February Medium/Long Range Discussion Thread

[WinterWxLuvr]

Just now, psuhoffman said:

Whatever someone focuses on won't change the outcome. I agree it's worth watching but I'm still going to pay attention to the pattern as a whole and every possible threat. Some people can multi task. 

Yeah, and nit picking weak events is a waste of time anyway.  They're too sensitive to small changes at the upper levels to be able to pin down at any length of time.

The 132 hour "event" looks warm at the surface but I think that could easily be overdone.  Little more cloud cover, more precip could hold those down.  850's are plenty cold.

Im curious as to what happens Sunday night.  The vortex that the gfs has on the sc/nc border at that time could easily end up further north.  That's often the case with those northern stream sw's.  If it ends up on the Va border instead, we might get a little light snow.

[WinterWxLuvr]

4 minutes ago, showmethesnow said:

Really nothing to focus on in that time period at this time except for maybe some light snow up towards PA. The whole setup argues against anything somewhat meaningful for the general region. Of course things can and do change. so there is that. But we would need to see some drastic changes at the surface and 500mb's to make it work for more then a very light accumulation for the general region.

I think more than a light accumulation out of that one isn't happening.  A light snow event seems top end.

[psuhoffman]

1 hour ago, showmethesnow said:

After looking over the 00Z GEFS I would say it made a big step towards showing potential in the longer range (Day 12-16). 12Z was showing a broad flat trough without much dig through this period, which though it had some possibilities, probably argued that anything meaningful would be to our north.  00Z has now moved towards two distinct pulses within that trough, one centered at day 11 1/2 and the other at day 14 1/2 that actually show more promise overall for our region. Haven't looked at the individual members with the 12Z run but I would not be surprised if they for the most part did show a two wave scenario but timing issues smoothed the mean out giving us the broad flat trough. If this is indeed the case I would not be surprised to see in future runs a digging deeper and sharpening of the first impulse, if not both, as the timing issues between these two get resolved. Which would be a good thing.

Edit: For what it is worth the GEFS mean snowfall do show decent upticks with both time periods.

I appreciate waking up to your straight forward take on the overnight guidance vs some of the sky is falling stuff we get it the op gfs doesn't show a blizzard. 

I haven't had time to dig into the overnight stuff yet, do that after my morning meetings and running copies, but your right in your guess regarding the gefs yesterday washing out the two waves with timing differences. The snowfall jump from dat 10-16 was from two distinctly different waves. Some members hit with one some with the second and a couple with both hence the big totals. 

The first day 10-11 has the risk of a west track. It's coming during a relaxation between troughs. It's going to depend on timing and if a feature up too can suppress the flow enough as it approaches. Still too far out for those details. 

The next one has the better setup but being that far out makes it silly to even discuss more then to say there is a window there.  

[showmethesnow]

32 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

I appreciate waking up to your straight forward take on the overnight guidance vs some of the sky is falling stuff we get it the op gfs doesn't show a blizzard. 

I haven't had time to dig into the overnight stuff yet, do that after my morning meetings and running copies, but your right in your guess regarding the gefs yesterday washing out the two waves with timing differences. The snowfall jump from dat 10-16 was from two distinctly different waves. Some members hit with one some with the second and a couple with both hence the big totals. 

The first day 10-11 has the risk of a west track. It's coming during a relaxation between troughs. It's going to depend on timing and if a feature up too can suppress the flow enough as it approaches. Still too far out for those details. 

The next one has the better setup but being that far out makes it silly to even discuss more then to say there is a window there.  

Morning. Thanks. Been trying to follow yours as well as others takes on the long range, but this is the first time in over a week that I have actually sat down and looked at the models for myself.  For what it's worth I was actually encouraged by what I saw. Of course we have been there done that all year with what looks to be promising setups so I guess we will see. 

[CAPE]

48 minutes ago, WinterWxLuvr said:

Yeah, and nit picking weak events is a waste of time anyway.  They're too sensitive to small changes at the upper levels to be able to pin down at any length of time.

The 132 hour "event" looks warm at the surface but I think that could easily be overdone.  Little more cloud cover, more precip could hold those down.  850's are plenty cold.

Im curious as to what happens Sunday night.  The vortex that the gfs has on the sc/nc border at that time could easily end up further north.  That's often the case with those northern stream sw's.  If it ends up on the Va border instead, we might get a little light snow.

I am interested in the Sunday-Monday deal as well. The CMC and GFS are both trying to go deeper with the vort max. Euro looks flatter. These are the types of systems that often are not resolved until the shorter term, and can surprise at times. I could see this evolving into a 1-2" deal for some places in our region.

[North Balti Zen]

Since I never have anything useful to add to this thread, maybe this will help - from HM on twitter:

 

[North Balti Zen]

Course, he then posted this:

[showmethesnow]

1 hour ago, WinterWxLuvr said:

Yeah, and nit picking weak events is a waste of time anyway.  They're too sensitive to small changes at the upper levels to be able to pin down at any length of time.

The 132 hour "event" looks warm at the surface but I think that could easily be overdone.  Little more cloud cover, more precip could hold those down.  850's are plenty cold.

Im curious as to what happens Sunday night.  The vortex that the gfs has on the sc/nc border at that time could easily end up further north.  That's often the case with those northern stream sw's.  If it ends up on the Va border instead, we might get a little light snow.

Famous last words but I really don't think I would worry to much about temps. Fairly fresh cold air mass and the dew points are running in the upper teens to low 20's. Wherever that fairly potent vortmax rotates through just to the north of it should see some decent rates that will cool the surface down and probably quickly. And the surface warmth looks to be shallow to boot with the 925mb temps sitting in the low 20's. 

[mappy]

41 minutes ago, North Balti Zen said:

Since I never have anything useful to add to this thread, maybe this will help - from HM on twitter:

 

 

39 minutes ago, North Balti Zen said:

Course, he then posted this:

you're an awful poster. stop posting. fool. 

[mappy]

 

[Ralph Wiggum]

3 minutes ago, mappy said:

 

you're an awful poster. stop posting. fool. 

 

43 minutes ago, North Balti Zen said:

Course, he then posted this:

Doesn't HM post mostly for NE? So I assume by East Coast storm he is implying NYC Northward?

[WinterWxLuvr]

7 minutes ago, showmethesnow said:

Famous last words but I really don't think I would worry to much about temps. Fairly fresh cold air mass and the dew points are running in the upper teens to low 20's. Wherever that fairly potent vortmax rotates through just to the north of it should see some decent rates that will cool the surface down and probably quickly. And the surface warmth looks to be shallow to boot with the 925mb temps sitting in the low 20's. 

Agree totally.  That's what I meant when I said it could easily be overcome.

Tough thing about any light event is trying to pin down where any decent precipitation might fall.

[mappy]

2 minutes ago, Ralph Wiggum said:

 

Doesn't HM post mostly for NE? So I assume by East Coast storm he is implying NYC Northward?

i have no idea. i was trolling NBalti Zen

[Ralph Wiggum]

1 minute ago, mappy said:

i have no idea. i was trolling NE Balti Zen

I thought that was paeasternwx's job? ;-)

[North Balti Zen]

HM's tweet said "east coast" so I thought it perhaps applicable to our area and dropped it in here, even though we are not as snow sainted our betters further up 95 since, last map I checked, we are also on the east coast.  I will defer to Katie whose map skillz are professional, to fact check me on whether our area is indeed  on the east coast.

Bad posting, over. For now.

[mappy]

2 minutes ago, North Balti Zen said:

HM's tweet said "east coast" so I thought it perhaps applicable to our area and dropped it in here, even though we are not as snow sainted our betters further up 95 since, last map I checked, we are also on the east coast.  I will defer to Katie whose map skillz are professional, to fact check me on whether our area is indeed  on the east coast.

Bad posting, over. For now.

 i love when you get sassy. 

 

also, yes. we are indeed along the east coast. and PA is indeed NOT part of the mid-Atlantic subforum. 

[PaEasternWX]

42 minutes ago, Ralph Wiggum said:

I thought that was paeasternwx's job? ;-)

 at least I know when to post in banter. No reason to be trolling other people.

[wawarriors4]

12z GFS wants to bring some light precip (light snow) through late Sunday night and Monday.

Looks like maybe 0.5-1" from EZF to DCA with more as you go East, with 2-3" on the Eastern Shore

[showmethesnow]

Really convoluted setup with the energy at 500mb for heading into the Sunday night/Monday morning time period. I could be wrong but it looked to me as if we just miss getting something much bigger then an inch or two storm talked about this morning.

[showmethesnow]

Partial phase of the NS energy with the southern stream initially but then it loses it. 

[CAPE]

3 minutes ago, showmethesnow said:

Really convoluted setup with the energy at 500mb for heading into the Sunday night/Monday morning time period. I could be wrong but it looked to me as if we just miss getting something much bigger then an inch or two storm talked about this morning.

Its trying..its been trending slowly in a good direction on the GFS and CMC.

[Bob Chill]

1 minute ago, C.A.P.E. said:

Its trying..its been trending slowly in a good direction on the GFS and CMC.

I like it. It was never going to be anything substantial. We both know these subtle little vorts can do neat things on models at very short leads. Especially once in meso range. The real fun comes Saturday when the RGEM drops 2-4 on us. lol

[NorthArlington101]

It would double my total!

 

[CAPE]

1 minute ago, Bob Chill said:

I like it. It was never going to be anything substantial. We both know these subtle little vorts can do neat things on models at very short leads. Especially once in meso range. The real fun comes Saturday when the RGEM drops 2-4 on us. lol

Yeah this has looked like it could become legit trackable for several runs now. Even the Euro has shown some light precip for the area, but it has a much flatter, progressive look. It needs to get on board lol.

[CAPE]

2 minutes ago, NorthArlington101 said:

It would double my total!

 

S DE is the new NE MD.

[SomeguyfromTakomaPark]

GFS looks pretty epic for jonjon land.  Pretty much continuous snow all through next week.  Easily a foot plus, maybe even 2 feet by next weekend.  

[showmethesnow]

4 minutes ago, C.A.P.E. said:

Its trying..its been trending slowly in a good direction on the GFS and CMC.

When there is so much energy flying around it is so hard to know how it will go until you are closer in. Think we just miss seeing a half decent storm on this run, 2-4 or 3-6 deal sort of deal maybe?

[Bob Chill]

Just now, C.A.P.E. said:

Yeah this has looked like it could become legit trackable for several runs now. Even the Euro has shown some light precip for the area, but it has a much flatter, progressive look. It needs to get on board lol.

I tend to favor the gfs over the euro on a NS vort in the med range. Inside of 72 you want them both looking the same. Then it's meso madness. lol

[CAPE]

2 minutes ago, showmethesnow said:

When there is so much energy flying around it is so hard to know how it will go until you are closer in. Think we just miss seeing a half decent storm on this run, 2-4 or 3-6 deal sort of deal maybe?

I think 1-3.. maybe 4. The potential of a couple inches is big given the recent crap period. I am good with that.  Although like Bob said, one or more of the Meso models will probably "NAM" us.

[showmethesnow]

The look on the second chance we have around 150 hr has degraded and pulled farther north.