FXWX

And just like that; a flip of the wind direction and GON goes from 71 to 58...

I'm only a causal poster, but I do spend a good amount of time reading posts by mets on here. I'm not sure how many of the excellent mets on here continue to put up with the BS. I do not recall any met doing anything other than discussing 7 to 10, 10+ day snd/or the weeklies trends, as modeled, with a crap lot of caveats each time. And once the patterns got within 7 days, they were almost always discussing why it was not likely to not work out in positive way for snow and/or cold lovers across central & southern areas. The lack of comprehension on this board is stunning sometimes.

I'm not even talking about next week... I'm just busting about the constant persistence talk in the face of an obviously different look to the pattern evolution. Hey, it may lead to nothing at all, but it won't be for the same reasons. Actually late next week is actually the first tease as I see it.

When he has 6 inches of persistence on his driveway or a half of persistence breaking tree limbs into his property...

100%... We all know what the tenor of the winter and modeling has been up to this point in time... But you have to be ready to drop the persistence argument when it starts becoming obvious that argument wouldn't cut it anymore. Are we 100% there yet, no... But we are very close.

Yes... Your text to me did highlight this potential... Spot on...

Obviously, lots of if's still in play, but the overall pattern evolution playing out in recent trends, suggest the most promising period for SNE could be at hand; although that would not take much given the tenor of this winter. The cold loading & press being modeled by the GEFS would lead to a wonderful period of gradient snows / ice across portions of the region. I'm certainly not going to commit to high confidence outcome at this time, but I really like the look of the layout across south-central and southeastern Canada and would think confidence will jump quickly over the next 36 to 48 hours, if these trends do not collapse.

Hey Will... just a couple of thoughts... when I look at the physical layout of the projected 500 mb pattern, I am just not sure if there is enough wiggle room for the ridge to retrograde much, and as you stated it hard to have much confidence it is coming westward much. I see the broadness of the Canadian vortex and the stout look of the Alaskan ridge, just not sure how much wiggle room and flexibility there is within that layout. Obviously, that assumes it evolves as modeled??? We have 4 pieces of the puzzle; broad polar vortex, modest ridging in the far east side of the -NAO sector, Alaskan ridging and a very broad west to east southern ridge. Just not sure the room for retrograding is great. With that in mind, I'm agree with your skepticism. If we could really get the ridge to retrograde west/northwest, that would help compress the Canadian trough, which in turn would setup a pretty wild gradient between the PV and the southern ridge... that in turn would likely setup a period of fast-moving swfe's for New England; obviously snow potential for any one location would be dependent upon where the cold side gradient ended-up... Lots of ifs and buts with very low confidence about how all of this will play out over the next 2 to 3 weeks. Given the tenor of the winter to date, not holding my breath for SNE; especially south of the Pike.

Here's the book...

Completely different world back then... I have a 1888 Blizzard photo book that has pictures from many southeastern NY and CT towns... Many of the photos are stunning; phenomenal drifting in some areas; folks exiting second floor windows, etc...

Lol... Just referencing a huge local event that if I could go back in time would have loved to experience... Obviously not one I was around to enjoy... Although, growing up in south-central CT, that area would have been just north of some of the monster totals across parts of srn CT. Actual winter storm memories for me don't kick in until late 60's...

Mar. 1888, Feb. 69 (Lindsey Day storm; personal favorite since I had just had NWS teletype data drop line installed at my house), Feb. 78, Feb. 83, Feb. 13

I hear ya Will... I fully understand the scientific / meteorological rush and excitement of following the development of a powerful, and yes dangerous, storm event. And there is no doubt that our desire to study the mechanics of their development has lead tremendous advancement in our ability to predict them. And most importantly, has saved and will continue to save, thousands of lives. I also know no one on here is truly rooting for death and destruction. In my old age, I find myself still excited about the prospect of forecasting a major / life-threatening event, but at the same time more worried about everyone's well-being than I used to be. I'm going to date myself here, but the first dead body I ever saw was that of a women stuck under debris in the Farmington River in Unionville, CT during the 1955 flood! I never shook that image. That event, as tragic as it was, lead to tremendous advancement in river flow control and flood mitigation across the Farmington river watershed. So, a lot of bad occurred, but significant good followed.

Yep

You always have to be careful about you wish for when it comes to damaging storms... Folks love to rant about damaging wind events and wish they were more intense and widespread across SNE... But there can be tragic human consequences like last week when we had an infant killed by a falling tree during last Friday's strong winds. The older I get, with older children and grandchildren, the more I think about the other side of the exciting weather coin.

I agree... Just busting given the tendency for folks (including myself) to never expand the storm gaze away from their backyard. I have a nephew that lives south of KC KS. He always complains to he's never that close to svr wx! Mind you, he's called me twice from his basement when tornadoes were within 3 miles... Lol

It's always MBY only storms. I guess the Jan. 2022 eastern Mass blizzard would also not qualify...

Yep... After such a boring winter, for most in SNE, this event, strong & bitter cold, was kinda neat to experience...

-13.4 here.. pretty uniform once above 1,000'

-6 here in Burlington with a light coating of snow. Couple of DPW crews out treating in a couple of towns...

There is a tremendous amount of coordination that takes place between NWS, private sector mets, towns and school districts during events like this... Very strongly worded discussions have been distributed by NWS folks in all the warning and advisory areas. But there is only so much you can do. In the end, if comes down to parental guidance and the willingness of the folks to heed the advise. Elementary kids usually are actually pretty well prepared by the parents; high school kids are a whole different animal. The Boston situation (lots of walkers) is all predicated on the timing of the true arctic air arrival & increasing wind speeds; the morning is no big deal, but the elementary kids head home in the 3:30 to 4:30 pm period and by then it is going to be nasty. They are trying to protect the mid / late afternoon period.

Exactly...

Actually, many of my heating fuel clients watch those numbers (wintertime mins) with far more interest than they do daily maxes. They see the trend!

Given a full warning in place, most districts would be wary of bucking the strong wording in the warning. Opens the door for criticism if something bad happens...

Overnight mins have been the story for several winters now... Used to be very common to fall into low to mid teens years ago... Now it's a challenge for consistent overnight lows in the teens across SNE...