Carvers Gap

Looks like the eastern ridge complex will be sent westward for a couple of weeks minimum. With it being a diminishing Nina, still have to think a very extended summer is in order. I will GLADLY enjoy being wrong if it isn't. Either way, the upper 80s for real feel are better than 105F

First measurable rainfall IMBY in roughly eighteen days. Tied for the driest my yard has ever been until today. Finally, some showers today. It is not nearly enough, but we will take anything at this point.

I think this winter is much less cut and dry than previous winters. Maps above look about right. I tend to lean with John on this. The QBO in conjunction with a fading La Nina by February gives me pause about the second half of winter. That said, there might be just enough of a hangover to get us through Feb. What would be optimal is La Nina to transition quickly to a weak Nino this winter. That would give us a quick start to winter and then prolong winter due to Nino. Timing is rarely that perfect. Initial thoughts for winter(temps): September- October: HOT! DRY! November: BN to seasonal December: Seasonal January: Seasonal to above February: Much above(unless Nino kicks in early) Snow: AN west of the Cumberlands. Normal for TYS and Chattanooga. Slightly BN for TRI. Mountains much BN. Overall precip: Crap shoot Normally, I like to write some preliminary thoughts during June. In the past, I haven't really changed those ideas as. we have approached winter. This year is not going to be one of those years! It will almost certainly have to be modified. The ENSO is a total crap shoot for winter. It could easily go to a weak Nino or the dreaded La Nada. The Nina is on shaky ground. The QBO in conjunction with a Nada could spell a torch for winter. That said, I think a winter similar to the past two is likely. The reason I have TRI and the mountains as BN for snow is that those areas really depend on an upslope/northwest component IN CONJUNCTION w/ coastal storms for snow. La Nina makes that difficult on both fronts. We catch just enough ridging over here in NE TN that is causes coastals to track too far inland and it prevents NW flow reaching this area. But I will say I do think we see some very severe bouts of cold and some long stretches of very warm weather. Again, similar to last winter, but this is trick because it is highly possible that we will see a transition from Nina to Nino by next April. I do feel confident in thinking that next summer will be seasonal in terms of temps for July and August. I think this summer...we bake w a brief respite upcoming for 2-3 weeks. WARNING: This is highly likely gonna change. This may need to be amended a couple of times prior winter. ENSO was pretty locked-in during the last two winters. It is not right now. My confidence in the above might be 40%.

Got back from Oregon 12 days ago. Not a drop since we have been back. Everything is getting pretty much fried in this area. So little rain.

Cosgrove thinks there is a flip to neutral or weak Nino by midwinter. Looks like the ENSO forecast is showing an abrupt change around January. He also noted that the current Nina is sort of choppy. He pointed out that subsurfaces temps in some regions are quite warm(right below the colder water). I feel a bit more confident that next spring and summer will be seasonal to BN. My comments...The QBO, which has been strongly negative, would appear to be set to turn positive. There are some conflicting signals out there re: winter. I tend to favor a cold start, and then wx chaos as the ENSO flips. Seasonal forecasts are pretty much a crapshoot...this winter may be a monster crapshoot. It seems when we have variation in the pattern during the winter season, we have our best chances. I would think that is likely this winter.

Rainfall has been doing the splits over my region. We have had no measurable rainfall since last Sunday. We have only had one day of measurable rain during the last two weeks. Getting very, very dry here.

Evidently my idea of moderation during the last ten days of June is....the upper 90s! LOL. Really strong work on my part. I agree with Jeff's comment about the heat looking more spread out. But man, the adjustment from running in the mid 60s in Oregon to running in the mid 90s is BRUTAL! We were pretty acclimated when we left, but having to start over now. Yesterday was truly awful. Some of us ran in the morning. It was 80 degrees and 82% humidity. It was like running in a sauna. The afternoon was worse. I am pretty sure the real feel on my phone wx app is too jacked up. It was 106. NWS had us at 99 for the real feel. To quote Talladega Nights, "I'm on fire!" Oregon was a blast. We did the area from Coos Bay southward to the Redwoods. We worked out of one town in the middle of those. Wx Dad dropped the ball on a side trip. We rolled out of Eugene on day one and headed to Crater Lake prior to shipping over to the coast. The Cascades were awesome - just huge trees. That is every bit Bigfoot country. One of mine has studied CL and is a huge fan! So we were all excited. Got there, and it started raining. And the entire crater was fogged in!!!! I should have known better. Still it was something to behold to see the 5-7' snow fields near the rim. Some of the buildings were still covered to the second floor. They get ~550" of snow seasonally. I had to look that up to make sure I wasn't losing my mind. Anyway, we headed for the coast. We got to the place we were renting that night and there were 35+mph winds sustained. Gale advisories were posted. I have no idea what they were gusting to, but the winds were shaking the house. You could hear the ocean rumbling. It was awesome sleeping with the wind whistling through the windows, rain pelting the glass, and the roar of the ocean outside. If you remember the scene in Harry Potter (Sorcerer's Stone) where Harry is taken to the island by the Dursley's and Hagrid shows up - that kind of wx. Next morning, we woke up and it was over. The winds did return later in the trip as the atmospheric river event unfolded(that same event eventually caused the flooding in Yellowstone). We had those big waves where the wind was whipping the spray off the crest. Last couple of days we went to the NCAA Track and Field Championships at Hayward - bucket list right there. The Vols finished 3rd in the country on the men's side(best finish since 2022). We rain on Pre's Trail for 3 days during the trip. On big dude came rolling by in his Oregon gear(and I mean rolling). We quickly looked him up on Google. Pretty sure he was the collegiate record holder in the mile. LOL. We ate a lot of good food. This was our first real vacation since the pandemic. Evidently, one of our kids didn't get properly checked-in on the flight from San Fran to Eugene. That slight error would cause cascading issues on the return home. On the plus side, we did get to meet every, single family who boarded the plane (as we stood and waited for the ticket issue to get cleared up...)....not once but twice. But I can't complain, we made both connection and our luggage showed up on time. TN wx while we were gone was outstanding. The heat hammer dropped as our return flight touched down in Atlanta. Time to take the coats off and turn the A/C up to full. I don't know how the Atlanta guys do traffic there every day BTW. I get irritated if I don't make it through downtown Kingsport in two lights(Kingsport folks know what I am talking about).

HOT!!! I have been in coastal Oregon and the transition back to TN is HOT!!! I did get to experience a humid couple of days there as the atmospheric river paid a late season visit to the Pacific Northwest. I also got to experience a gale along the coast. So awesome. Looks like the heat here will moderate by the last 10 days of June - HOPE SO!

We received some decent rain last night in the form of a severe storm. 2" size hail fell in Church Hill. We saw that incoming on the radar and were getting ready to move our cars to a parking garage downtown! Right as we got ready to load-up, the severe hail portion of the storm dissipated. Areas of Fall Branch received some smaller hail as it crossed Bays Mountain. Outside of high winds, hail is the worst. After dealing with that several years ago in the form of torn-up cars(broken windows and looking like they had been hit with a hammer), gutters with holes in them, broken furniture, and a new roof(after getting a new roof just 6mos earlier)....I truly hate hail storms. Thankful for the rain, though.

Last week...Portions of NE TN were added to the drought monitor(early stages). The area in SE TN was expanded. Today’s update will be interesting. We are in a cycle where NE TN is dry and getting drier. It has been my experience that those types of summers tend to struggled to get back to normal for precip. I put my garden in slightly early this year as a bit of a gamble. I think late summer has the potential to be really tough on gardens and farms.

I think I have shared this before....but when we were at Sanibel Island years ago, we shot some really cool shots of the sunset there. We noticed a lot of people(more than usual...but not by much) viewing it as well. We took some really good shots. Got home, and realized we had photographed a partial solar eclipse that evening. LOL. The shots were awesome. All we had to do was to dial-back some of the exposure features on digital editing...and there it was. Anyway, my dad got some good shots last night with his iPhone. They are a bit grainy, but it looked like TRI had decent skies. The moon was definitely red in his shots.

Those model runs which suggested a BN May or much BN May are in serious trouble.

Some much needed rainfall in NE TN/SW VA. @tnweathernutshared with me that part of I-81 were in rough shape in SW VA as one area received like 6-8" of hail. So, in some places...too much of a good thing.

If this next batch of precip weakens as it approaches NE TN(as it has for much of spring), we may find ourselves on the drought monitor by next month. It is getting quite dry. That is a bad sign for summer in regards to heat and drought. Looks like Niña conditions will persist for a while.

Frost advisory here this morning and temps in the mid-30s.

The 18z GFS seems to be honing-in on yet another trough amplification around the second week of May, and yes....snow showers in the mountains. Unreal.

IMHO, depends on if there is a Nina hangover. If there is, early summer could be hot and dry. If Nino begins to take over, the middle to second half of summer could be seasonal (which still means hot) and decent precip. I haven't looked that closely at though, so huge grains of salt there. Spring seems to have been a mix of both.

The 6z GFS has high elevation snows for May 2nd. Not good.

Looks like more BN wx is inbound. Going to have to get some tomato plants in the ground regardless. Time to garden. May is gonna be a fight to keep things growing on track. We had extended summer last fall. After three very summer like days, we are about to get the exact opposite for the first half of May.

It is a little breezy right now but due to kick up. Just heard in the radio that Johnson Co schools are closed to frozen precip up there.

The cold front pushed through just after 4:30 yesterday. I covered up a good chunk of the garden in preparation for frost. Though I am not sure it frosted, the water on the tarps is frozen. So, it looks like we had a bit of a flash freeze just before dawn.

I talked to my Dad who is in his 70s. He said that he remembers springs during his childhood as being really windy. Neither of us remember winds like we have had so far with the exception of maybe one year(can't remember which). Yeah, I am good delaying the really hot weather. This weather is not a huge deal right now, but if it were to drag into May...this could have a negative effect on farmers and gardeners in the region. And yes, it looks like modeling keeps trying to spin up storms/fronts which drag cooler/cold air into our region for a while. My backyard definitely looks the best that it ever has. That is probably true for my street(front yards) as well.

And yet another strong trough amplification is showing up consistently around April 22.

Just read that Red Lodge, MT, (ski slopes) received 27" of snow in 24 hours. I saw on social media that Pony, MT, received 30". Those front range blizzards during spring are no jokes.

Meanwhile, in Bismarck, ND... Seriously, there are some great live shots of the blizzard on NDDOT. https://travel.dot.nd.gov/?layers=cameras,closed-blocked,event-orange,incident-red,informational-grey,roads,travelalerts,warning-blue,warning-yellow