weatherwiz

Probably will go out and measure between 9:42-9:47

Not sure how much outside but everything is white! Would have to estimate between 1-2''.

Disappointed...when I first started reading this I thought this was headed into the direction of a failed Christmas love story where you were running across campus knee-deep in snow trying to give your crush a good-bye kiss as she departed for semester break.

This. It really is just a guessing game as to what will transpire. Those who like cold/snow can make a justification as to why it will be cold/snowy. Those that like warm can make a justification as to why it will be warm lol. But at the end of the day confidence is any type of outcome is about as close to zero as you can get. Subtle changes within some key features = significant implications on the outcome.

meh define "suck" and what you're measuring. The biggest issue is not models themselves but how they're being interpreted, especially in the medium-to-long range. If someone is just rip-and-reading an H5 height anomaly graphic and taking it as face value they're doing themselves an injustice. And that's the issue with these graphics and how they just get tossed around and interpreted...just face value instead of doing an assessment. And assessment being just ike what Scott did above...understand how a slight fluctuation and shifts of core height anomalies can mean significant alterations to the pattern as a whole.

Hell, we may even end up with some severe threats!!!!!!!!!!

IDK what's more impressive...the degree of cold in the PAC NW next week or the degree of warmth in the mid-section of the country. May have to go with the later b/c there are strong signals 60's dews could push well into the Ohio Valley with 70's dews maybe into the Gulf Coast? I don't think there's ever been a December high risk before but I bet we could head in that direction later next week.

Great post. I think the NAO is certainly over-valued and too much emphasis gets placed on it and you can use the same reasoning and rational behind why ENSO sometimes get too much emphasis and and is over-valued. When heavy research began, there wasn't a huge data set to work with and alot of these now existing indices and teleconnections either haven't been published yet or very little was known about them to really incorporate into research. There's alot of work (older) which focuses on one-to-one comparisons... 1) ENSO vs. precipitation (rainfall, snowfall) and temperature 2) NAO vs. precipitation and temperature Hell...we've seen alot of numbers ran for the Northeast...for each climo station which shows snowfall totals during +NAO vs -NAO. At the end of the day does that really provide accurate assessment or information? I would wager not and this is because there are just way too many influences that need to be taken into account. There has been lots of research (more recent) too which continues to strongly indicate North America storminess is more of a product of PNA/Pacific mode vs. the NAO...and if you really think about it...that makes a ton of sense, The way I view it is the Pacific dictates the pattern, however, the Atlantic (or Arctic) can manipulate it.

When do the Mets look to improve?

I still can't get over Saturday. 80's across Texas with 70's as far north as KS/OK and AR/MO border and then single digits across the northern Plains. Hell even IND may sneak into the lower 60's.

yeah I'm with you there. It's extremely frustrating and at times teasing. While it's still several days out this end of weekend ordeal has gone in the teaser category...but hopefully can end up in the cha ching category

I'm not inclined to think in this direction yet, but it has just as good of a chance as any other solution of verifying. If we end up torching though...we're going to torch. Those anomalies which have been occurring across the South at times (especially this upcoming weekend) have been wild.

Maybe even a few ticks warmer than April Very true. But the jest is to tamper back high hopes (at least on a personal level). There has been alot of excitement generated about the upcoming pattern and the potential it may hold...but we could very, very easily end up with crap...like total crap. With the crap a result of a dry pattern or hell...even quite a bit above-average. But like you said, its so convoluted and chaotic that it's really anyone's guess as to what happens. There is just zero confidence moving into these upcoming few weeks.

It's become nice in southern CT. Skies have become partly sunny...just wish it was 10-20....40°F warmer out.

lol GFS has a 150+ knots MLJ streak develop. Anyways, nice to see Sunday is still being signaled. After that though...the northern stream just looks like crap. It's a sheared mess of garbage. Really tough to envision anything working out in that. Even southern stream is kind of garbage. Sunday may be our best hope

Lift looks pretty decent region wide so would be shocked if SW CT didn't see some snow from it. It's quite cold aloft too so we'll maximize whatever QPF we deal with. I would imagine ratios upwards of 15:1 so maybe some can fluff their way to 3''.

Looks like it also passes directly over Lake Ontario...that probably enhances moisture as well. Previous models runs (which were drier) I think tracked this farther southwest.

hmmm I thought there was another one. I remember one occurring while I was still in school.

Which doesn't seem to be the case. There may be some brief periods where the blocking relaxes a bit when is when we may sneak in a day or two of some above-average temps (just hope it's not at the expense of a cutter ) but I actually like the blocking signal moving forward in the essence of the pattern. You don't want a stout block b/c then we may have suppression issues but if we get a strong enough block to shunt the gradient south a bit we should be good.

wasn't there a local upslope event a few winters back...maybe 2017-2018? Parts of NE CT ended up with like 7-8'' and literally nothing was forecast (in terms of accumulations).

Yeah we're like being saved by the -NAO right now and these sfc high's sliding across SE Canada. But we are really walking a fine line over the next few weeks...which pretty much defines the gradient pattern that's been discussed but we could just as easily end up on the wrong side.

A big key moving into the upcoming couple of weeks is going to see exactly how the pattern evolves across Asia and the western Pacific over the next 3-5 days. We think the pattern here is chaotic and complex it's probably moreso across that part of the globe. This may also be tied into the MJO given how strong that signal is but ultimately how the pattern exactly sets up across the western U.S. will have huge impacts for us. Until that SE ridge signal weakens (which there is some support for that) we could just as easy end up in an above-average temp regime with cutters as we can a colder pattern with snow chances.

Was pleasantly happy not to see or encounter any ice upon heading out the door this morning.

Snowpack blows. 1) You gotta do walking detours when your shortcuts get all buried in snow. Sure you could walk through the snow but not if its very deep. You could fall and get trapped and be buried until spring. 2) Sometimes it can impede driving...like pulling out of side streets or within parking lots. It's just a giant Mount Washington of Snow. 3) It makes it feel even colder. 4) You can get snow in your shoes (this ties into #1 I guess). 5) When it melts everything becomes a mud pit. 6) If it's too much...you run out of places to put the snow. 7) Snow pack blows.