January 2026 Short/Medium Range Thread

[Scottie16]

Wouldn’t we see more of a Cold Air Damming affect with this system?


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[Weatheriscool]

9 minutes ago, Scottie16 said:

Wouldn’t we see more of a Cold Air Damming affect with this system?


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I would imagine that solutions will change multiple times between now and next weekend; at noon, it will likely be vastly different from what is currently depicted

[TellicoWx]

1 hour ago, John1122 said:

The current forecast of ice box cold, warm up and rain, back to ice box, then warm up and rain, is weather torture for our forum area. For it to happen in December and January is particularly brutal. Especially with a potential second year in a row of "once in 50 years" type snow possible near the Gulf due to the air behind our first rain maker tonight. 

Need a reset...have to punt that pesky Great Lakes low. We have had too much northern stream dominance, hopefully the models are starting to catch on to the southern stream wake up in the medium range..just a wait and see if guess the way some of the modeling has been off lately.

[TellicoWx]

29 minutes ago, Scottie16 said:

Wouldn’t we see more of a Cold Air Damming affect with this system?


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If there was a High sitting over the lakes then possibly. But a GL low aides any type of vort to draw just enough southerly flow in advance up the valley to wreck the lower thermals. You can overcome this after the vort passes, but need it to generate some type of lee side low close enough to us to pull down the cold and still close enough to assist with lift to switch the moist low/mid levels over before they naturally dry out. Despise GL lows worse than SER...more ways to overcome the latter.

[Holston_River_Rambler]

For tonight, do we really buy the models showing snow at onset for some lower elevations and continuing throughout? This is basically a front swinging through with a low level jet nosing into the TN Valley, right?

I just can't think of a time when this kind of a set up produced snow recently for any lower elevations. 

Interestingly the 3km NAM has CAD for eastern escarpment of the plateau:

 

 

If someone rides just the right side of whatever boundary there is, they cold get some good rates though. 

[Holston_River_Rambler]

For some reason my CAD plateau gif isn't working, so I will post a static image here 

 

Now, Tellico ninja'd me with that explanation of CAD, so to be clear this is not a normal CAD set up as Tellico describes. The above is some weird microclimate mess that may or may not play out. 

[TellicoWx]

1 minute ago, Holston_River_Rambler said:

For some reason my CAD plateau gif isn't working, so I will post a static image here 

 

Now, Tellico ninja'd me with that explanation of CAD, so to be clear this is not a normal CAD set up as Tellico describes. The above is some weird microclimate mess that may or may not play out. 

It's picking up downsloping winds aiding the warm nose...could it pin the cold against the plateau..possibly, but it's rare...nose would have to be really weak.

[Holston_River_Rambler]

So is the consensus now that the Euro AI is the way to go for medium range (days 4-7 or so)? 

I like that is has a lower resolution like the NAVGEM, so it concentrates more on the general pattern than trying to get fancy with mesoscale features. 

[GBOVolz]

For some reason my CAD plateau gif isn't working, so I will post a static image here 

 
Now, Tellico ninja'd me with that explanation of CAD, so to be clear this is not a normal CAD set up as Tellico describes. The above is some weird microclimate mess that may or may not play out. 

Unless the winds are out of the SE, those temps don’t make sense to me.


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[GBOVolz]

It's picking up downsloping winds aiding the warm nose...could it pin the cold against the plateau..possibly, but it's rare...nose would have to be really weak.

I can’t remember what year, less than 10 years ago, but on the NW side of a line from Morristown to London got hammered from a event that was forecasted to be snow, rain, snow but CAD kept everything snow NW of that line. I ended up with 9” and the temps never got above 28°. At the same time, Sevierville was all rain in the mid 40’s.

Edit this to change NE to NW of the line.

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[Jed33]

I think it was in 2015. The further N and W you went, the more they got to a point. The CAD worked for the valley but the foothills and mtns got blasted with WAA. It was literally snowing and in the 20’s in the valley and raining and 45-50 degrees in the foothills and mtns. I’m not sure what it did to the plateau at the top elevations? Some of the heaviest snow I had ever seen until the MLK day 2024 over running event, which had some similarities in the foothills and mtns but was not quite exactly the same.

[GBOVolz]

I think it was in 2015. The further N and W you went, the more they got to a point. The CAD worked for the valley but the foothills and mtns got blasted with WAA. It was literally snowing and in the 20’s in the valley and raining and 45-50 degrees in the foothills and mtns. I’m not sure what it did to the plateau at the top elevations? Some of the heaviest snow I had ever seen until the MLK day 2024 over running event, which had some similarities in the foothills and mtns but was not quite exactly the same.

I was thinking 2015 also but I’m terrible with dates


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[Jed33]

That contributed to that 2014-2015 season being one of the best that I’ve seen since we moved to E TN in 2011. That year we exceeded 20in total snowfall, but it didn’t really get going until late Jan and ramped up in Feb. and into March.

[GBOVolz]

That contributed to that 2014-2015 season being one of the best that I’ve seen since we moved to E TN in 2011. That year we exceeded 20in total snowfall, but it didn’t really get going until late Jan and ramped up in Feb. and into March.

One of the analogues that I continued to see back in late summer to early fall for this winter was 2013-14. (I think) lol


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[Carvers Gap]

The biggest issue is widespread drought.  It has picked up steam this winter regardless of weather pattern.  Reminds me of 17-18 which was so cold at times but the STJ was not there.   The other thing is the northern stream is out of sync with the STJ…meaning its vortices are not connecting with STJ impulses.  I see some signs of that relenting after the 25th.  I am not sure how long that window lasts.   Some modeling has Feb holding a SE trough w a PNA ridge.   The GOA low is present on some modeling late, but generally that has been a red herring. 
 

I still remain optimistic that we see wintry conditions.   There is a lot of cold air in modeling right now.  I have to think we score with that on the table. 

[Scottie16]

WRF2 trending cooler for tonight’s wave.


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[*Flash*]

2 minutes ago, Scottie16 said:

WRF2 trending cooler for tonight’s wave.


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Indeed, we pivoted from needing westward trends to cooler trends. Still have my eye on the plateau tonight. National guidance is modest but those high-res short-term models are suggesting multiple inches in some parts.