February 2026 Medium/ Long Range Discussion: Buckle Up!

[Yeoman]

3 hours ago, Terpeast said:

Bad news, aigfs is an op model so little confidence in its blizzard scenario. 

Nevermind the fact it's 14 days away.. good lord people

 

[stormtracker]

1 hour ago, Maestrobjwa said:

Alright kid if you're gonna share Beethoven then you HAVE to listen to Beethoven too--it is a requirement 

And he stole a pic i posted before. It makes me sad we prob won’t see that Beethoven again for a while. 

[bncho]

7 minutes ago, stormtracker said:

And he stole a pic i posted before. It makes me sad we prob won’t see that Beethoven again for a while. 

i found the first on the internet (probably why it was the same image as yours), but hopefully this new one helps liven your spirits!

[Maestrobjwa]

Thought this was an interesting tidbit (pretty sure it would count for BWI too, lol): @H2O This further proves your point!

 

 

[wxmeddler]

The sleet really created a heck of a glacial layer that's got an enormously high albedo. That combined with the temps, this snow isn't melting for at least another 2-3 weeks.

[SnowenOutThere]

1 minute ago, wxmeddler said:

The sleet really created a heck of a glacial layer that's got an enormously high albedo. That combined with the temps, this snow isn't melting for at least another 2-3 weeks.

The melts started in Charlottesville. Finally saw patches of grass where the sheet was disturbed before it could set in. 

[WEATHER53]

16 minutes ago, Maestrobjwa said:

Thought this was an interesting tidbit (pretty sure it would count for BWI too, lol): @H2O This further proves your point!

 

 

Titian’s of cold  and snow 

[winter_warlock]

5 hours ago, Blizzard of 93 said:

People were so busy punting & canceling that they missed PD3 on the 18z AIGFS… Lol!

Is there other model support besides the AIGFS for this storm?

[Ji]

Euro had a vd snowstorm to out south lol

[Jebman]

Lets reel in PD 3!

[stormtracker]

1 hour ago, Ji said:

Euro had a vd snowstorm to out south lol

Not a snowstorm I wanna catch. 

[RevWarReenactor]

The 6z GFS offers some hope. Tonights clipper is more north. Friday's clipped is more juiced with some places gettsing a few hours of light snow. VD looks like two potentials; could be rain, could be congrats north carolina, but the potential is there. 

[Chris78]

15 minutes ago, RevWarReenactor said:

The 6z GFS offers some hope. Tonights clipper is more north. Friday's clipped is more juiced with some places gettsing a few hours of light snow. VD looks like two potentials; could be rain, could be congrats north carolina, but the potential is there. 

It's close to a big storm for us PD weekend.

Maybe we need just enough cold not Vodka cold lol.

[Ji]

6z grok

[mitchnick]

Starting to think maybe the advertised warmup will be muted like all the previous ones have been. Could be wrong, of course, but who cares if I am.

[Chris78]

5 minutes ago, mitchnick said:

Starting to think maybe the advertised warmup will be muted like all the previous ones have been. Could be wrong, of course, but who cares if I am.

We need the pattern to relax but not to the point it's 60 degrees lol.

The current cold is just to overpowering.

Hopefully we can find a middle ground. 

[H2O]

You know shit is bad when LR thread doesn’t have more than one page overnight. 
 

Doo doo pattern relaxation, doo doo storm tracks, doo doo next two weeks

[CAPE]

40 minutes ago, Chris78 said:

It's close to a big storm for us PD weekend.

Maybe we need just enough cold not Vodka cold lol.

The problem is h5 looks quite a bit different on current ens guidance for that period compared to a 3-4 days ago. The developing NE Pac Nina ridge is stronger and we end up with a largely mild Pacific air mass for the mid month period. Not much cold around as currently advertised. Still subject to change ofc given we are 10 days out. As usual, we just cant know yet.

[Chris78]

4 minutes ago, CAPE said:

The problem is h5 looks quite a bit different on current ens guidance for that period compared to a 3-4 days ago. The developing NE Pac Nina ridge is stronger and we end up with a largely mild Pacific air mass for the mid month period. Not much cold around as currently advertised. Still subject to change ofc given we are 10 days out. As usual, we just cant know yet.

Yeah. Hopefully it's a quick relaxation rather than a 2 week+ change that would come close to closing down the 2026 snow season lol.

For MBY I kind of want the moisture first and hope temps work. Probably the opposite of the low lands. 

My area has gotten burnt the last several years from south and east storm tracks.

I'm not really sure what to root for anymore honestly lol.

[Weather Will]

WB 6Z AI EPS has lots of hits to our south in the extended.  Not a shut out look.

[Maestrobjwa]

1 hour ago, CAPE said:

The problem is h5 looks quite a bit different on current ens guidance for that period compared to a 3-4 days ago. The developing NE Pac Nina ridge is stronger and we end up with a largely mild Pacific air mass for the mid month period. Not much cold around as currently advertised. Still subject to change ofc given we are 10 days out. As usual, we just cant know yet.

Still feel like that window will be our last chance for snow until March (unless guidance shows something different for late Feb?). Saw in another thread the timing of the SSW is similar to 2018...

[Heisy]

Still feel like that window will be our last chance for snow until March (unless guidance shows something different for late Feb?). Saw in another thread the timing of the SSW is similar to 2018...

Only issue is as of yesterday’s runs it’s getting away from a full reversal. We’ll see how today’s charts look

[mitchnick]

33 minutes ago, Heisy said:

Only issue is as of yesterday’s runs it’s getting away from a full reversal. We’ll see how today’s charts look

I saw that yesterday on the Euro site weeklies page and was wondering why no one had mentioned it. I've taken enough shade this winter, so I  figured somebody would bring it up. Lol

[JenkinsJinkies]

Found this in the SE board. Late month is looking BN again, not vodka cold but still below average. GFS is more intense, Canadian is more moderate, and Euro meets in the middle.

[psuhoffman]

@Chris78 @CAPE we did need the pattern to relax some... the amount of blocking we had along with the +PNA -EPO was causing extreme suppression.  The one significant precipitation event we've had in the last month came during a temporary -PNA.  

And this is not uncommon.  I've said before that when I looked at every single 5"+ Baltimore snowstorm the majority of them did not come in frigid arctic regimes.  And it becomes even more apparent if you just look at the 10"+ storms.  There are several reasons for this.  Big storms ride the thermal boundary and that means they are usually along the rain/snow line...not in the middle of an arctic airmass!  We have to be somewhat near the warmth to win OR there has to be a wave amplifying enough to press the warm boundary back towards us!   Waves don't amplify in a cold NW flow regime!  There are some rare examples of super cold storms, we got one last week, but it requires so many rare things to time up perfectly...if that is the only way we get big snowstorms we would be in big big trouble.  

A lot of our big snowstorms came during periods that weren't that cold.  Feb 83, Feb 87, Jan 2000, Feb 2006, Feb 2010, Jan 2011, Feb 2014, March 2015, Jan 2016 all came during periods that weren't arctic cold right around the time of the storm and most of them we even had to worry if it would even be cold enough!  Way way way more of our big snowstorms come during "just cold enough" regimes not during our craziest coldest arctic airmasses.  Those tend to be dry.  We can luck our way into a frontal wave or weaker snow...smaller snowstorms are more common in these cold periods...and we've been perhaps unlucky not to get at least some of those during this latest period...but our true big snowstorms usually come during less cold periods.  

What's been especially frustrating over the last 10 years is a lot of the patterns that historically would provide us with chances of snowstorms...not cold but should be "just cold enough with a good track" ended up just too warm and when a perfect track system came alone it ended up a perfect track rainstorm.  But that doesn't change the equation. It's been so long since we had a big region wide snowstorm during a pattern like Feb 2006 or Feb 2010 that it seems some are starting to think we need some big EPO/PNA ridge induced arctic airmass to get a big snowstorm but that's never been our typical path to a big snow.  Most of our big snowstorms came during blocking regimes with a split flow under it and no arctic air anywhere (no NS to FCK up the flow) and some juiced up STJ wave came along with the perfect track and it was just barely cold enough to snow.  

[snowfan]

[BristowWx]

6 minutes ago, snowfan said:

OP GFS doesn't look cold at all during that time.  Does it or am I hallucinating?  

[JenkinsJinkies]

1 minute ago, BristowWx said:

OP GFS doesn't look cold at all during that time.  Does it or am I hallucinating?  

That top map is wind chill.

[BristowWx]

2 minutes ago, JenkinsJinkies said:

That top map is wind chill.

yeah.  But its pushing near 50F on the 2m map.  on the 11th.  just a point of interest.  for a headline like that you would think sub 500dM thickness is in the offing.  its 552.  long way off.  who knows.  

[yoda]

Unfortunate on the 12z GFS on the 15th for most of us... Eastern Shore cleans up.  Idea is there tbh as others have mentioned