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December Medium/Long Range Discussion


yoda
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21 minutes ago, Maestrobjwa said:

Two questions:

1) What other examples outside of 1995-96 where we did okay in a nina because of what you just mentioned?

2) Speaking of 95/96...was some record -AO/-NAO the reason why it worked?

Well 1995/6 was the only example where we had a blockbuster winter on the whole...because it was the only nina where we had persistent blocking all winter long.   So you have to judge things in proportion...if we only get a 10 day blocking period you can't expect to get 50" in that 10 day period.  But if you get 10" of snow during that 10 day period...that was a productive period.  But if you end up with only that 10" all winter the winter as a whole seems bad, but that blocking period wasn't the reason.  The problem in a nina is we tend to do REALLY bad without blocking.  So the whole rest of winter is often a barren wasteland outside those blocking episodes.  Especially in a moderate or stronger nina.  We can sometimes get lucky with some smaller snows in a weaker nina without blocking.  

So with that out of the way...limiting this to more recent 1980 onward ninas for Baltimore...and looking at periods of prolonged blocking...we had some very transient blocks that lead to an isolated minor event over the years...but lets look at just longer periods of blocking during moderate or stronger ninas.  Links to the H5

January 1985 there was a major blocking period in January that lead to 2 snowfalls 2.5" and 3.7".  This one you could argue underproduced...it was a pretty darn good looking pattern that only produced 2 storms and pretty minor.  But it wasn't totally wasted it did snow twice during the 4 weeks of major blocking.  But this was probably the biggest underproducing blocking period of the list I looked at.  It was brutally cold at times though.  

https://imgur.com/Mwy5pwN

the blocking broke down in February and a more typical nina pattern took over and that was winter over.  

March 99 really produced with several snow events in our area over a 2 week period.  

https://imgur.com/GVgexww

We wasted most of the rest of that winter with a +NAO

January 2000: this was probably the biggest over performer.  We only had about a 10 day favorable blocking pattern that whole winter and we hit big time with 3 snowfall events across the area and 1 HECS.  

https://imgur.com/OexbcZJ

December/January 2010-11:  This one underperformed.  A lot of bad luck.  Somehow missed a miller a that took a weird curve and had a messy phase that screwed us over.  We did get 2 snowfalls in January out of it, one advisory and one warning level event.  So it wasn't a totally wasted period but we did miss out on the one HECS level event during this period...hit on that and it goes from slightly disappointing to epic.  Oh well.   Also...we tend to waste NAO blocking in December more then any other month...if you get blocking you would rather it later then earlier in winter.  

https://imgur.com/N8eM9FS

Some notable weaker nina blocking periods that produced recently

February 2006:  lead to that one big storm...the pac ridge was REALLY flexing though and limited our ability to get anything more out of that period. 

March 2018: shame that block didn't come a month earlier but we did get one minor and one significant snowfall out of it even in March.  

The problem in those years wasn't that it didnt snow when there was blocking...it was mostly that it didnt snow much at all the rest of the winter when there wasn't blocking.

As for 1996...There were 2 periods of extreme blocking that set off what happened.  The first was early in the winter.  It was actually fading by the time we got the HECS in January but the pattern was set in motion.  We got several minor snows in December during the height of the block.

This in Dec set everything in motion. 

Dec1995.gif.535ca0b7999d163314f50fff5797a007.gif

But the second half of January the blocking faded and this was the only period where a typical nina pattern took hold and lead to our torch/melt/flood period. 

Jan96Torch.gif.c146deb50442fbfd5855642ec9868bd5.gif

Then the blocking reloaded in late January/February and set off the second half of winter.  That blocking would reload several times the rest of winter into April.  

1996P2.gif.ca12637fbd700815861c23a0474a84c5.gif

If we were to get a repeat of that level of blocking that repeated multiple times all winter like 1996 we would likely end up with a very good winter again, nina or not.  Not saying we necessarily do as well as 1996..there might have been some luck in there too...but we would snow quite a bit given the number of chances we would get with that kind of blocking all winter long (with the exception of 2 weeks in January).  

 

 

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10 minutes ago, WxUSAF said:

Eps and GEFS have -3SD AO next week. That alone is a snow signal. Fingers crossed we can take advantage of a good long wave pattern.

Or it could go down like the EPS control and the reaper will be busy. Suppressed, miller b split, huge suppressed storm just to our south, and the grand finale a perfect track perfect h5 huge rainstorm on Xmas eve as the cold gets too stale. 

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Just now, psuhoffman said:

Or it could go down like the EPS control and the reaper will be busy. Suppressed, miller b split, huge suppressed storm just to our south, and the grand finale a perfect track perfect h5 huge rainstorm on Xmas eve as the cold gets too stale. 

That would be the most epic fail ever. To add insult to injury, a snow shower misses Ji by a mile and dumps a coating to his south on XMAS day

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30 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

Or it could go down like the EPS control and the reaper will be busy. Suppressed, miller b split, huge suppressed storm just to our south, and the grand finale a perfect track perfect h5 huge rainstorm on Xmas eve as the cold gets too stale. 

Wow, thanks for checking in Deb

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2 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

Happy hour almost delivered. But a lakes low screws it up. We get a perfect track huge rainstorm. 
 

Unfortunately that’s not that uncommon for December.  But that crap better not continue in Jan/Feb 

Shit ton of rain though.

Immediately followed by cold and windy!!

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Happy hour almost delivered. But a lakes low screws it up. We get a perfect track huge rainstorm. 
 
Unfortunately that’s not that uncommon for December.  But that crap better not continue in Jan/Feb 
Awful. You can't afford to waste these big gulf systems. This isn't a Nino with a constant juicy stj. You gotta score now
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8 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

Happy hour almost delivered. But a lakes low screws it up. We get a perfect track huge rainstorm. 
 

Unfortunately that’s not that uncommon for December.  But that crap better not continue in Jan/Feb 

Now in such a modeled scenario (thankfully still out in fantasy land), what does the GL low do? Steal the cold air, or?

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12 minutes ago, Maestrobjwa said:

Now in such a modeled scenario (thankfully still out in fantasy land), what does the GL low do? Steal the cold air, or?

Put a low to our northwest. Go counterclockwise around it. What direction would our wind flow be?  I’m oversimplifying it but...it cuts off the cold air source. 

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21 minutes ago, CAPE said:

Shit ton of rain though.

Immediately followed by cold and windy!!

Yea. But my main take away is every run of every model is building a monster blocking regime. And at a time of year when that matters for some hints at the winter base state. But yea it would hurt bad if it went down that way. But I bet if this look lasts until prime climo it’s just a matter of time. What would hurt bad is if we waste this now then it flips before we get to the part of winter when we usually do take advantage of blocking. 

18 minutes ago, Ji said:
24 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:
Happy hour almost delivered. But a lakes low screws it up. We get a perfect track huge rainstorm. 
 
Unfortunately that’s not that uncommon for December.  But that crap better not continue in Jan/Feb 

Awful. You can't afford to waste these big gulf systems. This isn't a Nino with a constant juicy stj. You gotta score now

It hasn’t happened yet. It’s close. Only a small adjustment from a snowstorm. Let’s see. 

8 minutes ago, Wentzadelphia said:

What a beautiful block towards the end of the run.

Yikes ya 

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31 minutes ago, Ji said:
37 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:
Happy hour almost delivered. But a lakes low screws it up. We get a perfect track huge rainstorm. 
 
Unfortunately that’s not that uncommon for December.  But that crap better not continue in Jan/Feb 

Awful. You can't afford to waste these big gulf systems. This isn't a Nino with a constant juicy stj. You gotta score now

Yeah! You should ask to talk to the manager...Karen

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37 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

Happy hour almost delivered. But a lakes low screws it up. We get a perfect track huge rainstorm. 
 

Unfortunately that’s not that uncommon for December.  But that crap better not continue in Jan/Feb 

Soooo close. Not fun to look at, but take that at this range. Even has some snow in NC/VA before somehow the cold air disappears. I’d be happy with snow to rain even given it’s December. Just want to get on the board and hopefully take advantage of this blocking that’s developing.

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1 hour ago, SnowLover22 said:

Not bad.

 

632097094_ScreenShot2020-12-09at7_17_49PM.thumb.png.4f9d54d64b70aa093fd8e3bbbf1a83b6.png

 

And way out there at least according to GEFS, it looks to be a west-based -NAO. 

gfs-ens_z500a_nhem_60.thumb.png.3ce3caba6af5e0e8aec700dde2efc39f.png

 

How negative do we want this NAO to get -1 to a -2?

That’s a lot of western NA ridging for a 15 day mean.

Im in the camp of the pacific is more important than the Atlantic for overall winter type weather. Yeah I know we need the Atlantic for the big ones but we need the pacific for the cold

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1 hour ago, WinterWxLuvr said:

That’s a lot of western NA ridging for a 15 day mean.

Im in the camp of the pacific is more important than the Atlantic for overall winter type weather. Yeah I know we need the Atlantic for the big ones but we need the pacific for the cold

If you can only have one and the other will we total garbage the pac is better. We have more snows from pac help and a disaster atl then the other way. However, that assumes both the epo and pna are hostile. The advantage of high latitude blocking in a Nina is if you get enough ridging into the western NAO and AO domain it’s going to apply pressure on the TPV to either retrograde west just enough to pop a pna ridge...the you have a +epo, +pna -AO/NAO which is a great snow pattern or you get the tpv to drop into the west and pop an epo ridge and get a -epo -pna -AO/NAO which is also good. It’s hard with a great looK up top for the pac to remain total garbage in both the epo and pna domains. 

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1 hour ago, WinterWxLuvr said:

That’s a lot of western NA ridging for a 15 day mean.

Im in the camp of the pacific is more important than the Atlantic for overall winter type weather. Yeah I know we need the Atlantic for the big ones but we need the pacific for the cold

  LOOOKS   better here    woof    monster  -NAO   if its  correct
 

gefs_z500_anom_noram_384.png

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