psuhoffman

What are you talking about. I’m always in that mode. Only exception is around Xmas or if it’s a crazy cold pattern and I can build snowpack and keep it. Otherwise it’s go big or go home. I’m not really a big “snow” fan I’m a big snowstorm fan. Huge flakes and 3”/hour rates or bust. It doesn’t have to be huge totals. The squall where I got 3” in like 45 mins 2 years ago was awesome. But there has to be something dynamic about it. 3” of light snow that’s going to melt within a couple days does nothing for me. Back in 2015 I was annoying people because there was a 3-5” WAA wave storm 2 days out and I was rooting against it because there was a better setup to get a big amplified bomb right behind it but only if that WAA wave got squashed. I was 100% willing to kill a guaranteed 4” for like a 20% chance at a big storm. But I know those big storms are rare and unlikely any given threat and I’m not going to clog up the threads crying and complaining when they don’t happen. But it’s probably a good idea for people to know where my analysis is coming from. If someone else is just looking for 1-2” of snow they might get a more negative perception then is reality from my analysts since I’m only analyzing our chances of a flush hit.

@WinterWxLuvr if you want a snow of significance all im saying is hope in the next couple cycles we see guidance converge on a 6z Gfs type solution. Even the 12z is close enough that’s the kind of look 72-100 hours we can work with and get some minor adjustments to make it an event worth the time. But if the Gfs moves towards the euro and come tomorrow the majority of guidance had the snowfall southeast of 95…were pretty much cooked. People will say things like “it’s still 72 hours out plenty of time” to make themselves feel better but how often has that worked out?

Right now we haven’t seen stability or consensus reached. We’re right at 100 though so that suggests we’re about to see guidance converge. Once that happens…recent history suggests there will be noise and outlier runs each cycle but whatever the preponderance consensus is will be close to the final result. If in the next 24 hours we see the Gfs and euro converge on a snowfall targeting southeast of DC again…then that’s probably going to be the end result. Maybe we sneak in a couple inches. Maybe we get nothing. I’m not even that worried about it. I’m in this game hunting the flush hits so frankly if we fringe or get skunked isn’t much difference to me. Both leave me equally unsatisfied. I don’t complain. Storms miss. Oh well. Just saying I’m in this for the big storms. And if guidance says it’s a miss once inside 100 hours it’s very rarely going to become anything significant and I’m not really interested in praying for some miracle trend just to eek out another 2”

I thought the NAM at 84 looked like the NAM at 84

Depends what you call big changes. The fringe of a storm moving 50 miles isn’t big Imo. We know the edges and banding don’t get pinned until the very end. But we haven’t seen huge synoptic changes once inside about 100 hours. We’re right at that now. And maybe we’re seeing convergence. Ukmet lost it’s crazy amped up solution from 0z. Gfs also trended a little south. Icon and Euro trended towards the Gfs. Toss the ggem as the outlier. Maybe there is another curve in the next 24 hours but if not the consensus of all that guidance is likely close to the final outcome.

I wish people wouldn’t focus on those charts so much. The NAO chart was positive when there was a block right over Greenland back in December. Those things are calculated in ways that don’t always translate the same. That said he isn’t posting in good faith anyways he is a troll.

How many times do you intend to say this same thing in a slightly different way?

at a quick glance I didnt see much support for that in the EPS anymore. It lost that camp overnight mostly. Maybe its right here but the GGEM has been pretty awful lately. Oddly its overall scores are ok...kind of like the UKMET, its great at getting large scale hemispheric H5 anomalies but just flat out awful with synoptic details.

But it’s all or nothing. If the NS dominant solutions are correct there won’t be much front end because there is no moisture transport into the boundary.

It kinda went to what I was saying about the 18z eps amplified members where the track looked good but we still didn’t get snow because it was keying on the NS so it all developed to our north.

Gfs would be a conundrum. Do I stay at snowshoe for 15” or come home early for 9”. Honestly 9” at home is probably more exciting and the kids would probably prefer that.

I wasn’t towel throwing. Just saying it’s not Dec when some 3” snow puts me in the holiday mood. Or Jan when maybe I can build a snowpack. At this point a few more 2-4” snows don’t do much for me. The only thing that would change my perception of this winter would be some dynamic events. im not mad though. Actually I’ve been more focused on my weekend ski trips (got ikon pass and am getting my moneys worth) and I’ve seen a ton of snow in WV and Vermont. BTW for those that get frustrated tracking this is helpful. It’s making the winter fly by and I have multiple locations to track for every week. So I’m not even upset about it but objectively it’s been an absolutely horrible winter here and nothing short of some big storms will change that now. I’m 27” short of average going into mid February. I’m not gonna nickel and dime out if that hole.

I know this is late but what I meant was when I saw a few of the crazy amped solutions still didn’t really have an impressive snow presentation I was curious (how does a sub 990 low over the bay not have a 12”+ area for example) and when I dig a little it seemed to be because the snored solutions were developing the NS wave. The reason we saw mostly misses to the SE and NW with no big flush hits like the gefs was there weren’t really solutions that keyed on the SS and amplified that wave and that’s my preferred solution. We could get some snow from an all NS solution but I’m fully big game hunting now. I’m sitting on the least snow ever on this date of 16 years up here and I’ve seen plenty of minor snows. At this point the only thing that can save this season from being on my personal hate list would be some kind of dynamic singular event. If all were going to get are minor snows I’ll pass. But I don’t begrudge anyone chasing whatever they want! I’ll track anything. But I’m rooting for the big dog options even if it’s lower probability. So far this season reminds me of some of the Nina’s in the 50s, 70s and 80s that weren’t that warm and ended near normal or only slightly below at DC but we’re awful here. Makes sense. If you get a cold but generally blah pattern all it takes is a couple hits to get DC near normal. If DC finished with 14” and we get 18” that was a top 50% year there and a bottom 10% here.

Problem is it’s keying on the NS SW so even the more amped solutions aren’t good (for DC) as they end up too far NW. If the NS SW ends up the focus of the amplification there really isn’t much of a path to victory for some of the area. The GFS and GEFS was much closer to a winning progression with more focus on the SS wave.

You just had to didn’t ya

The icon sucks at sucking

I’m so proud no one took that bait. 10 years ago there would be 20 posts extrapolating the NAM by now. We’re starting to show potential!

NAM at 84 was interesting. Lol

There was some luck to it but on the other hand If you look at the overall snowfall the last 4 Nina years and a mean Nina snow anomaly map they end to kinda close. i can’t find the darn thing right now but the max Nina snow minimum is right along 95 from DC to Baltimore. With near normal to the southeast and northwest. The screw zone near DC to Balt is kind of typical of a Nina.

But again I’m not calling TOD or anything. This has a shot. Sometimes these low % things do work and we get lucky. But I’m also not excited. It’s got a lot working against it wrt the NS flow. We need to get really lucky with the timing of the waves because there are so many and barely (if there is at all) room for this to amplify.

Not exactly. You’re right wrt the timing. But that’s only part of the equation. Imo our bigger problem is the spacing. Conservation of energy laws say we do know simply by “how much is going on” that our odds are low. We need a more amplified solution. The more crap is flying around in the NS flow the less likely anything can amplify more. So simply the fact there is so much going on is bad. It’s complicated. We don’t do complicated. Our winning snow setups are typically “keep it simple stupid”. That’s why our absolute best pattern possible is a split flow NAO block with cold in place. . NS is out of the way. Not all these stupid waves flyinh across to squads and flatten the SS waves. And a block to stop the resulting amplifications from cutting.

But we do…there are goalposts. Those goalposts haven’t narrowed completely yet…but the outcomes seem to very between not even close and kinda close. Yes timing differences determine just how badly the NS messes it up and that determines if it’s not close or close. But you know what we’re not seeing? A bunch of flush hit outcomes mixed in there. That means imo that while it’s possible the wave spacing makes it very unlikely. Even the better runs with better timing are still not good enough. Is it possible guidance converges on the absolutely perfect timing and wave spacing we need for this to work? Yes. Is it likely no. What I’m seeing is that there are simply too many vorts embedded in the NS coming across too fast to make the amplification we need likely.

Gfs went the wrong way. Same problem as always. Too much going on in the NS. 2 doesn’t allow 1 to amplify. Im also kinda over getting excited when we see a “trend” in guidance that takes us from “out of it” to “slightly less out of it”. It’s a fallacy to assume that trend continues. This isn’t dead but it’s low probability. Don’t think I’m saying it’s totally not gonna happen. But I’m not getting excited until guidance actually supports something. I’m tired of entering the 100 hour threshold saying “we’re close if we just get this and that trend”. No. Screw that. That almost never works. We just get frustrated. I’d rather enter the final 100 hours with the preponderance of guidance showing a flush hit and not needing a bunch of things to change in our favor.