Ed, snow and hurricane fan

Good instability, the NAMs show a pretty stout cap.

Now a Day 4 15% risk in a similar area. NWS FWD awaits the event moving into the range of the hi-res models. ~40 knots deep shear, which is enough with a forecast near 2500 J/Kg MLCAPE and near 8 C/Kg mid level lapse rates (producing almost 60 TT) but low level shear only about 10 knots probably means not a giant tornado threat. Which is what NWS said. Not good news, we're going to Euless to visit my Mom, 90 years old. May suggest a rental car to my wife. We leave Wednesday, which will be in range of hi-res models.

That escalated quickly.

A lot of palms died from the 3 hard freezes in four years, but the big palm, one seedling I transplanted a couple of years ago, and many of the little ones that pop up in the garden like weeds survived this years hard freeze. The banana plants look dead, but they do that every year with a frost and always come back from the roots.

GFS and Euro ensembles are singing the same song. Not like I was calling for a snow storm 8 days out.

Winter returns in a week. Not cold enough for anything fun, just cold. I'd expect to have warm stretches in March w/ daytime highs AOA 80F, and after this week, I don't see it. May see some severe N of here Thursday and Friday, but I don't see enough warmth for anything after that.

Looking at Euro 24 hour precip Friday, there will be storms that track just N of us. It looks better than the GFS for some needed rainfall but still showing SW flow in the 850-700 mb levels. I fear a dry Spring leading to the feedback that produces another 2 months plus of 100F temps around here. I think Euro's 250 mb RR entrance may be helping overcome a bit of the CINH, it would be nice if that whole thing edges a smidge S for better jet support. In your neck of the woods, I'm waiting for the under forecasted severe storms that form over the mountains in Mexico and drift across the river in the evening. I've seen pictures of big hail and damage from those storms. And there is actually more than 1 image of the net of the bats in the W Hill Country getting ingested into supercells. I found out they live under bridges in Houston as well after the last hard freeze stunned many, living in Austin late 80s/early 90s, I thought the bridge bats were unique to there.

Not most recent but 3km NAM shows ice starting to accumulate inland, at end of run.

Thoughts on interior ice accumulations? Euro has been suggesting it for several days.

I assume NOAA is just the one US agency, ensemble is the average strength by other US private and international climate observation organizations plus NOAA. I could be wrong, but it makes sense.

MBY not included. Positive tilt systems always mean I-10 area SAT to HOU is always capped. WE could use the rain here, the drought has ended but it has been a dry 6 weeks. Even into the Gulf Coast Friday, GFS seems to show capping that would be hard to break.

Just 44 years ago, I'd cross Sunrise Highway and walk under the LIRR tracks to go to the mall. NWS page says 77°F here in Houston, about 7F warmer than normal, but 67 must be closer to 20 above. I miss the snow, I missed 5 straight days of school in 1978. N. Houston suburbs, we actually seem to have more ice storms, two in the last 3 years. 1995, I think it was in college in Austin, 99F, a February record, followed one week later by an ice storm. Ice Houston and Austin can do, I remember a 6 inch 1980s Dallas snow storm with snow on the road for a couple of days, the Panhandle at 3000 to 4000 ft ASL, snow every winter. But Houston, a few frosts most winters (but banana plants down here will bunch if there isn't a winter frost and the above ground part of the plant lives), a hurricane once a decade, two or three times a decade an ice storm or a dusting of snow so that people can't write the date on their windshields and post the pix to social media.

No idea about 2024 in particular (interested to see if the March CANSIPS and NMME are consistent), but while noticing the satellite era produced little to no increase in named storms due to better detection (maybe because the 70s/80s were an inactive period following an active period), there has been a noticeable shift just since the 1995 active period began. An active period becoming hyperactive. Commented on before in the La Nina or El Nino threads (as an engineer, I think of a Carnot engine as a way to make something I don't really understand (meteorology) more understandable), maybe in a warming climate warming the polar region eventually trends numbers down (the heat sink of the Carnot engine warming reduces efficiency), but for now, warming MDR is winning the battle. Image from a link by @raindancewxin the La Nina thread.

Interesting. I think part of it is a shift to a slower pattern in the 70s and 80s, but the satellite era didn't produce a detectable shift to named storms.

I'm guessing degree days, or the amount of home heating oil and the like, for March will be below normal. Money in the pocket.

The further East a storm forms, the better the chance that mid-level weakness a shallow wave wouldn't be influenced by would recurve that storm. Most CV storms recurve. Most, not all, Hurricane Donna, a storm my parents remembered, that hit every state to some degree in 1960, was a depression before Cabo Verde. 1938, a storm my 90 year old Mom still remembers (her older brother with cystic fibrosis had to walk home from school with tree limbs coming down) was also a long tracker. There have been quite a few not quite technically Cabo Verde storms that made it. Isabel comes to mind. The further E the development, the better the chance of a recurve, but more MDR storms, if the percentage of early recurvers stays the same means more storms that didn't recurve. Oh, and warming ocean may be displacing the Bermuda-Azores high to the W. https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/clim/24/5/2010jcli3829.1.xml

That is what I am implying. Carnot Engines were a thing in steam powered power plants, if the heat sink warms and nothing else changes the process becomes less efficient. A steam powered ship is more efficient in cooler waters, and the crews working in them were much more comfortable as well. https://www.e-education.psu.edu/egee102/node/1942#:~:text=The Carnot Efficiency is the,reservoir operates ( TCold ). Edit to add a picture. Note the beard, just as I was about to be transferred to sea, beards for NCO's were disallowed. I had to pass an interview with 'Mo Gamma' and the CO to be allowed to operate the heat source.

I think it is relative, there are occasionally storms that form over waters below 26 degrees at higher latitudes (although there may be baroclinic enhancement at higher latitudes). A slightly cooler atmosphere probably reduces the heat necessary to drive the Carnot engine (less static stability), A warming atmosphere, and warming waters over the heat sink portion/downward motion part of the Hadley cell should raise the requirement for SST, it would seem. The question to me is if the negative effects of warming non-tropical oceans and a warmer atmosphere increases at the same rate the positive effects of warming MDR SST. At least for now the positives of warmer SST seems to be outweighing any negatives of warming away from the MDR. CFS ASO doesn't look abnormally active judging by precip.

The NMME and Canadian may or may not be suggesting an East Coast tropical system in September. Looking out is why the El Nino/la Nina threads get multiple posts per day.

1/200 year return frequency on a VEI 6 or higher eruption, the world might get lucky. About 75 years for a VEI 5/Mt. Ste. Helens event, assuming we could get a standard SO2 blast. I suspect some unpleasant weather/climate affects, but it'd knock down record SSTs for a few years, if I had to guess.

I used to drive nuclear reactors in the Navy. I know, scary. But nuke plants and natural gas plants would be the cleanest source of electricity that didn't depend on wind levels and insolation. Methane is 2 waters per one CO2. Granted, water vapor is also a greenhouse gas, but not to the extent CO2 is. Navy standard nuke plants, not 1970s lowest bidder US plants or Soviet plants, not built in tsunami zones (and simple things like not putting the backup DGs in the basement so storm surge from hurricanes benefitting from record MDR temps) would be safe. Nuke waste is another issue, but fear of waste 2000 feet below the water table in tunnels in the desert is more emotional than scientific.

What year was that Nino?

I noticed during Spring Break (all years but one I was working in Austin, but it applied to South Party Island as well) there was usually one final 2 or 4 day break of 40s at night and 50s day, and more seasons than not that was the final really depressing cool (but not cold enough to snow) snap of winter. I remember the Central Texas Easter weekend snow of 2007 (I had to check Google for the year).