griteater

burrel - I have a hard time buying a precip minimum just southeast of the Apps and a jump to the coast with this one. Just my opinion. I know we see that sometimes, but the trajectory of the precip and forcing is going to be more west to east in a continuous manner. The precip minimum and jump to the coast is more common when we have a wave approaching and crossing the Apps from a NW trajectory. Sure the eastern areas may get a precip boost, but I don't think a jump to the coast is in the offing here.

It's a package deal Mack - precip north / cold air north. You and I went from being right were we want to be with the 12z NAM, to yikes, too amped with the 18z. Great for the folks north of us though. Let's see what happens going forward. Need the big high pressure to come thru

12km NAM Sleet

12km NAM

On the NAM, the shortwave over the Great Lakes bumped north, allowing the storm and precip to climb north

NAM is amped

Reminds me of the heavy snow rates in Chattanooga with the last storm

Euro Ensemble Members

I mean, it depends on where your expectations are. Yes, I think a light to moderate event with some surprises is possible....it all has to come together though. Still 3 days out. The Euro has trended better at 500mb. At a timeframe of Wed aftn, the western ridge is taller...the wave out west is has trended west...and the flow across the south is better....all good trends. Then by Thursday morning, the wave over the Great Lakes that is acting to keep everything suppressed to the south has trended farther north - again, good trend for precip to climb north as long as temps work out.

Buyer beware of the Pivot precip type map on the Euro. The map says rain for Raleigh, but the sounding says snow (very, very shallow above freezing layer at the surface which is likely too warm)...and the sounding output at the bottom right says snow...granted, precip is light

3 days prior to go time, this is what storms that hit us look like. It's far from perfect, but we're in the game here.

The NAM looks really good here out west with the main northern stream wave dropping down thru the Great Basin-Utah-Colorado...Pacific shortwave that undercuts the western ridge tracks out ahead of the northern stream wave as it tracks from southern California into Kansas...energy/weak waviness in the subtropical jet moves from Baja to the ArkLaTex to the Carolinas. The suppressing feature is the shortwave that drops down thru the Great Lakes - so that's one to watch for the northern extent of precip.

The NAM really likes the idea of crashing temperatures in areas of steady precip

12km NAM Simulated Radar at hr84

Nice thing is that the precip on the northern part of the shield isn't meager

No, but it would be silly for most any of us to cancel/quit at this point anyway given the setup here

Ground temps guy has arrived...we are ready now for the storm!

The NAM goes ice cold here at 850mb across NE GA and northern SC as steady precip breaks out on Thursday, and the warm layer is very shallow near the surface. This is encouraging to see for those areas and north given, iMO, the NAMs likely better ability to resolve the arctic airmass. In terms of precip, it's going to be a long week me thinks. There are reasons on both sides as for whether the precip climbs north to where significant precip is realized. We need to see the shortwave interaction out west to work properly to get the needed return flow for moisture.

CMC dropped a significant wave from the northern stream down, tracking from the Great Lakes into E NC....an unlikely scenario, but who the heck knows

UKMet moved north, but it has been way suppressed. 00z run gets precip only as far north as Atlanta to Wilmington

Yeah, GFS was a scraper again. Meanwhile, the CMC has more of a traditional looking Miller A running from the NE Gulf to well off Hatteras...probably some significant snow totals over NE NC, but I don't have a map for it as of now

I'd say your eyes are trained. NAM looks good with precip. As precip surges into Arkansas, I'd say it probably begins to move more west to east from there based on the height pattern. Here's the sounding at Charlotte at hr84 on the NAM. Note the wet bulb (blue line in between the red and green lines) is below freezing except for a very shallow warm layer at the surface, and temp profiles are cooling thru the column as time goes on (dewpoint is dropping over time for example).

850mb zero degree line works south from Charlotte at 12z Thu to Columbia at 03z Fri as precip on the mean moves thru