Holston_River_Rambler

The tension is building:

Woo hoo!!! I just checked radar and was about to ask what you had. The precip band is still about 4-5 miles north of me.

Looks like they're headed towards my way too. Little warm up here at my place at 38, but we'll see.

Ehrmergerd, could it be? GFS 50 mb Heights: GFS 10 mb heights: GFS 10 mb temps: Obvs still a long way to go, but 6z GFS was interesting regarding the strat.

NAMs, RGEM, and RAP all show a quick shot of snow tomorrow AM for extreme NE TN and SW VA. Just based on living here as long as I have, the RAP's solution looks realistic to me: I fully expect 27, 8 x 10 glossy photos with circles and arrows illustrating all 27 snowflakes that fall, lol. Seriously, if I could get away tomorrow AM, I would drive to the Grayson Highlands and brave the biting ponies, for my one exact hour of light snow.

TBH, I'm kind of waiting for Jeff to lay the smack down on me for bringing up the MJO again. (And from Twitter no less). Please be merciful Jeff. We weenies have to have hope.

Thoughts? Webb has a Masiello endorsement...

RGEM still showing a few flakes Wed AM: The NAM suite is ever so slightly flatter with the jet to our north and so there isn't as much lift. And just so it's clear, I'm not hoping for some crippling doom storm. I'm shooting for an hour of wet, light snow somewhere in the N. Plateau, SW VA or NE TN. But hey the "Thunder in the Mountains" (TIM model) is coming in with a good run at 12z:

OP Euro wants to make sure we are good and soaked :

A little (always successful ) "just in time" wintry action at the end of the hi reses at 18z

In terms of just having some cold around the TN Valley (which is I guess where we are at this point), the Euro has some light snow over KY in the wee hours of Wed morning.

One thing I do worry about worry about with the MJO progression is that as it works its way east, it gets shunted south of the equator, and the 0z GFS shows jus that: That's not to say that the GFS is right, but it is something we've seen before and the kiss of death would be for it to spawn a TC in the southern hemisphere that rolls SE. Here are the EPS members takes on how this could unfold through Dec 19: ] Def does seem like the wave will make and attempt to push east, but exactly how strong it is and how far it gets remain to be seen.

Normally not a huge BAMWX fan, but:

Today felt like a January thaw after the past few weeks. It just feels weird to have the January thaw feeling/ warm breeze before Christmas. Gut feeling is that this is going to flip hard later in Dec. I know, I'll go ahead and do it myself:

Overnight Euro starting to get ye olden rainy GFS look: Let's consider the OP's Norther American look at the end of its run: Obviously not a good look, but how many good looks have we seen at 240 hours that dissolve within even 7 days? Even if this does happen, (climatologically more likely than a good look for us) notice the connection between the SE ridge and ridging over Baffin Bay. Carvers, I think, remembers that look from 2018. Might could be some warming up yonder: now a little bit lower at 50mb: To me, even though the temp anomalies are close to stacked up, they don't quite sync up, so there is some instability (TBH not sure if that is the right word for anything that high up) I think there's some interesting stuff happening in the strat, but not only do we have to get to mid December to see how it plays out up there, but then we have to wait to see how and if it trickles down to the troposphere. GFS is not as enthused as the Euro for the temp anomalies.

The GFS speculates that any unfortunate aridity shall soon come to an end with our normal La Nina El Nino Winter monsoon pattern. Just think what surpluses of rain John could reach between today and April?!?! Trend gif of the last approx. 16 runs of the GFS total precip EPS members (admittedly only one run) seem a bit drier: But you know, if the we do actually get into the floody pattern that we all know and love, soon janetjanet will pay us a visit or two.

Found a fun new tool this AM: https://re.ssec.wisc.edu/?products=MIMICTPW2.100&center=11.178401873711785,-157.14843750000003&zoom=2&width=1316&height=780&basemap=bluemarble&labels=line&view=leaflet&timeproduct=MIMICTPW2&timespan=-24t&animationspeed=100&animate=true

For those interested in the strat visuals: GFS 50 mb heights and then 10 mb temps: Same for the Euro:

Overnight Canadian model was happy and full of joy

I don't quite feel like this winter has, as Carvers would say, "shown its hand" yet. To be fair, it is November 24 though. There just isn't anything that has jumped out to me as a death knell or a reason to be very excited. There have been things that have looked horrible in the medium to long range (Pac configuration) or awesome, (-NAO), but neither has turned out to be a deal breaker or maker in the short range. Currently, both OP models have some things of interest in the medium to long range: Euro Pac jet looks interesting: 500 mb on GFS looks interesting in the AO region: There are some interesting things on the GFS's OP longish range (10 -15 day) tropical forecast that are reflected on some EPS members, but not sure how much stock to put in them at this time. No Isotherm outlook yet either. He suggested in his critique of his own work that he would have benefited from waiting until the end of November last year, so maybe that's what he is doing.

@Blue Moon can we get some Lake effect pictures to hold us over until the AMO flips? Pretty Please??

Incontestable proof, proof I say, that EPS Member 8 loves us and wants us to be happy (days 13 - 15 anyway):

For one of the few times I can remember, the RMM plots looks pretty similar between the operational GFS and Euro: Euro RMM: GFS RMM: GEFS RMM: In terms of atmospheric convection, there seems to be a pretty good spread all across the W Pac and Maritime Continent: Western Pac had petered out a bit for a couple of days (at least that's how it seemed to me), but looks sorta healthy again. Michael Ventrice has a cool new way to visualize the way tropical convection helps modulate the Pac jet: source: http://www.atmos.albany.edu/student/ventrice/real_time/maps/mjo/global_analyses.html You can watch the jet extend as the VP200 anomalies drift east. To me, it looks like the MJO wave is trying to creep towards the western Pac, but weakening a bit as it does so. Last but not least we have the Paul Roundy Waves page: source: http://www.atmos.albany.edu/facstaff/roundy/waves/analogs/analogs.html I think that animation is showing the heights at 300mb as they might evolve through mid December, given similar situations in the tropics (but I may be totally misusing or misinterpreting that data and animation). If someone has a better read on the Roundy data, please let me know so I can use it in a better way.