The Mystical Month of February--Long Range Discussion

[psuhoffman]

1 minute ago, jaydreb said:

I don’t know.  A gradient pattern could set up pretty well for you.  

It could...but let’s do this exercise. Let’s say the boundary ends to to my south and I get 3 straight snow/ice events next week. A 6”, 5”, and 3” event back to back. That’s a great week. I wouldn’t complain about that. But then I would still be entering late February 12” short of Climo. Could I pull off another 3/4 events to nickel and dime my way to that last 12” yea...but that’s starting to really become a stretch. If I did pull that off that might be even more epic than doing it with a couple of big storms. That would take almost non stop snow events the rest of winter to pull that off. I would be ecstatic.  I’m just saying that seems highly unlikely. 

[Maestrobjwa]

9 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

You’re right but it’s hard for me to let that go. 

1.  I love big storms. I would take a winter with 30” that all fell in one storm over a winter with 40” that came 3-5” at a time. 

2.  Im still 26” from climo. I guess Im still trying to beat climo. I wasn’t the last 2 years. Gave up on that early. This year will be a bummer if I dont. But I doubt I can get there without at least one big storm. Maybe not an hecs but at least a 10”+.  I could get four 6” storms and still be 2” short of just mean.  I doubt I can nickel and dime my way to average from where I am. I bet without at least one 10” storm I probably am not making it. 

I'm pretty much in the exact same thinking about all this. (Except my yard was kinda in between the jackpot zone and the screw zone last month!) I wanna see at one 10"+ to hit climo (which I consider to be 20 inches, with 15 being the mean). It has been an uphill winter for half the subforum, and to not get at least that would be disappointing. And there's certainly nothing wrong with wanting big storms (no matter the likelihood)

(And the funny part about what ya said about one 30" storm? Some deem 2015/16 still kind of a failure despite that exact thing happening, lol). 

 

[psuhoffman]

@jaydreb just looked at my local records, in the last 50 years Manchester has only beaten climo without a 12”+ storm twice. 1994 and 1982. And both years had multiple 9” storms. It’s very hard to beat climo here without at least one big storm. Luckily we get a 12”+ storm most years. But without one it’s really really unlikely for me to beat climo. 

[Bob Chill]

30 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

You’re right but it’s hard for me to let that go. 

1.  I love big storms. I would take a winter with 30” that all fell in one storm over a winter with 40” that came 3-5” at a time. 

2.  Im still 26” from climo. I guess Im still trying to beat climo. I wasn’t the last 2 years. Gave up on that early. This year will be a bummer if I dont. But I doubt I can get there without at least one big storm. Maybe not an hecs but at least a 10”+.  I could get four 6” storms and still be 2” short of just mean.  I doubt I can nickel and dime my way to average from where I am. I bet without at least one 10” storm I probably am not making it. 

I'm rooting for your yard big time dude. If you think about it... every modeled big storm pattern vaporized before it got to the mid range. Right now the long range doesn't look good for big storms. Maybe we get a big storm pattern but we don't even know about it until the mid range. Would fit perfectly with how this year has gone right?

I have a hunch you get a 10"+ storm in Feb. It's a good pattern for elevation and climo to work in your favor. We'll see how it goes. You still have 6+ solid weeks left.

[WinterWxLuvr]

Ok, just have to say this, but in my opinion climo is not a good standard for winter. I surpassed climo in 15-16 and I hated that winter (all 72 hours of it lol). To each his own, but snow events and extended cold with at least some snow around is what winter is all about. I also think January was a very good month here. Think it was about 12 or so inches but more importantly it was spread out over 5 events with two plus solid weeks of snow cover and cold.

Granted if February does the same, I’ll reach climo but I can see a winter that comes up short of that being good and one that surpasses it being bad.

[psuhoffman]

18 minutes ago, Bob Chill said:

I'm rooting for your yard big time dude. If you think about it... every modeled big storm pattern vaporized before it got to the mid range. Right now the long range doesn't look good for big storms. Maybe we get a big storm pattern but we don't even know about it until the mid range. Would fit perfectly with how this year has gone right?

I have a hunch you get a 10"+ storm in Feb. It's a good pattern for elevation and climo to work in your favor. We'll see how it goes. You still have 6+ solid weeks left.

Thanks, appreciate it, I was happy for you when you got that big one last month. Really was. Obviously I’m rooting for my yard but if I’m not getting snow I still root for DC.

But I don’t deserve any sympathy. I’ve had a good run up here. Even though last year was technically below avg I still made it to 34” while much of this sub suffered. I’m probably spoiled. People probably roll their eyes at my woes and i don’t blame them. But none of that changes the fact I still want to try to beat climo lol. I should let it go though. Odds are against it from where I am now. 

You know I actually do get fringed up here sometimes. I was in January 2010. There have been several others. But in most years (like that one) there are enough chances that eventually it evens out. This year has been weird so far in that regard. 

I don’t know if we ever get a big storm pattern. The NAO seems like a lost cause. I do think we stay mostly cold and snow friendly during mjo phases 8-2 but I don’t know if that will mean a big one. I tend to favor smaller to medium ones att. 

[psuhoffman]

6 minutes ago, WinterWxLuvr said:

Ok, just have to say this, but in my opinion climo is not a good standard for winter. I surpassed climo in 15-16 and I hated that winter (all 72 hours of it lol). To each his own, but snow events and extended cold with at least some snow around is what winter is all about. I also think January was a very good month here. Think it was about 12 or so inches but more importantly it was spread out over 5 events with two plus solid weeks of snow cover and cold.

Granted if February does the same, I’ll reach climo but I can see a winter that comes up short of that being good and one that surpasses it being bad.

Your right...if I got a 2 week period with multiple events and snowcover I would be happy even if I fell short of climo. 

[SnowGolfBro]

Torch week is not such a bad thing. Let the atmosphere reset and hopefully we luck into a warning event. The boundary is going to set up this weekend and a little shift South and East and then hopefully the chips fall right

[clskinsfan]

26 minutes ago, WinterWxLuvr said:

Ok, just have to say this, but in my opinion climo is not a good standard for winter. I surpassed climo in 15-16 and I hated that winter (all 72 hours of it lol). To each his own, but snow events and extended cold with at least some snow around is what winter is all about. I also think January was a very good month here. Think it was about 12 or so inches but more importantly it was spread out over 5 events with two plus solid weeks of snow cover and cold.

Granted if February does the same, I’ll reach climo but I can see a winter that comes up short of that being good and one that surpasses it being bad.

I agree with everything you said. And like I said earlier we have been lucky out here this year. 15-16 was a horrific winter. But that blizzard though. I have never seen anything like it and I doubt I live to see 40 inches from one storm again. 

[cbmclean]

1 hour ago, psuhoffman said:

It could...but let’s do this exercise. Let’s say the boundary ends to to my south and I get 3 straight snow/ice events next week. A 6”, 5”, and 3” event back to back. That’s a great week. I wouldn’t complain about that. But then I would still be entering late February 12” short of Climo. Could I pull off another 3/4 events to nickel and dime my way to that last 12” yea...but that’s starting to really become a stretch. If I did pull that off that might be even more epic than doing it with a couple of big storms. That would take almost non stop snow events the rest of winter to pull that off. I would be ecstatic.  I’m just saying that seems highly unlikely. 

In general, when you refer to "climo" without qualification, are you referring to the mean, or the median?

[psuhoffman]

7 minutes ago, cbmclean said:

In general, when you refer to "climo" without qualification, are you referring to the mean, or the median?

Usually when we say climo we mean mean. Median is a better indicator of normal. I usually shoot for median knowing we only beat mean 40% of the time or less but this seemed like a year to go big game hunting. 

[cbmclean]

18 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

Usually when we say climo we mean mean. Median is a better indicator of normal. I usually shoot for median knowing we only beat mean 40% of the time or less but this seemed like a year to go big game hunting. 

Sadly, most of the big game animals have been on a very slow boat meandering around the maritime continent and the western pacific.

[showmethesnow]

 

7 hours ago, BristowWx said:

Nah.  Not pissed anymore. Hit bottom when I was pacing the house at 12 am the other night waiting for the GEFS thinking WTF. Just gonna ride it to the bottom like that captain on the Titanic.  

That's the spirit! Unlike some others... 

[showmethesnow]

What happened? Did everyone sleep through the Euro Happy Hour? Seeing as no one is here, DRINKS ARE ON ME!!!

[showmethesnow]

For those curious about the Kuchera here it is. Just a rough look at temps but the system stays all snow just north and west of the cities. Euro suggests better then 10-1 ratios the deeper into the cold where 15-1 is showing to the far west and north. Pretty classic look with a system driving towards the lakes to our west with a transfer to the coast. Wouldn't take much, quicker transfer, boundary a little farther south initially, to move those pretty reds and pinks south and east through the cities. Of course it could go the other way as well.  

[showmethesnow]

Looking over the EPS there was a noticeable uptick in support for the day 7-8 storm within the members and the control. Saw an 1/2" increase over the 12Z and an inch over the previous 00Z on the means with the 2 " line now just north of Baltimore. 

[Ji]

Looking over the EPS there was a noticeable uptick in support for the day 7-8 storm within the members and the control. Saw an 1/2" increase over the 12Z and an inch over the previous 00Z on the means with the 2 " line now just north of Baltimore. 

Looks like it all boils to timing of system with high pressure

[showmethesnow]

4 minutes ago, Ji said:

9 minutes ago, showmethesnow said:

Looking over the EPS there was a noticeable uptick in support for the day 7-8 storm within the members and the control. Saw an 1/2" increase over the 12Z and an inch over the previous 00Z on the means with the 2 " line now just north of Baltimore. 

Looks like it all boils to timing of system with high pressure

Just looking over the 500's for that period of time and there is a marked improvement. Not seeing much NS energy dumped into the SW through so we are seeing less up a bump up with the heights in the east. Even better, it is ejecting that SW trough eastward. Dare I say, it is starting to take on a very good look for that period of time?

eta: We are still 7-8 days away so nothing is set in stone. But with this run it did take a pretty big step forwards.

[Ji]

Just looking over the 500's for that period of time and there is a marked improvement. Not seeing much NS energy dumped into the SW through so we are seeing less up a bump up with the heights in the east. Even better, it is ejecting that SW trough eastward. Dare I say, it is starting to take on a very good look for that period of time?
eta: We are still 7-8 days away so nothing is set in stone. But with this run it did take a pretty big step forwards.

The fv3 is much slower so by the time it gets here the high is already of the coast. But yes...euro has improved big time last 2 runs. Some pretty severe EPO in long range too

[CAPE]

GEFS has been baby stepping its way to a decent look by around the 20th. 0z run finally flattens the SE ridge and has a cold look at the end.

[showmethesnow]

At 7-8 days away I will try to curb my excitement but what we just saw on the 00Z EPS has my Spidey senses...er... Snow senses tingling. EPS made a strong move towards a possible significant event IMO. Again, 7-8 days away so lets not get carried away just yet.

Below is the 12Z run for towards the tail end of the storm. Notice that we have strong trough slanted down into the SW so of course we are seeing strong higher heights to our south and east. This trough alignment is due to the fact that the NS dumped too much energy into the southwest reinforcing this trough. Notice also that we are seeing the strongest higher heights situated off our coast equidistant between the 50/50 south of Greenland and the trough in the southwest. This is in response to the slowing of the flow between these two features and is showing an attempt at creating ridging. But these two features are separated too far apart so we are not seeing the bucking of the flow (ridging). 

 

 

Now look what we have on the latest run. Notice that we now see the whole trough is now ejecting eastward. We didn't see a large injection of NS energy into the southwest reinforcing the trough as most of the energy was allowed to eject eastward. Even better yet, without that ejection of energy the SW trough has decided to go along for the ride. This push eastward has several impacts. We see the initial higher heights to our SE leading into the storm come in much weaker and we are seeing a much quicker breakdown of those higher heights on the western portion. Not only that but the separation between the trough and the 50/50 has closed. We are seeing the flow slowed even more then the previous example so now we are seeing indications of buckling (ridging) now showing up between those two features. Now some may ask why ridging between the 50/50 and the trough to our west is so important. Put that feature into the above map and what we see is a deepening and a quicker turning of the trough to our west. Which would be a very good thing in the current pattern being shown. Think BOOM.

 

 

The above look isn't quite there yet for 'THE LOOK' but it is getting awful close. Close the gap just a little more between the 50/50 and the trough and what we probably end up with is either an initial over running event morphing into a coastal somewhere off our shores or just a plain coastal running up from our south. Both of which would most likely feature copious amounts of moisture. Now mind you, the above look is a very good look as well that shows much promise so let's not just dismiss it.

But again 7-8 days away and the EPS is sometimes notorious for mishandling SW energy so let's see where the models take us before we start firing up the snow blowers.

 

[psuhoffman]

1 hour ago, showmethesnow said:

What happened? Did everyone sleep through the Euro Happy Hour? Seeing as no one is here, DRINKS ARE ON ME!!!

Maybe they finally learned that an op outside 100 hours shouldn’t be taken any more seriously than a crazy person on the street holding up a sign screaming “the end is near repent”. The euro is just a slightly better dressed crazy person than the gfs, while the gem is drunk and passed out under its sign. 

[aldie 22]

February seems to be progressing like January did...I can't wait for the February 31st snow

[psuhoffman]

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

GEFS has been baby stepping its way to a decent look by around the 20th. 0z run finally flattens the SE ridge and has a cold look at the end.

I’m “open minded” about the transition period, maybe the euro is right, but I’m confident given the mjo and soi that things should shift towards an eastern trough alignment by the 20th.  Relying on mjo trends this year I would expect a 2-3 week pattern window on the short end, maybe 4 if the mjo dies in phase 2/3 and takes its time getting into a warm phase. At that point who cares, it’s mid March and its over.  Given that we have had no shortage of precip all year that should mean increased snow chances from late February through early March. 

[showmethesnow]

Looking over the extended on the EPS beyond our possible day 7-8 storm and we are mostly seeing improvements there as well. The only issue is that the EPS is starting to lose the N-Atlantic. We are seeing a continuing decay of blocking over Greenland. This is resulting in a migration of the lower pressures we were initially seeing in the general 50/50 region now towards the east of Greenland. Without that 50/50 the N-Atlantic is pretty much lost for us with such weak blocking. But before some start preaching Doom and Gloom there are two things to consider. First, the models are notorious for mishandling the NAO domain so this could just be a matter of the models once again picking up on the blocking as we near in time. Second, with the continuing improvements we are seeing in the PAC and the West there is a good chance we will not need it anyway.

And as far as what we are seeing in the west are positive trends. We are seeing the EPS moving away from the idea of a strong SW trough as it is weakening it with a shallower drop thus resulting in weaker heights in the east. The EPO is also looking generally more inclined to the possibility of a northern based +PNA towards the end of it's run. Overall the general look/flow looks more conducive for seeing the boundary shifted south from previous runs. Overall the overnight EPS run was a win in my book.

[showmethesnow]

Don't put much stock in ops outside of 5 days or so but after looking over the Euro and now the 06Z GFS there might be an indication there is some play in the day 7-8 period of time. Generally similar evolutions at 500's on both with the exception being that the GFS is about half a day slower ejecting the western trough. Looking at the surface on both we are seeing a primary running to our west with redevelopment to it's east in our general region. 

[psuhoffman]

@showmethesnow

there has to be some major conflicting members in the eps day 15 because that look is really odd. Decent lower heights to our northeast but the epo is still way to far west and absolutely puke ao and NAO yet the conus is cold. Must be some pretty cold members and disagreement on features spreads it out and skews things. My fear from that day 15 look would be given that AO if the epo doesn’t go crazy the whole thermal profile could tighten and the cold pulls up into Canada and the whole conus torches.  Not sure it’s worth it though since it’s been wrong at day 15 all year. 

[psuhoffman]

1 minute ago, showmethesnow said:

Don't put much stock in ops outside of 5 days or so but after looking over the Euro and now the 06Z GFS there might be an indication there is some play in the day 7-8 period of time. Generally similar evolutions at 500's on both with the exception being that the GFS is about half a day slower ejecting the western trough. Looking at the surface on both we are seeing a primary running to our west with redevelopment to it's east in our general region. 

Looking across the gefs and eps ensembles there is a theme. Some members key on that little weak front runner day 6 and develop that. Those runs either have no day 7/8 storm or it goes north of us. The members that keep that wave weak look good day 7/8. Those still bullseye NW of 95 but most give DC decent snow and the heavy isn’t far NW. similar to the op although the op was a outlier in terms of Precip. Most are a more modest storm.  Both 6z gefs and 0z eps shifted south slightly so another shift or two and DC could be in even better shape. 

[showmethesnow]

1 minute ago, psuhoffman said:

@showmethesnow

there has to be some major conflicting members in the eps day 15 because that look is really odd. Decent lower heights to our northeast but the epo is still way to far west and absolutely puke ao and NAO yet the conus is cold. Must be some pretty cold members and disagreement on features spreads it out and skews things. My fear from that day 15 look would be given that AO if the epo doesn’t go crazy the whole thermal profile could tighten and the cold pulls up into Canada and the whole conus torches.  Not sure it’s worth it though since it’s been wrong at day 15 all year. 

I have to admire your stamina to continue to pick apart the long range. At this point I am pretty much done with delving deep into extendeds. With how rough the models have been it has been pretty pointless in my mind and I no longer have the energy for it. I will continue look at the 500 means and some other maps but as far as picking apart each ensemble member I am pretty much beyond that. 

[psuhoffman]

1 minute ago, showmethesnow said:

I have to admire your stamina to continue to pick apart the long range. At this point I am pretty much done with delving deep into extendeds. With how rough the models have been it has been pretty pointless in my mind and I no longer have the energy for it. I will continue look at the 500 means and some other maps but as far as picking apart each ensemble member I am pretty much beyond that. 

Oh I’m done with that too. That analysis was just from a quick look at the mean. It’s obvious there has to be divergence though from that look. The mjo has been driving the bus all year so I’m simply tracking that now and leaning on common sense pattern progression.