bluewave

This is officially the warmest midnight to 6am hourly temperatures of all-time at Newark in January. Newark has been at 65 to 66 degrees with 3 new hourly records and two ties. https://mesonet.agron.iastate.edu/plotting/auto/?_wait=no&q=153&network=NJ_ASOS&zstation=EWR&month=jan&var=max_tmpf&dpi=100&_fmt=png

While you hope we get a favorable storm track for heavy snows at the coast, just pointing out a colder pattern coming around the 20th isn’t a guarantee. That’s why storm tracks are so important. Late last January with a similar 500 mb pattern we only got some light snows.

Ensembles begin to correctly pick up the general 500 mb pattern in the day 8-10 range. So I never really pay attention to what the operational GFS shows for an individual storm that far out in time. The NCEP should follow the ECMWF lead and stop running the OP beyond 240 hrs. Notice how the ECMWF only has the control and ensembles day 11-15. And those are often too low skill to be of use that far out in time.

Forecasts beginning around the 20th look very close to the phase 7 composite.

Looks like we have a chance to beat both those readings the next few days when the site updates.

Looks close to the MJO phase 4 record for January. &_ACCESS_wind 2020 1 9 3.0007334 -0.43843362 4 3.0325940

Yeah, the 70 at Newark was warmer than 8-29-17. 2017-08-29 69

The 68 at POU is only 2 off their all-time January high of 70 in 2007. http://wxweb.meteostar.com/meteogram/link.shtml?choice=Kpou Time Series Summary for Poughkeepsie Area, NY (ThreadEx) - Month of Jan Click column heading to sort ascending, click again to sort descending. Rank Year Highest Max Temperature Missing Count 1 2007 70 0 2 1932 69 2 3 1950 68 0 4 1937 67 0 5 2016 65 0

This was the 6th year that Newark made it to 70 degrees in January. It was the 4th time since 1998. Time Series Summary for NEWARK LIBERTY INTL AP, NJ - Month of Jan Click column heading to sort ascending, click again to sort descending. Rank Year Highest Max Temperature Missing Count 1 1950 74 0 2 2007 72 0 3 2002 70 0 - 1998 70 0 - 1932 70 0

We can always get a transient -NAO from a wave breaking event. But more lasting -NAO episodes are usually associated with MJO phase 8 and SSW’s.

This is another case of the SE ridge surpassing expectations in situations that allow for it. While not as extreme as what happened in February 2018, this is close to the record 500 mb height for January at OKX.

I am guessing that it is related to the MJO. We lingered in 6-7 later last January before the push into 8 during February. But we are much more amplified this year than last year.

Funny how similar that general forecast 500 mb pattern is to January 20-31 last year.

Impressive temperature jump in NW NJ from 45 to 61 in an hour.

More extremes from the jet stream. This is a 5 SD max near 220KT.

NYC already approaching the record high and it’s only 7 am. Current temperature in NYC 59 1/11 63 in 1975 59 in 1980 59 in 1933

This is pretty cool.

The historic snowfall run from 12-13 to 17-18 was epic on Long Island. My guess is that these amounts for a 6 year period may have been a 100 to 200 year event under older climatology. But who knows what the return period will be for this to occur again under our new more extreme climate. Monthly Total Snowfall for ISLIP-LI MACARTHUR AP, NY Click column heading to sort ascending, click again to sort descending. Year Oct Nov Dec Jan Feb Mar Apr Season 2012-2013 0.0 4.2 0.6 3.3 31.4 7.4 0.0 46.9 2013-2014 0.0 0.3 8.1 25.2 24.5 5.4 0.2 63.7 2014-2015 0.0 T 0.4 30.2 13.4 19.7 0.0 63.7 2015-2016 0.0 0.0 T 24.8 13.2 3.2 0.2 41.4 2016-2017 T T 3.2 14.0 14.7 7.4 T 39.3 2017-2018 0.0 T 6.0 22.0 1.4 31.9 4.6 65.9 2018-2019 0.0 4.3 T 0.9 3.5 4.1 T 12.8 2019-2020 0.0 0.1 4.2 0.4 M M M 4.7

It’s very difficult to predict how long the lull periods between active benchmark tracks will last. We had the record breaking 95-96 season followed by the 96-97 to 01-02 lull. The only decent snowfall season in that 6 year run was 00-01. Things really picked up in 02-03 and were great until 05-06. We saw another downturn from 06-07 to 07-08. Some slight improvement for 08-09 before the big ramp up lasting until 10-11. Then another big step down in 11-12 before another uptick in February 2013. Nemo in February 2013 opened up our greatest 6 year benchmark track run through March 2018. Since last year, we have been in a consistent cutter or hugger storm track regime. There were also a few disappointing southern stream suppressed storms like in early December 2018. So the big question is when the rapidly deepening benchmark storm track will make a return.

Like I said, mixing issues with KU benchmark storm tracks are not a problem. We had some mixing issues with the last March 2018 storm and still went 10-20 inches of snow. But these 1-3 or 2-4 front end thumps then sleet or rain have been a big disappointment since last winter. That’s what we get with storm tracks to our west that cut or hug. Hopefully, we return to a rapidly deepening benchmark storm track.

The South Shore only had 4 inches last March vs 30 plus in March 2018. Nobody minds some mixing if you get double digit snowfall total. But you need rapidly deepening dynamic systems to the south to pull that off. Hopefully, the intense benchmark storm track will come back to life soon.

It wasn’t that long ago. We had plenty of benchmark storm tracks with double digit snowfall at the coast right through March 2018. Last winter we started with the cutter and hugger storm tracks where interior sections had the heaviest amounts.

It would be nice. But the coastal posters will be happy when they see the storm track shift south closer to the Delmarva.

We’ll know the storm track has improved when we get an amped system with no P-Type issues. That’s what we have been waiting for. People at the coast will be happy when they get all snow from start to finish.

Even Long Island can get into the record warmth with the flow becoming more westerly behind the Sunday morning squall potential.