Geoboy645

Yeah outside of the 11/30 snowfall and a rain event in early January we haven't had a significant precip event essentially since mid August. Hopefully this incoming active Pacific pattern has some widespread precip events in the next few weeks otherwise we are going to have some Problems as early as April. Especially if we have another Smoke Drought in May and June like 2023 which is a distinct possibility this year.

Yeah I am concerned about getting a warm precip event on top of this snowpack. Especially in the Ohio Valley where there's a higher chance of them being in a rainy warm sector and there's a recent history of significant heavy rain in February. There's a general 3-9 inch snowpack over the region with deep frost and frozen streams. It doesn't even take that much rain or snow on the ground to have a major flood. Nebraska in 19 only had a few inches of snow and like and inch of rain. The region has had bad experiences with that type of flood before, notably in 1913 and 1936. Even up here anything like the March 19 warm sector and we have problems as well.

Yeah here at Madison its easily been the coldest and snowiest first half of winter in a while. Even with the Christmas warm wave and first week of January. We are at 38 inches of snow so far at the airport with about 12 of that over the last week. That's a total that's only been "recently" surpassed by years like 07-08, 08-09, and 00-01. We have a general 3-7 inches of snow OTG. Pretty good start to say the least.

What was originally looking like a pretty standard cold wave for mid January has now become a potentially very significant cold wave for the region. Model runs are showing sub zero highs for at least the northern parts of the subforum on Friday and potentially Saturday. And some runs like the most recent GFS have daytime highs on the level of the 94,96, and 19 cold waves at least N of the IL-WI border which is extremely impressive without widespread deep snow cover. We have already had sub -30 wind chills and sub -5 daytime temps here today, and if we don't cross 20 on Wednesday we may have at least 10 days straight of sub 20 highs.

Yeah this cold blast could be significant from a duration perspective. Nothing super crazy for temps, but we could be talking at least a week of sub 20 highs if we undershoot Wednesday by a couple degrees which is possible with the fresh snowpack. The Holiday cold wave was sub 20 for 12 days here so that's the modern mark for duration of a cold wave imo.

Meanwhile here around Madison, we just had one of most localized snowfall events we have had in a while. The original forecast for Friday into Saturday was 1-2" Friday morning and then another Friday night. Instead we had a localized Fgen(?) band setup Friday night over the I-94 corridor and just sit for about 18 hours. With some occasionally heavy rates of 1-1.5" of an hour, Madison ended up recording 5" of snow on 1/16 and 5.6 on 1/17, although the snow depth doesn't quite represent that because of settling.. This was a very dry and fluffy snow too, so we could have localized ground blizzard like conditions tomorrow with the cold blast. Thing is, this band was not much wider than Dane County. I have some snow up here, but like 3-4" not 6+. And if you go N to Portage or S to Janesville they may have like 2-3 OTG. This honestly feels like a summer MCS that forms and doesn't move and dumps 5-6" of rain in a night, but just snow instead.

MKX mentioned a potential upgrade to Blizzard warnings for the northern CWA if some of the higher end winds come to fruition in their afternoon AFD. Even without that, wind gusts up to 60 mentioned which iirc would be our strongest synoptic wind event since 12/15/21. So that's fun I guess.

Around here the accumulations don't seem like they are going to be that significant, 2-4" or so. However, the wind and flash freeze are going to make things bad for travel tomorrow night and Monday morning. Actually it's probably a good thing we don't really have a preexisting pack for this storm or else this would be a slam-dunk ground blizzard for most of the region. Further N, easily the most severe winter conditions since 1/12/24, if not the March 23 set of blizzards. Wouldn't be surprised if the Blizzard Warning gets extended S into WI from the UP and the LE belts.

This winter reminds me a lot of 22-23 just shifted 2 weeks earlier. Early cold and snowy period followed by a long period of storminess on the W Coast and warmth here in January. Hopefully this means we get a 22-23 like rally in February and it gets done by March 15th this time around. Madison and Green Bay recorded around 50 inches of snow in the Feb 15th to April 1st rally in 22-23. Something like that but a bit more spread the wealth and earlier would be nice to say the least.

If this incoming ridge pattern was in June or July, it would be a ridge rider pattern with MCS's every night. Good thing it's *checks notes* the week of Christmas.

For records sake, the anomaly at Madison the first half of the month was -12.6 (!). We will see what it actually ends up being by the end of the month.

Correct. In fact, from what I can tell this might be the first double digit storm before January 1st since the second storm of the December 2016 sequence, if not 12/20/12. Which is insane to say the least.

Definitely looks like the potential for a significant hit for the Madison metro is steadily increasing over the last day or so. Could get very interesting here, especially because we are potentially less than three days out from the snow starting to fall on Thanksgiving weekend, with all that entails for travel. Could see headlines and messaging start in earnest tomorrow because of this factor.

Yeah this could be a sneakily impactful wind event given it's the day before Thanksgiving and all. Could affect both air and road travel.

Hard to believe at this time last week we were talking about feet of snow falling in areas that are now over 70 degrees. Got to love November in the Midwest.

With the issuing of WSW's for Chicago and the N IN lake effect belts, I figured that this event has become thread-worthy. The main storm system isn't that notable, with the warm ground leading to at most an inch or two of accumulation for some higher terrain areas away from the lake. However, after the main system passes through we could have a significant lake effect event for so early in the year, especially on Sunday night into Monday. LOT and IWX have highlighted for the potential of at least several inches of snow wherever a main band sets up for any length of time. Combined with wind and the fact that leaves are still on the trees from the previously very warm autumn, this could be a potentially significant early-season event. Especially considering the possibility that one of the bands may set up into downtown Chicago and points south of the city, and the fact that this really has only become a thing within the last 24 hours.

Fortunately there are several indications that we are about to end up in a much more active pattern potentially starting next week. And with a still well-above average Gulf, could get interesting here for storms. The fact that, unless something stupid happens, we are going to have a Gulf like that with no TCs to cool it down before storm season kicks up is going to make things interesting for moisture availability the next couple months imo.

Yeah no complaints about the forecast for the next week. Consistent upper 60s and sunny, the perfect October combo. Much better than the June in October weather of last week. And with a hint of a more active storm pattern incoming for the second half of the month for those who are going to go "but it's so boring!"

I guess we are doing June in October again. This could be forecast for the week of Father's Day or the 4th. Not so much for October 1st. At least the days are nice though. Just to think, we have the same daylight as ~March 10th rn, where we can have a foot of snow on the ground and 20 degree highs.

Drought monitor is starting to look pretty rough to the S and E of the forum. Widespread D1 with pockets of D2 and even an area of D3 (!) in OH and S IL.

The next week+ looks like almost an exact repeat of last September's consecutive 80s streak, with maybe just slightly less intensity. Will be interesting to see how many consecutive 80s we have, which after today's date is more and more impressive the later we get into the month. And how much we recover the anomalies for the month. We bottomed out around -9 a couple days ago, so we'll see if we get close to or above average for anomalies after this stretch.

Looks to be a very cool start to the month for the entire region. Some very impressive cold anomalies showing up for later next week considering the time of year and how far out this is. Definitely a difference from the last couple of Septembers where we were in the 80s and 90s well into the month.

Woah, I did not realize it has been that dry down there this month.

Yeah I'd be alright with this weather for the next 6 weeks, with the occasional rain chance so we don't dry out.

It's been a couple years since we have had our late August first cool wave. Definitely will feel nice (smoke not withstanding) after this humid summer.