Bob Chill

Well, after going 3 for 3 and feeling cocky, I was quickly reminded that we are who we thought we were. Models busting low on temps by more than 5 degrees last night was the cannon across the bow. No biggie. I was never really into this one. Anafronts with well above freezing after midnight have a tough path to win

Exactly. I mean sure, -pna is not favored here. Never has never will. Not all pnas are equally bad. As long as the western half of Canada keeps the -epo cold factory intact, we're always just a front or 2 away from snow temps. Seen far worse in recent years. That's for sure. Lol

La ninas tend to make a come back late Feb through mid march. March 2001 redux coming Weird year right? A flip to an annoying -pna makes a lot of sense unfortunately. The west got straight blitzed with a storm cycle to close the year then mostly ridge/dry since. Time for that to change. Doesn't mean we roast. No idea. But a trough returning in the west for a time seems highly likely to my gut. Then, like you said, maybe another busy cold period. A -pna in Feb isn't always bad anyways. Depends on how the wavelengths set up. Canada remains good for manufacturing cold air in general. A -pna in that environment is far from the same when then pac jet goes zonal. That's a shutout

Agree with you. Anytime we have a broad conus trough with cold highs sliding by to our north, we're in the game. I actually prefer broad troughs except for big dogs. Opens the door for a wide range of vectors that can hit us. Big steep troughs/ridges only provide a 1 lane highway. I like 270 + the commuter lanes pointed at my yard

No problem at all. Always keep in mind, no matter what any model shows IRT a storm, if the run is showing something that rarely if ever happens in your yard, go with your climo. This was my mental breakthrough some years back. Topography, geography, and latitude are powerful drivers in our area. That's why storms often break the same way over and over in your yard. Don't expect a different outcome to come frequently or easy

They didn't really miss anything. Had a hard time resolving multiple shortwave in fast flow out in time just like they always do. This stuff cuts both ways. Sometimes storms go poof and other times they go pop. Whenever we are in a busy NS pattern, you simply can't trust or feel confident in anything beyond 72 hours. Models did an excellent job honing in. Just wasn't the result most hoped for

I wish it was that black and white. Overall, on the balance, gfs is pretty good with NS driven patterns. However, gfs has been upgraded pretty recently and it takes a while to figure out strengths and weaknesses. I've thought the new gfs was pretty good when it was the FV3 or whatever it was called. Ran too cold but did well in mid range. The atmosphere is nearly infinitely complex when it comes to turning math into a simulation. No one model is ever even close to being "the one". That's where the fun of this hobby comes from. In the midrange, all models are wrong. How and what is wrong is up to the interpreter.

Whatever "it" is about this progressive Northern stream pattern, it fits the gfs physics the best. Don't know what and it will definitely flip again but for right now, the gfs is the mid range king as long as the general longwave pattern holds in its current form imo.

I didn't like the setup at all for the big euro solutions but I still felt pretty strongly that a weak shortwave would attack from the WSW. About out of time to flip to a chance at 3-6. Northern stream is tricky here. You can't rule things out too early and you can't have confidence in any decent sized storm. OTOH, if my yard gets 1" or more tomorrow then it's 4-4. Hot streaks have limits. Lol

Anyone consider what might happen if the front simply doesn't push as far south and all else stays the same?

Fixed your typo

History/climo says a flip to warm and early end to winter. But this winter has made every long range forecaster remember that it's impossible to predict snow in advance. So, it's impossible for me or you or anyone to have any idea what Feb has in store. Looks to start off the same way this month is prob going to end. Looking beyond that isn't something I do beyond a wild guess like everyone else. Lol

Well, it's a Nina, northern stream dominant, no stable block, and also January. A big storm will have a lot to overcome until Feb imho. Not being satisfied with THIS January is ridiculous.

Low end warning totals for our yards is a reasonable boom here. We've seen plenty of these over the years. The typical screw job when we're in the crosshairs is losing on the front due to temps. I have no strong feeling as to whether or not the jack stripe runs the typical climo line or not but for now, it seems like it should.

Euro is perfectly realistic with upper level setup. Makes more sense than a wound bomb (which would be awesome of course). 4 days out on the northern periphery of the cold snow side of a progressive shortwave? How can you not like that? And not figting temps tooth and nail? Mostly importantly, we are on a heater and yes, it does want to snow here.

I have no time to have fun here today until late but please remember this has never been and currently isn't a big storm setup. It can happen with a vigorous ULL pass but the macro pieces all point towards a quick hitting 3-6/4-8 for whomever is in the middle of the lucky stripe. Neg tilt or closed off shortwave is the boom scenario. Otherwise a power progressive wave/stripe is highly favored imho only

Back during the hot runs in 2014 & 15, we had a lot of things go poof in the mid range only to have them poof back different and snow anyway.

This is a lot better setup leading in than yesterday. An actual cold air pump feeding the storm. There's a lot to like but tricky part is snow stripe will prob be narrow. Statistics and odds and stuff. Lol. Otoh, eps has some closed off bombs. Those def don't have narrow stripes. Haha

If the euro ULL close off idea is right, we don't have as much to worry about with losing latitude as yesterday. H5 has nice highway tracks running SW-NE without a convex "bend. This is a good setup for an elongated moderate event. Anyone in the right highway lane will get a good total. Distribution of snowfall would be more uniform. Just need the hose pointed at your yard

Ala 2014. Lol. From the early Jan storm (7th maybe?) until end of Mar there was something trackable. More than once, while we were tracking a midrange threat, a short range threat would pop.

This is where mistakes are made. When Ma sends you snow and you aren't genuinely grateful for it, she remembers it and you will pay for it. As soon as I accepted that and put it in practice, the MoCo deathband was reborn. I kid you not. Just ask @WxUSAF. He knows. He did the same thing and the connection was made setting up the HoCo-MoCo deathband.

I always root for a big dog no matter but when it comes to dreaming about repeat periods I think more about years like JFM 03 & 14. 96 had a similar period but I wasn't here for that one. I adored the 2010 storms for sure. But deep winter was quick to come and go. The Jan 87 back to back storms didn't have nearly the depth of Feb 2010 but the deep winter that followed was next level. Roads (even main ones) had snow stuck on them for longer than I remember at any other time here. My weeniesm is multi-faceted. I get off on extended deep winter conditions, bay freezes, devastating ice storms, massive water main explosions, kids stuck to flagpoles, and fun winter stuff like that. My weenie is complex

I'm simply not going to sweat a thing until Canada warms up. For me, it's that simple. Even if the pna screws us, as long as the continental air factory keeps running, we're in the game it seems. We haven't had a cold Canada for a few years. Would make sense that it keeps running. On another note... my yard just crossed 4" of precip for Jan. Might easily end up 5" or more. I don't track qpf like snow but I can't even remotely remember a wet Jan like this. Multiple events over 1". Nutty.

Interesting. Top D11 analog is a nasty nasty ice storm in OK, TN, KY, etc and also a sizeable snow event in NC/SC. Overall, analogs show active winter wx all over the east half of the conus in general. Good times.

We both appear to strongly believe in winter "personalities" when they show up. They can have their way and override any and every conventional thought. They can render blocks useless or turn a marginal pattern into a snow parade. It's important not to let recency bias cloud your head. Last year was last year. Last time I've seen anything like what guidance is showing now is the 6 week period from 2/14 - 3/31 back in 2015. Not every winter has a personality. Especially a strong one. Last year's personality fought us tooth and nail door to door in the face of decent longwave looks. This winter appears to have shown its hand. 3 for 3 in two weeks happens like never in my yard. That's meaningful and beyond dumb luck imo. I'm riding the it wants to snow this year personality until it's over. Me thinks it's going to be a while yet...