Bob Chill

My gut is telling me Feb is going to feature a -epo in general and maybe it builds before Jan is over. Same with the pna... I believe Feb will have a +pna in general. Not looking like the atl is going to have stable blocking so I'm not excited about Feb or think it will be a memorable month. At the same time I don't think Feb will be a disaster like the pattern that set in since the week before Christmas and appears to want to continue for at least 2 more weeks. I've conceded that this isn't going to be a memorable winter so any event that requires a shovel will be celebrated.

I don't think Jan will torch door to door. Second half can easily flip. Maybe not flip to sweet but it's very unlikely the pna stays strongly negative all month. Next couple weeks look rough but we're also in the time of year where we need the least amount of things to go right. Maybe choas sends us a cookie. Unfortunately this year is the more common way winter goes in these parts. Sucks every time it happens but it's the opposite of unusual.

@psuhoffman I do see a realistic way out within the next 2 weeks. 18z gfs op shows the process in motion. All ens agree that a very cold arctic airmass is going to get displaced into the conus out west d10-15. That will move east. Modified but still cold. Once that happens we could get a reshufffle and the atl starts fighting back. Gefs is building the scand ridge and that could be important as things shuffle around. The atl might flex and start pushing back against the -pna. That's the fast way out. The other way is for the nasty AK ridge to roll forward (or retro) and start shoving things. That seems like a long way down the line but I really don't expect the Pac to stay ugly through Feb. We'll see a +pna period before the end of Feb imo. Too far away to discuss

Don't have to worry about very interested... EPS says lol to the op. Actually degraded from 0z and that didn't look good already. Still a cluster that says maybe but I was expecting a more promising run.

Lol- "very interested" = starting to beleive we actually have a legit chance. Next step is "all in" and the step after that is a face slap of reality and rain.

It's a screwy progression. There's a partial transfer right overhead that cuts off the waa precip. It could be right but what if there was no partial transfer we would have had 3-6" region wide before dryslot. If the shortwave accidentally tracks under us it's a warning event. Pattern obviously favors a crappy track but we have a knack for sneaking something in nearly every year. Very interested in the EPS. If there's a sig jump in good solutions I'll get very interested

Lol- euro speeds up the shortwave on the 7th so the column is good even with a west track but the transfer still figures out how to skip over us with the waa shield. I do like the progression though. It would be an event regardless of the verbatim solution. Still plenty of leeway for a good track too. If the storm becomes a legit threat we should call it the lemonade storm

Surface sucks but mids are ok. NW crew could have a wintry period.

I'm not 100% sure but I believe the Jan 16 block was just a random ridge that got locked into place at the right time. Someone can correct me if my old memory is failing. 2013-15 featured a lot of stout scand ridges that behaved like blocks at times. The big Feb 2014 storm was a byproduct of the scand ridge.

Here's a visual. This is a run over run change and not an anomaly map. We're still pretty toasty in the east but you can see the trend of lowering heights in the eastern half of the conus. That's likely a sign that there's a cluster of EPS members moving things in the right direction.

EPS tossed us a cookie crumb. Trended towards rolling the trough in the west eastward and if you squint, go crosseyed, and wear someone else's glasses you could say that there is a slight hint of a -EPO starting to consider its options of making a return.

It's a combo of things. Pos tilt obviously hinders the ULL from energizing. The progression is disjointed with SLP way out in front to the NE of the ULL. Neg tilt earlier could capture the SLP and blow the whole thing up but we wouldn't be remotely close to being on the "good side". It's certainly possible we get a period of instability driven precip as the shortwave tracks by us but it won't amount to much.

Euro isn't going to do it this run but definitely an improvement with the northern stream trying to force the shortwave south. I can envision how the storm can track south of us. All the indices suck ass and it prob "shouldn't" snow next week but our area generally pulls off a jacked up convoluted event that "shouldn't" happen once a year or so.

I'm just trying to accept there's a chance that I may see snow fall from the sky. I don't disagree with your explanation on how it could be a decent event but you're describing how multiple things have to go right during a winter where absolutely nothing has gone right so... LOL

The 7-8th window is as good as any chance we've had this year. General consensus is to run SLP to our west but ensembles have many iterations that still drop some snow on us even with a west track. The sucky part is we have to root for a weak/disorganized system or we're toast (literally). EPS is just about 50/50 with at least a little frozen. Would be nice to pull something off (however small and messy) because it's tough sleddin' out there.

Weeklies say the pattern over the next 2 weeks is here to stay through mid Feb. 18z gefs is down right hot d15. I think today is rock bottom. Seriously. It can't get much worse. Weeklies are often wrong so I'm not saying I beleive it and think we're doomed for 6 weeks. But seeing basically an identical pattern set up for 6 straight weeks isn't fun to look at.

Don't make is more complicated than it needs to be. For right now we're dunski and there is nothing showing up anywhere that says that's going to change. If/when it does then it will be discussed in minute detail. All PSU is saying that just because it looks like a disaster now doesn't mean it's a lock for the next 8 weeks. There are escape hatches to keep an eye out for and until then play golf and stuff.

Ensembles have done an excellent job this year. There has only been one notable time where things made a big shift in the medium range and that was the brief -AO/NAO period we just had. That sorta popped up unexpectedly. Other than that d10-15 has done quite well. Especially since mid Dec. People who don't think models have any accuracy beyond 5-7 days are flat wrong this year. EPS has been killing it.

Jan 16 had a nice west based -nao

There's some splitting hairs going on. Nobody can predict months in advance and nobody claims to. However, there are reliable clues that can indicate good and bad well in advance. The AO being the biggest one. Dec is going to finish positive and not by just a little. Forecasts are for that continuing into Jan. Possibly strongly positive. For that reason alone we currently have and will continue to have below normal snow chances and well below normal big storm chances for the foreseeable future. That's not a guess. It's a fact.

12z EPS is showing a legit SE ridge at the end of the run now. Hope the d8-10 deal works out if we're heading to SE Ridgeville

Between today's 12z and last night's 0z, I'll take the 12z version any day. Last night was eye candy but it's a moth fart away from being on the rain side. A constant theme this year from medium to short range is less suppression, less cold, less blocking, and more rain. The 12z run had deep entrenched cold and tight spacing. That's the first time I've seen an op try and run precip into a large/established cold airmass in a long time.

It's a good TN valley overrunning setup. Shortwaves are pretty tight so amplified is unlikely. I liked the run a lot. Gives us a chance during a rare occurance of a solid antecedent airmass. Many of the EPS hits are weak wave/overunning deals. Not surprised to see the op throw one out. Would be nice to be tracking a legit threat under 6 days away. Getting closer...

I agree with @showmethesnow. We have at least 2 pna ridge spikes and EC troughs on tap from 1/5 - 1/10. First one is prob a lost cause as the antecedent conditions suck. The second on is much more interesting and is what both the gefs and eps have as our first legit window. I don't give a crap what ops say every 6-12 hours as we're still too far away for any type of reasonable accuracy. Keep the window open and maybe something breaks right. We could spend most of Jan chasing progressive troughs. Keep them coming and it will accidentally snow on us

Next 10 days are essentially a shutout. Seeing signs of life beyond that but who knows how things will shake out. I say we get snow by mid month for no other reason than having cold around during the heart of Jan requires the least amount of everything else to go right to get some snow. It does look like cold is returning in some fashion. Need a little luck