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Texas/New Mexico/Louisiana/Mexico Obs And Discussion Thread Part 8


wxmx
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I went outside about 20 minutes ago and it was snowing pretty good. Our vehicles and front yard were covered with about a half inch of snow, but the streets and sidewalks were still mostly just wet. With the freezing temperatures it shouldn't be long for them to ice up and start accumulating snow. Radar still looks decent. 

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We ended up with a couple of inches of snow... maybe 2.5" or so. The roads here in Longview are terrible, as traffic has compacted the sleet/snow/slush into a layer of ice on all streets. I don't advise traveling anywhere today if you don't have to.

Streets will refreeze tonight (if we see any melting from the sun later today) and a similar issue with more black ice should reappear tonight and tomorrow morning.

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If DFW Airport reaches 12°F or lower as forecasted...then that will be the coldest we have been in 22 years. You have to go all the way back to February 1996 when we hit 8°F. Doubt we will hit the single digits, but we could. This current streak is the longest on record by a wide margin of not falling below 10°F.

We are going on nearly 3 consecutive years without any significant snow or ice. Last event was March 4, 2015. By significant I mean 0.25 or greater of ice or 2 inch or greater of snow. If nothing occurs this year, it will be the longest stretch since 1978 without any significant snow or ice for DFW, possibly longer.

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11 minutes ago, DFWWeather said:

If DFW Airport reaches 12°F or lower as forecasted...then that will be the coldest we have been in 22 years. You have to go all the way back to February 1996 when we hit 8°F. Doubt we will hit the single digits, but we could. This current streak is the longest on record by a wide margin of not falling below 10°F.

We are going on nearly 3 consecutive years without any significant snow or ice. Last event was March 4, 2015. By significant I mean 0.25 or greater of ice or 2 inch or greater of snow. If nothing occurs this year, it will be the longest stretch since 1978 without any significant snow or ice for DFW, possibly longer.

Crazy stretch we are in.. I personally fear with how everyone closed down almost, that when we do have a real threat, people won't take it seriously and we end up with an Atlanta or BHM situation of people stuck all night long. Glad however to see TXDot starting to use the brine more like we have in the midwest, sure it doesn't eliminate the threat entirely on roads, but it can make a difference in the severity of the slick roads, unless you get ice cold temps like what we have.. I think it's safe to say that Tyler and Longview are having cobblestone ice like we did in 2013 in DFW right now. 

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My street is now clear, but seeing reports that mossy roads around here are ice covered. I sure the difference here is I did not get any freezing rain and barely any sleet. Also very little traffic to compact the snow so the sub filtering through the clouds wad enough to warm the blacktop here.

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I'll repeat my earlier complaint - its amazing that Monterrey, Brownsville, Houston, New Orleans, Savannah, Charleston, San Antonio and other cites have had snow this winter while it has barely rained here since September. The good news is...it is very cold today. So that's nice. 

I will say: One of my analogs, 1943, had multiple snow events into the deep South and TX, like down to the Gulf Coast, so that is actually verifying pretty well. You had a super warm Atlantic, neutral PDO, low solar activity, and an east-based "cold Neutral" look to ENSO that year. 1943 is like a colder version of 2008 nationally. Even the warm patch of waters north of the cold Nino 3/1.2 existed in 1943-44.

 

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Ended up being a mediocre event here in Austin. Woke up with a bit less than 1/8 inch of ice on the cars and surfaces and then it sleeted for 2 or so hours. Seems that Houston ended up faring better because they got 2 days off of school/work. Still can't complain because this is our 4th wintry mix event of the year and if there's no severe then at least we have something to track.

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MJO is now coherently just barely in phase four, many models have it in phase five in a week or less. Snap to a much warmer pattern for the US east of the Rockies should be coming. Will be interesting to see how much of this gets wiped out -

CYKi45Y.png

Areas of North Dakota were +2 to +4 in December, so a wipe out of the (relatively) minor cold anomalies in January there would put them near normal, not cold for winter. Suspect the blue and purple areas on the map have a colder than normal month, I think the green areas end up near average though. Those reds in the West should trend down too. Would expect most areas to be +8 to -8 by the end of the month instead of +12 to -12. Even here, largely without precipitation, it looks much colder than December now. West Texas is fairly cold in phase five, so don't think the cold is particularly threatened in Texas.

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The GFS, Euro, 3-km NAM show a fairly healthy line of showers associated with a Pacific cold front moving through NM, bringing rain and then maybe snow even to valley locations. Going to have to be one incredible cold front if we go from 55-60F on Saturday to snow by Saturday Night, although it does happen.

GFS thinks 0.10-0.20", Euro and 3-km NAM think 0.05" or so. I'd expect 0.05"-0.10" precipitation, with up to the final third of it as snow...0.1"-0.5" in the city?

 

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Next shot for NM is around the 21st. Then, the 28th+ looks like an opportunity for most of the region if heights in the Pacific coast can build and tap the Canadian cold air. Plus, it looks like the NE will build a semi-blocking ridge, which would give us a deepening, slow moving trough and a 1-2 punch of cold air, plus the resulting positive tilt to the trough can tap moisture from the Pacific.

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2 hours ago, wxmx said:

Next shot for NM is around the 21st. Then, the 28th+ looks like an opportunity for most of the region if heights in the Pacific coast can build and tap the Canadian cold air. Plus, it looks like the NE will build a semi-blocking ridge, which would give us a deepening, slow moving trough and a 1-2 punch of cold air, plus the resulting positive tilt to the trough can tap moisture from the Pacific.

The 12Z NAM 3km maxed out at 28" of snow on Sunday for the mountain above my family's place in southern Taos County NM. They have not had even half that this season as a whole.

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The 3 km-NAM is honestly awesome at short range - it had essentially no rain/snow for the city and that seems to be verifying other than 20 minutes of trace-level rain. Euro and GFS both had much more, with some snow. Will be impressed if we end up with even 0.01" from this event in the city. On to the next storm I suppose. The non-Nino winters here after major hurricanes hitting TX lean heavily toward dry January, and we're ~2/3 through with 0.03". Not sure why the local NWS kept the weather advisory for the city for this event, it was 52F at 10 pm when they renewed it. My rule is <50F on a warm day by 10 pm if it is to convert to snow over night.

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