Ralph Wiggum

ICON has us in the low to mid 20s here Saturday afternoon with a mix of sleet and fzra. Been getting progressively colder at the surface each run.

But the pattern concesus no matter what nor how the tellies shift around to change the overall hemispheric look there is almost zero tendency neither this season or last to progress into something that provides meaningful widespread snows. I know parts of this sub had a fluke event 10 days ago but these small windows in between tellie shifts are the only ways we score and even then I would say of the 5 or 6 times the key features transition only 20% of those windows are producing. One of these seasons it will reverse and.the atmosphere will do no wrong. It is just proof again it is so damn hard to get a pattern that produces for more than one of our subs in a particular event.

I am really dreading the next 10 days tbh. Some are saying but this time is different but the same recurring themes keep surfacing. So whether a longwave in china is different or a blob of HP over N Canada, the truth is the apparent real weather patterns at the surface are repeating ie storm cuts to GL and secondary redevelops a hair too late, a storm is too far off the coast, a storm slides right over us, or we have a good track in between cold shots and mix or rain. I dont see this changing...unless there is a hemispheric reshuffle of the overall background state tellies or we somehow fluke into something late in the season as everything gets convoluted during seasonal transition and HL actually appears in some form besides progressive/transient.

Seems reasonable. As for the follow up system(s) the favorable looks are headed the wrong way again and getting delayed or the longwaves are just not lining up to produce anything meaningful. I'm afraid the GL cutters and systems just off the coast during cold air retreat are going to continue. It is probably going to take a fluke late in the season to give us something meaningful. Still think we have one large system before its all over. Whether big enough to get us to avg per my outlook tbd. I will be the first to claim I failed at season end....nothing to hide or be ashamed of. Just not looking great right now.

It's the see-saw ens pattern we've seen since mid Dec. I have no clue what is causing it but we go 2 days of great looks then swing towards a degrading look then back again in 2 days. And at the end of the day the better looks and 'productive' storm chances are still 10 days+ out.

Dont use the GFS op for forecasting LR teleconnections would be the best advice anyone can offer.

Where is your winter LR forecast posted that is on cue as you said? You might be the only forecaster to have nailed it outside of Tom. Would love to give you credit where credit is due. Is the 6-12" this weekend part one of the MLK weekend back to back storms you forecasted?

The 31.6 is right over my house just N of PHL. If we get within a day or 2 and something remotely similar is progged, you are welcome over. You just have to appease my son and daughter with snow tubing, building snowmen, etc while I'm mc'ing the grill. And @C.A.P.E. needs to bring the beer. Prefer an imperial stout or a porter but any will suffice.

Now that guidance is trending colder the next problem has shown up. The waa and system overall look drier. We have a few days to hopefully tweak things for the good but we just cant find a way to find a break this season.

This day 10 threat is closely resembling the system for this weekend at roughly the same lead time. Guidance showed ridging moving across S Central Canada with an ULL moving underneath. The ridging kept looking stronger for a bit and I remember posting how the surface low couldnt cut. Same setup day 10 now. Someone will assuredly reply how this setup is different and it is contingent on the 50/50 and the ridging I mentioned and that a minor adjustment puts us all in the game. And while I agree, there is the argument that a minor adjustment the other way can take us right out of the game too. In any event, the storm track and base pattern will be the same here as others recently. We've seen this before where the next one looks better, the one after that looks better. Not trying to deb just making my case why I think the long lead system is going to end up not working as we would like. Recent history and very similar setups say primary moves near the GL and secondary develops just a smidge too late. Timing and placement of key features are just a hair off this season for whatever reason. I hope we trend differently but I cant go against what we've seen already.....maybe this can somehow buck the trend and be "the one". Things look ok now on the ens but again, to have this hold or improve over 10 days this season is a tall order.

Isnt it 99% always day 10+ though?

Thought the same about the flip back to snow...was odd. All frozen tho 0z run. ICON is now all frozen as well.

I'm not sure the Euro and GFS are going to pick up the CAD as well as the mesos. The euro hi res maybe and its 18z has all frozen up this way from what Ive read.

Was sort of surprised to not see the 18z nam brought up. Is it because it's the NAM? Anyway, complete frozen event now i95 N and W. Even ends as snow. Really curious to see if the NAN is handling the CAD better than globals and what the mesos do as we get into range.

Appears to be an isobaric camel dropping a deuce off the DelMarVa coast. Not sure what implications that would have if any.

Sad reality is last year by this time we at least had a few small storms. This year...nada.

NAM doing its thing. Mesos getting in range. Maybe better pickup of cad? Almost entirely a frozen event here on NAM with lots of pingers:

I'm guilty of looking ahead at times but in this pattern with a fast NS with transient HL ridging we will benefit from focusing on 240 and under (180 and under better) and taking one wave / system at a time. Surprises tend to pop up with these looks next 5 day to a week.

Latest MJO trend is backing down...much less amplification and fast return to cod.

Remember the 12-16" wxsim forecast?

Focusing medium range. Clipper-type disturbance at 138-144. Not sure if it will keep showing up or even stay together in the fast NS flow but basically all we have in the medium range.

Crap, I riled up the weenies with the Pepperidge Farm thing/wording. @WxWatcher007 I prefer cash but a blank check will suffice, ty

@psuhoffman You asked (maybe sarcastically?) if I thought there was anything worth discussing under 240. I mentioned the one stronger NS vort some models are picking up on around 132-144 hours. Going to be a challenge until under 4 days and may end up being nothing, but since you posed the question and there really isnt much else going on. Maybe we can get this under us in some way, shape, or form tbd.

Clipper type system around day 6/7 then of course the stj wave day 10ish. Surface reflection of day 6/7 is meh tho we know clippers are lighter precip and also we sometimes dont see better reflection until under 4 days.

Key features are displaced just enough that the systems are either just off the coast, squashed to the S, or like this weekend system during the brief relaxes in the cold flow. That's my take from analyzing the LR. We might benefit from returning to focusing under 240 in this pattern.