rockchalk83

For those Oklahoma folk looking for snow, the GFS-FV3 is a non-starter. Has a sleet -> rain scenario for all but the panhandle for much of the event. Pretty decent snow accms in S MO, though.

It does. There's very little ice on this run of the Euro. There is also a very sharp cutoff to the snow, with much of S KS & S MO missing out on the big accms.

Looking at the 12z Euro run in real-time and comparing it to the GFS/CMC models...the Euro is farther west with the high pressure, putting it in SW Iowa at 00z Saturday. The GFS/CMC have it over northeastern Iowa at that time. All the models have the high pressure at or near 1038 mb. The end result of all that is that for most of our region, Friday may be dry. The lone exception would be across S & SE OK, where light rain could breakout during the day.

Finally another SC Kansas reader! Welcome aboard.

I don’t think it’s an algorithm problem, but more of the GFS-FV3 resolving a closed low at 500 mb, which leads to a more significant moisture envelope in the cold air versus an open wave like the other models seem to be doing. To me, that seems to be the key to the forecast right now and not the cold air. It is interesting that the GFS, GFS-FV3, plus many of the GFS and EURO ensemble members were progging a closed low scenario during the overnight runs. Something to watch as we get into the mesoscale modeling beginning tomorrow.

The low pressure was modeled to be weaker, plus the high pressure was a tad stronger and farther west with the morning operational models. Let’s see what the Euro does.

To me, Euro seems to be the most bullish on the cold air intrusion, while the Canadian and GFS models are torchy. It's interesting to me that the GFS-FV3 model (still experimental) progs more ice than snow for our region in the same time frame, so perhaps, this is a slippery compromise of the operational suite. Digging deeper into the ensembles, like StormChazer said, some of the Euro ensemble members have some significant totals in the Kansas/Missouri/Oklahoma region, but caution should be used on those since sleet does account for the "Snow Depth" images. Still though, only about half or so of the GFS ensemble members have an event in our neighborhood in the day 6/7 window.

Been watching that period as well. Seems to me like the models have loosely locked on to the system coming out of the desert Southwest. The caveats to all this are 1) how fast does the colder air come down and will that act shove the system farther south? And 2) what role will the expected snowpack in SD/Nebraska play with the colder air? Does it make it colder and easier to shove farther south? It’s worth noting that close to half of the 00z Euro ensemble members had some big precip totals for that timeframe, while more than half of the GFS ensembles were dry or had minimal precipitation. Definitely something to watch thru the weekend into next week.

The Euro ensembles do show something in the Dec 3-5 timeframe, but the operational run is completely different than the GFS & Canadian as alluded to above. I'll be a curious observer in model trends over the next couple of days, too. With this most recent storm, it seemed like the models locked onto it in the day 5/6 time frame, then fine-tuned the track. Will be interesting to see if that happens again this time.

To your point, the Euro is showing Ice Storm warning totals across the Kansas Turnpike corridor on Wednesday night into Thursday morning:

The GFS does not handle the cold air well on the 12z run...NAM seems to handle it the best. The GFS initialized (12z) with 59 degrees in Wichita, when in reality it was 63 degrees. At 15z, the GFS had it at 37 degrees, when in reality it was 34. By 18z, 30 mins from now, the GFS predicts a temperature of 44 degrees. Wichita is currently at 31. The 12z NAM initialized much better. At 12z, it initialized with 61 degrees. At 15z, it had 32. It is predicting an 18z temp of 32 degrees for the top of the hour. Probably best to follow short range meso models for tracking the cold front and temps. As for precip, it would appear the NAM has been most consistent in that area regarding big ZR totals, but there are questions remaining on how shallow the cold air will be and if the precip falls heavy enough that it doesn't accumulate and warms the column from the top-down.

Thanks Bill for the very insightful answer. I am hoping to work in the NWS one day and am becoming increasingly concerned about the crush of candidates for met jobs in all facets of the industry.

This is a question for the NWS mets who read this....do you foresee a time soon when NWS would be hiring with the amount of the 1990's, or do you see a time when the NWS would downsize offices?