ridge at 16 day leads... lol. Wut?

 

We're seeing a lot of absolute primo upper level panels for a coastal storm lately. They keep getting better too. I said a bunch of times back during the 13-15 stretch about how I would like to see what would happen with a nasty -EPO and -NAO. heh. Might find out...

IMO seeing coastals pop up is a good thing regardless since it means there's a chance this winter pattern might feature at least some favorable periods.

All for a nasty -EPO and -NAO as long as it's not overdone to the point where we're getting suppression. I'll be thrilled to see our SE friends cash in on Miller A's that start in AL as long as they eventually get around to mauling us. But I'll take a pass on smoking cold cirrus while watching Atlanta get hammered by a southern slider.  

9 hours ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

 

Wow -- incredible amount of information and very informative with lots of detail and explanation as to what's going on.

I found this section re NAO prediction fascinating -- and quite an interesting history lesson re the contributions of @UniversesBelowNormal:

18 hours ago, frd said:

Not to jinx us, but love seeing the orientation of the PV combined with the location and from there tons of snow will be put down just to our NW and a breeding ground for some very cold air delivery, eventually a direct discharge. 

We did not have this last year. Also, it seems the atmosphere, at least so far, is conducive to showing ( and delivering ) a good pattern. 

Hopefully any turn to the milder later in November is just a reload, or a brief moderation.  Still like a normal December with snowfall opportunities.  

 

Also I like seeing as much early cold as we can over the GL region.....the quicker we can get the lakes cooled down and partially frozen, the less moderating effect they have on the cold shots coming down from Canada. Since so many of our events have at least a portion of the subforum flirting with the freezing line, every degree matters.

19 hours ago, frd said:

If you believe the notion that this will be a back loaded winter, combined

with a  possibly colder and more active November leads me to think this March will have higher odds of snow and cold. With the exception of last March,  we have trended to winters lasting longer, and starting later in this decade.

.................

Granted October 2009  was much colder , then November turned warmer in time 

 

 

Yeah I never count March out -- it can be a lot of fun sometimes if things line up just right. In a couple of the "bad" years, our best storm of the season was mid or late-March. 

It will be interesting to see if there's any similarity to 2009 this time around, one obvious difference is the Oct cold in 2009 seemed much more widespread and this year it was cold west/warm east. 

46 minutes ago, losetoa6 said:

Impressive 850 temps  -11 , -12 

30s for highs n+w ..nice . Even drops trace snow in Carolinas lol

November is the new January!

40 minutes ago, rclab said:

I like your explanation. Sadly it makes picking the correct 5 + 1 for mega and power ball look easy. As always ......

Thanks -- don't forget to mix in general atmospheric chaos/butterfly effect, a VERY short recorded data timespan (relative to all of past history).....trying to predict longer term and seasonal weather has lot of parallels to picking numbers or trying to "game" a slot machine. Quite a few of the folks who participate in this forum enjoy hitting the casino as well...I don't think that's a coincidence. And the nice thing about weather is when it pulls the rug out from under you, you only suffer a hit to your pride and not your pocketbook. 

3 minutes ago, Maestrobjwa said:

Again which begs the question...will the benefits lag until NEXT winter...or will we already feel them this year?...

Depends on the lag duration....on the positive side: solar was very low last year as well so if there's, say, a 1 year lag, we're getting any benefits now and next winter might get even more "help" in that area. If there's not a lag, then we're getting any benefits as we go in real time. All good, right? 

But remember it's never only one factor -- the ultimate winter outcome is a combination of dozens of known factors (and maybe even more that we still don't fully understand yet). And of course the possible links between low solar, HL blocking, colder winters, etc are still being explored, so no guarantees. 

19 hours ago, BristowWx said:

that's the one! it can snow in November

Quite so.....we got 6 inches on Nov 15 last year.....

10 minutes ago, losetoa6 said:

Saw that. And many Eps members showing pretty strong ( esp this time of year ) sprawling highs penetrating the Conus day 9 -10 . 

We got 5 or 6 inches last year on Nov 15, maybe an early start again for this season?

Would be really nice to get a little appetizer on the board up front, say a couple inches or even some mood flakes. The years where we're completely shutout with torches or "no chance" patterns until late Feb or March are the worst......

2 hours ago, WxUSAF said:

I think it’s more that long range ensembles typically show a pattern washed out in space and time, where there’s typically more variability, especially in winter, due to storm systems that aren’t seen in long range ensemble means. As you get closer, the ensembles resolve that variability. For example, next week still looks BN overall, but it was looking like wall-to-wall cold a couple days ago. Now you’re seeing the ensembles pick up on a brief warming around next Wednesday due to SW flow ahead of the next cold front.

That said, the gfs and GEFS definitely have a cold bias in the long range, and there’s also a tendency to overdo HL blocking. 

I’m buying the cold look more right now because the Eps is very bullish on cross polar flow.

Ah yes, good point that the ensemble washout wouldn't "see" brief warming periods related to return flow, etc....which then start to factor back in closer in time and moderate the original extreme.

I think your approach of analyzing the background state and other supporting factors (or lack of)....like the cross-polar flow you mentioned.....is a smart way to evaluate whether the LR might be on to something or if it is just out to lunch (or trying to lure weenies into early reapings). 

3 hours ago, WxUSAF said:

Certainly a very cold look for next weekend on the ensembles. I’d wait until this weekend before being comfortable with how cold that ends up. Colder looks in the long range tend to modify with time.

Would it be reasonable to say that, more often than not, most LR modeled extremes (hot, cold, HL blocking, etc) tend to moderate somewhat as we get closer in time? That has been my general experience. I figure it has something to do with compounding of modeled errors out in time creating a tendency to overdo things a bit.....

Interesting thoughts from Cranky on the upcoming winter:

http://www.stormhamster.com/entry2/e101819.htm

Something you've seen me post since the summer and the process continues to reinforce. We just watched two October storm setups born off this very pattern being emulated by our stream flows. We'll watch the next attempt to do the same.

Does this persist into winter? If so I continue to say we could see several more classic arctic outbreaks and classic coastal winter storm tracks.

I am not talking about a ceaseless onslaught. The overall winter pattern in my opinion likely features the blander milder November, a colder active December, then January/February maybe a little above norms, with March/April possibly featuring another late period colder/active return.

Yet within all of that? Expect a few more classic outbreaks and storm tracks.

Of course, it is still early, and it will be another 4 to 8 weeks before we truly know if the support we see now is still in play by then.

3 hours ago, WxUSAF said:

Ukie cancels winter

 

Got any verification scores for handy for that model? 

Also early on last year it seems like almost every model in the LR seemed to be predicting a big -NAO that just kept sliding out into the future and never actually materialized. Maybe we'll play opposite again this year to our advantage. 

Wow -- just checked in to see if the winter discussions are starting, and was pleased to find quite a lot of solid technical discussion and good data points! Here's to hoping we can keep this "quality post" trend going...and looking forward to another fun winter tracking season. 

Pleassseeee just once -- it's time we had a low solar + Modoki + neg NAO + warm blob epic winter. 

On a more serious note, I'm liking what appears to be a more favorable PAC shaping up, since the PAC really hurt us several times last year. 

Like I've been saying, April 16th is the day to watch to appropriately bookend the season vs Nov 16th! 

OTOH, shift the entire thing east a bit and maybe we could force the IRS to close on April 15. 

1 hour ago, psuhoffman said:

And it’s not from the coastal next week...it’s a day 11-12 storm around April 10th lol. 

 

April 16 is the threat window to watch, I'm tellin ya.......Nov 16th and April 16th will be appropriate bookends. 

11 minutes ago, BristowWx said:

Can’t remember the exact year of the last one..want to say 1998

Not the most recent one, but per: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/capital-weather-gang/wp/2014/04/03/you-wont-believe-how-late-it-snowed-in-d-c-in-colonial-times/?utm_term=.bfbf413844f7

• The Great April Fools Day Storm of 1807. From the Ohio Valley to the northern mid-Atlantic, anywhere from 1-4 feet of snow accumulated, with the higher amounts, of course, in central Pennsylvania, New York, and New England.
• April 5, 1863 recorded 12 inches of snow in Georgetown, Washington, D.C.
• DC's latest measurable snow was on April 28, 1898, when .5 inches fell. 

34 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

The real threat still looks good 

 

You know one of these years the April Fools storm will eventually verify.......2019 seems as good a year as any for it to happen. 

27 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

I’m gettin fringed 

The PSU-FRING index is the best single teleconnection for us getting snow. 

1 hour ago, Ji said:

Gfs suppression next week. Too cold!

Maybe instead of Nov 16 it's going to be Dec 9 for the other bookend..... OTOH, can you IMAGINE the trolling PSU would dish out to DT?

2 minutes ago, losetoa6 said:

Eps member E12 has a 36 - 48 hour HECS day 8/9.  Definitely our best shot period for an anomalous late season hit .

Under 10 days -- it's a lock!

52 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

This one is more realistic for all of us 

Is that a real member or did you just pull Dec 9, 2018?