Ralph Wiggum

Hopefully that is a trend! If we can reverse that SOI into sustained negative territory, the rest including the MJO and AO should follow not far behind in response. Many of the old-time pros have hinted at this scenario and suggest this may be the catalyst to finally get things moving along as we approach mid month. Very rarely during a Nino will a positive Dec SOI anomaly (common) remain positive into January and iirc this year has been near, if not a record level SOI anomaly for December. ENSO history suggest the reversal will happen so this is decent news. Thanks for posting.

Yet 6z was closer to a better hit based on H5....more of a classic taint to rain to pasty snow look. The Nov storm had a similar tucked track but was able to give i95 some snow so it's possible with the proper vort pass setup we could do something like that again. But we've already seen some drastic flips in the last 18 hours irt this threat so I expect more changes before guidance reaches a consensus. Looks like battle of the globals right now with the 2 heavyweights (euro and gfs) slugging it out.

NAVGEM is SECsy FWIW.

Dont tell that to the NAVGEM....SECS all the way.

Holding out hope but we've seen similar looks at 5 days fizzle quite a few times in the past 5 weeks so maybe *maybe* this will change and will be part 1 of the step up towards mid January. Any change in the trends/recent patterns would be a plus. Keeping hope alive!

Tucked slp ftl.....unless you live in the NW burbs. Euro, CMC, Icon and fvc3po similar. Will monitor.

Going into and moving thru this winter so far has been like a hopeful sport team at the beginning of the season. Let's compare this winter to I dunno, the Redskins. At the start of the season, there are high hopes abound.....the slate is clean, the air is fresh, the sky is the limit. And everything looks fantastic on paper (historical modoki el Nino climatology). The season gets off to a fast start (November snows for some) and next thing you know you're ahead of expectations (Redskins in first place!!). Your nearby division rivals that historically perform better (in football and snowfall climatology) find themselves slipping away fast (Philly and NY....screw Dallas). Things look promising and the schedule looks favorable (500mb pattern) moving forward. What could possibly derail this destiny?? But then things start to unravel....your star QB breaks his leg (MJO), losses start piling up (crud Atlantic blocking), your backup QB goes down (SSW underperforms).....postseason hopes look bleak (mid Jan epic pattern flip). Then, in the blink of an eye, what looked like unchartered territory with likely January playoff football (promises and hope for the pattern change) are gone. How could this be?? Everything was lined up perfectly. But alas....we've been down this road before with this football team AND with broken promises of epic weather pattern changes. Moral of the story....things always look great on paper at the start of the season but dont always pan out the way we would have hoped due to unforeseen circumstances. Oh, and we do fail very well and very often.

I feel the same way scrolling thru 'it's coming soon' posts. Two way street.

Just not in the cards

EPS continues going in reverse clearly not the direction we want to step. Luckily other guidance is bouncing around still but the EPS has taken steps back for a few runs now and is actually trying to re-establish the recent meh pattern down the road.

Havent looked at 500mb maps but I will venture the following 2 scenarios would probably happen given the trends this season.....either SW storm slows down then finally comes out but cuts up the OV or suppression city.

You know it's a weird season when surface lows are travelling SE down the Cali coast. Wth

Wake me when the move from phase 7 to 8 begins please.

Seeing several pro forecasters and even some really good hobbyists starting to back down from the 'epic winter' talk and now just mentioning a subtle and slow transition to a colder pattern which might be favorable for chances. Hoping u r right Paul and we can salvage the mid Jan and forward period!

Until the mjo moves out of the warm phas(es) getting a snowfall in the I95 areas to verify is a long shot regardless of what models are showing. It's like groundhog day tbh a repeat performance....for now. We are either squashing the stj or when we get the jets to merge it has been pumping the warmth and we get a cutter or tucked coastal look. Need to kick that mjo in gear.

Not much to talk about but watching the gfs op rolling in thru 132 and looks like it holds stj energy back just long enough while building confluence and waiting for NS to dive in later on. Delayed larger lp? Not sure what frozen implications would be tho. Eta: NM....NS never really responds to the ridging out West this run....streams remain separate. ICON was a tucked nor'easter (warm) FWIW so worlds apart.

EPS took steps back irt the mid month pattern change. PAC firehose continues to hold firm. Trying to keep hope alive but we are slowly losing the guidance that was strongly in favor of the Jan 15+ change to a positive wintertime regime. Need the SOI, MJO, and SSWE to start having positive effects sooner than later on the upcoming pattern else many of those 'epic winter' calls will be in trouble.

Nobody has given up but beginning to slowly see doubts from some pros popping up here and on other social media as well. Same general idea regarding the SOI and the MJO and how neither is really behaving as was expected going in. While December was mostly not a BN temp month for many, an argument can certainly be made to whether Dec truly was a typical Nino regime or not. There were certainly more Nina-like behaviors than typical Nino imho. Someone mentioned an atmospheric lag irt ENSO so perhaps this is a real thing?

This. We are slowly starting to get into the ens lead time out to mid month so in the days ahead there should be notable positive looks beginning to appear in the LR.

Back in full weenie force!

Yep....snows before the Christmas holidays thru 3rd week Feb for me. 10-15 events is a steep task but I wouldnt raise my nose to that!! I would also make it a KU sandwich meaning a KU to kick off the season and a KU at the tail end of my range. At least a 10 day period in mid January of straight sub freezing temps with 2 or 3 days of highs in the mid teens. At least one episode of legit below zero temps at night. One of those mid-teen days I request a 4-6" dry powder event. Make one or two storms a solid WSW 4-8" variety with the remainder being some clippers, some front end thumpers, and a few just avg 1-3"/2-4" as we get skirted by to the South (cant let our Mid ATL brethren go without a few good hits as well). That for me would be my ideal winter. I mean if it were up to me and I had a fully paid snow removal crew and was retired I would say non stop HECS conditions from Thanksgiving thru St Patrick's Day but I'll 'settle' for what I mentioned.

18z GFS OP and FV3CPO really trying to spin up the 'Newman Storm' second part of next week. At this rate we'll end up with another phased cutter rather than the thread a needle wave along an old front we were originally looking at.

Iirc one of the recent euro runs had the crawling cutoff look and wound up torching basically everyone East of the Apps all the way into New England. So yeah progressive fast hitter probably what most would want to root for but I could be wrong on that assessment.

I'm really confused what a current GOES satellite shot has to do with a mid-late January CPC outlook?

That mid-November snowstorm feels so long ago almost like it occured last winter.