psuhoffman

Not necessarily…the low gets into southeast VA. At that time it’s snowing here. Cold airmass in place will take several hours to erode even with the SE flow. From there yea the low moves N instead of NE and eventually that warms us but until it gets up into central VA were probably ok. And once it gets to us we probably dry slot. Getting it to our south before it turns north is huge here.

I don’t thunk 18z eps was west. It just was deeper due to a few more amped members and less outliers. So there was the illusion of a west shift by adding some more isobars and colors within the broader low position of 12z. The axis of the snow probabilities and means didn’t change at all and looking at the individual low plots they’re clustered about the same as 12z. Additionally there are more misses to the southeast, at least for the northwestern part of this sub, then I expected.

I’m probably making it sound worse than it is. The 18z euro control (and it looked very similar at 90 to the op euro so I think it’s safe to say this is about what the 18z euro was just lower resolution) was fine. Just saying given what it looked like at 90-100 hours a but shocking the low ends up over Hagerstown. But this seems acceptable Imo. We can thank the cold airmass in place for these results despite the track.

18z euro control does the same thing the Gfs does. Cuts the low from Wilmington NC to Hagerstown MD. Lol. It has the same improved look at 90 as the op but it seems the more amplified SW offsets those other improvements. The storm gets to eastern NC then goes nuts. By then the confluence is gone and nothing but ridging over the top so nothing to stop it from cutting due north.

The time on the link is wrong it’s from the last zoom. I’ll open tonight at 10:20. Quick discussion of the early high resolution runs then icon and Gfs. Can’t stay up for euro unfortunately.

Same link as before. Email me at [email protected] if you need the link.

I’ll open the zoom around 10:20 and stay until at least 11.

Email me at [email protected] and I’ll forward you the link. This goes for anyone else that needs it. Same link as last time.

Any interest in a short zoom tonight as Gfs comes in?

I could do a shorter one as 0z Gfs rolls in tonight if people want.

We better switch to geico…

Last comp. It’s hard to compare because the Gfs is much faster but if you take the Gfs when it had the h5 and surface low where the euro does at 90 hrs the euro is significant colder and south. Which is pretty amazing given the Gfs was at that point 12 hours sooner with less time to scour the fresh cold airmass.

One last positive and something I keep coming back too. It’s COLD in front. This has the best antecedent airmass of all the analogs we’re throwing around. That might make a big difference.

Where 18z EC it ends at 90 it’s hard to say. You would think it looks great just from this… The positives…the surface low is SE of 12z at 90 hrs. So is the h5 low. Slightly more confluence and suppressive flow over the northeast. Negatives… the h5 is more amplified, there is slightly more ridging to the north of the low and as the tpv lobe exits to our north that’s a problem. Unknowns…how the phasing is going to occur Overall I think this is a slight improvement over 12z. This is going to turn north but getting it faster and further southeast before that happens is our best bet Imo.

The differences I described above continue through 78 hours.

Through 66 it is (good). SW slightly east of 12z and less ridging and lower heights in front of it. High is slightly south. Slight improvements from what I can see. Obviously though we don’t know about the most important part which is the phase that happens later.

Of course he does it’s State Colleges biggest snowstorm ever. Lol. But it is a good analog but so is an early Jan 94 storm and Jan 12 96 and Feb 14 and there was a storm in December 2012 somewhat similar and they all had slightly different end results. He chooses the one that gave him 28” of course lol.

The ensembles look closer to what I think the op should have looked like post 96 hours lol.

Guys remember the old 5 day business planner in the 90s sponsored by Juan Valdez and Days Inn? Today the storm would have been on the very last day of that forecast. How seriously did anyone take the day 5 of that thing? Would we have dreamed of discussing the meso scale details we are right now? Yes maybe this should temper our enthusiasm some but my real point is to be amazed and how far we’ve come!

To be fair over the last 36 hours all the solutions among the more reliable globals have been between a coastal hugger and an inside runner. They all track the low somewhere through central or eastern NC and at our latitude between the Delmarva and Dulles. For 120 hours away that’s remarkably narrow goalposts imo. It’s just that we’re on a razors edge between a significant snowstorm or something less impactful. But 30 years ago we likely would be looking at goalposts between Indiana and Bermuda for the track at 5 days out! We’re now talking about details at day 5 we couldn’t imagine at day 2 when I first got into this game.

History of similar synoptic situations says something like this is more likely

That’s the track I expected too.

See my post above

Wrt the NW track. It can happen and I do expect a pretty sharp N turn when it gets captured and phases but that on the 18z Gfs is overdone Imo. But before even getting into that it was a better run. Look at 96 hours v 12z I’ll take that improvement at 96 v the wonky stuff it does later. The question is was that pretty radical NW jump from va beach to Hagerstown correct. I’d bet against it. Something like SE VA up the Chesapeake is more believable and that would have an enormous impact on the ground results in DC and Baltimore. Much less low level warm air surging in and provably would hold into snow a couple more hours which can mean 2-3 more inches. Plus sleet and dry slot v driving rain after. That’s not just a wag it’s based on the analogs to this setup where the upper low tracked similar to this and the surface low got into SE VA. The turn north was never that radical. The two 1994 storms for example, started in a similar spot and never got that far west. Both tracked up the bay or just east of it. Btw the first 94 storm had a much worse antecedent airmass so a similar track would yield better results. I think this has better antecedent conditions than the second 94 storm also. If that 96 hour Gfs plot is right I’d bet on a track through southeast VA then up the southern bay across northern DE and near Philly. That’s still west of ideal but that would avoid the spike into the 40s with heavy rain in the cities. Despite a slightly worse airmass that didn’t happen with the second 94 storm either. I got about 6” in western Fairfax county with a lot of sleet then a dryslot and temps stayed in the 30s. Didn’t lose any snow really.