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January 13-17 Winter Storm


Hoosier

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A lot to sort out in terms of details, which will dictate just how big/widespread this ends up being.  But the potential is there for a highly disruptive storm, and possibly a destructive one if it plays out right.

General setup has been commented on in the medium/long range thread, but just to summarize:  a very strong surface high moving through the northern tier will supply low level cold air as moisture overruns a frontal boundary, resulting in a mixed bag of precip types.  This setup gets going as early as late week, and if the models are to be believed, this could initially focus more toward the Ohio Valley.  The boundary should eventually retreat north, spreading the wintry precip with it, as the main upper level energy and associated surface low eject northeast.  This aspect is farther out in time and thus more subject to change.  If it does play out that way, then a very large area would be subjected to a wintry mess.

A lot of uncertainty here, but the prospect of a storm looks good enough at this point. The question is whether it ends up being rather run of the mill or something bigger.

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ILX office mentioned this system in their AFD

 

Area Forecast Discussion
National Weather Service Lincoln IL
301 PM CST Sun Jan 8 2017

The passage of the low and trailing cold front on Thursday will
usher in an Arctic air mass. There is better model agreement that
the front will stall in the Ohio River Valley Thursday night, and
remain an active frontal circulation as shortwaves ride northeast
along the boundary. One particular wave in the models looks to
trigger precip later Thursday night into Saturday, with the
potential for an extended freezing rain event. The ECMWF brings in
another low to keep precip going through Sunday, which the GFS does
not show.

With cold high pressure entrenched to our north feeding dry low
level air into central Illinois and warm air overrunning the frontal
boundary,portions of central Illinois could see significant icing.
There are differences in the timing of the wave of low pressure, the
movement/placement of the frontal boundary, and how long precip will
continue from Thursday night through Sunday. Likewise, thermal
profile differences create precip type concerns between the models.
Due to the uncertainty, will not change from the current forecast of
rain/snow for the late week/weekend system with this update.

One item that is in better agreement is that there could be heavy
rainfall/QPF in southeast Illinois from Thursday through Sunday,
which could cause some river flooding issues into the following week.

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Will be interesting.  Still in fantasy range but there are some signals for possible severe weather riding on the heels of this thing, especially from central IL/IN/OH southward.  That would definitely suck to have some low topped fast moving super cells move through the same areas that could be impacted by heavy ice.  Like I said fantasy range, but seeing signals of 60's and dews in the high 50's following this system,

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GFS peaks the high pressure at 1055 mb in western WI.  According to this map, there has not been a pressure that high recorded that far east of the Plains, at least at a major reporting station.  Doesn't mean the GFS can't verify but one has to wonder if the high actually comes in that strong.

 

AllTimeRecordHighSLPs.gif

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Yea I'm really unsure on how this will pan out. Euro may be ejecting the energy out too fast and GFS too slow. The critical factor is the strength and position of that high. Euro is weaker and further east which allows the qpf to creep north more into the colder air mass. GFS is crazy strong high pressure and really holds this south. IMO Euro has had better run to run consistency with this system. But I know lately GFS seems to be performing better. I haven't seen a good ice storm in ages. These kind of prolonged overrunning ice events are harder to come by further north. 

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1 hour ago, StormChaser4Life said:

Yea I'm really unsure on how this will pan out. Euro may be ejecting the energy out too fast and GFS too slow. The critical factor is the strength and position of that high. Euro is weaker and further east which allows the qpf to creep north more into the colder air mass. GFS is crazy strong high pressure and really holds this south. IMO Euro has had better run to run consistency with this system. But I know lately GFS seems to be performing better. I haven't seen a good ice storm in ages. These kind of prolonged overrunning ice events are harder to come by further north. 

Seems that way, doesn't it?  I was thinking that myself but I'm not sure if there's actually any data to back it up or if it's selective memory.

I guess I'll ask this question here.  Does anyone know anything about a big ice storm in the Midwest a long time ago... maybe back in the 1920s or 1930s?  I've tried searching and haven't found what I'm looking for.  I've read about this storm before but I just can't recall an exact date, and I don't think it was the December 1924 ice storm.

EDIT:  nevermind, just found it!  It was January 1930.

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1 hour ago, Hoosier said:

Seems that way, doesn't it?  I was thinking that myself but I'm not sure if there's actually any data to back it up or if it's selective memory.

I guess I'll ask this question here.  Does anyone know anything about a big ice storm in the Midwest a long time ago... maybe back in the 1920s or 1930s?  I've tried searching and haven't found what I'm looking for.  I've read about this storm before but I just can't recall an exact date, and I don't think it was the December 1924 ice storm.

EDIT:  nevermind, just found it!  It was January 1930.

I remember the ice storm in New England and Canada back in January of 1998.  I believe a few locations had 4" of ice accumulation.  They also had one in the early 1920s.  

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1 minute ago, SchaumburgStormer said:

Already seeing ice accum maps one Facebook. Ugh. 

Yep.  The negative side of weather and social media.  

A generic "potential ice zone" map is one thing, but it's not that, of course.  It's the maps showing those huge amounts.

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Model QPF outputs seem outrageous for January, but if they do indeed verify along with SFC and 850 temps, oh boy. Still in fantasy land right now, but I'd much rather take on 6-18" of snow than deal with the crippling impacts of 2" of ice. 

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