Late February/Early March 2026 Mid-Long Range

[Terpeast]

3 hours ago, MDstorm said:

Euro indicating some leaning towards east based, but not obnoxiously so.  However, that time frame is for June/July/August and things would likely evolve from that point on (either becoming more east based or migrating more towards a Modoki).  Of course, the Euro could be completely off from this juncture.  

Evolution of nino usually starts as east based then broadens to basin wide and ends as modoki as coastal South America cools/upwells. This time we should probably use RONI for the strength of el nino because the tropics are also warm across the board. 

[mitchnick]

Here's a link to the Cansips SSTA starting in November.  Looks basinwide with a lean to the west. Not a classic Modoki imho unfortunately. But the key will be the PDO and blocking coupled with this forecast, right or wrong. Forecast will be updated this weekend. 

https://www.tropicaltidbits.com/analysis/models/?model=cansips&region=global&pkg=ssta_noice&runtime=2026020100&fh=9

[CAPE]

March 2-3 still looking interesting with a weakish wave moving eastward underneath cold HP to the north.

 

[Weather Will]

WB 0Z GEFS has the early next week threat as well.

[Weather Will]

WB 0Z EPS PNA support for early next week as well.

[Weather Will]

WB 0Z EPS shows maybe enough cold air with the negative WPO early next week, lights out for at least awhile by the end of next week as warm air surges east.

[Weather Will]

WB 0Z EPS for early next week.

[WxUSAF]

End of next week continues to look torchy. 

[psuhoffman]

4 hours ago, Terpeast said:

Evolution of nino usually starts as east based then broadens to basin wide and ends as modoki as coastal South America cools/upwells. This time we should probably use RONI for the strength of el nino because the tropics are also warm across the board. 

 

4 hours ago, mitchnick said:

Here's a link to the Cansips SSTA starting in November.  Looks basinwide with a lean to the west. Not a classic Modoki imho unfortunately. But the key will be the PDO and blocking coupled with this forecast, right or wrong. Forecast will be updated this weekend. 

https://www.tropicaltidbits.com/analysis/models/?model=cansips&region=global&pkg=ssta_noice&runtime=2026020100&fh=9

 A couple of things I've noted when looking at SST's leading into all our Ninos and our snowfall results.  How the Nino starts has more impact than how it ends, unfortunately.  A true Modoki starts out west based (which is rare, most start east and evolve west but those don't have as much positive impact on our snowfall as ones that start and stay west based)  I think a true Modoki is unlikely at this time.

2002/3 was a perfect classic example of a Modoki nino

  If you ignore the anomalies right along the central america coast which were not completely related to the nino, those would actually have been slightly SW of there in a true east  based nino, the core of the warmest anomalies at the inception of the nino in September 2002 was clearly out near the dateline.  A true Modoki.  

But a basin wide representation ups our chances of a truly massive snowfall over an east based.  The strength matters.  The best seems to be a moderate basin wide.  2010 fell into this category. 

 

If a basin wide goes strong it becomes like 1983 and 2016, much warmer but still with an increased chance of a massive storm if we can just time one STJ wave up with just a cold enough airmass.  

 

Basin wide events actually have the highest correlation with HECS storms!  

Below is how I would categorize the different options.  I am only categorizing moderate to strong here because weak ninos are a wildcard.  IF they gain the necessary strength to impact the pattern they act like a moderate.  If they do not, the winter tends to behave more like an enso neutral.  Somewhere between weak and moderate is a tipping point where a nino actually behaves like we think of as nino.  But let's assume this next event is strong enough to reach that threshold...then the chart below is what I've noted looking at all our enso events

From best to worst although this is subjective 

True Modoki Event strong or moderate:  the strentgh of a true modoki doesn't seem to matter as much, but a true modoki event has never attained super nino status, they seem to cap at borderline moderate/strong.  A true modoki typically ends up more EPO driven than NAO, colder, more moderate snow threats, but with more events due to the enhanced STJ. 

Moderate basin wide: 

Our best chance at a HECS storm AND a colder nino if we get the NAO to cooperate.  2010 is the perfect example of when this type goes right

Strong basin wide:

elevated chance of a HECS but overall a warm winter is likely, Think 1983 and 2016

moderate east based: 

These tend to be somewhat warm winters but have produced some snowy periods if we can get cold for a few weeks with the enhanced STJ but overall they average out to slightly below avg snowfall for Baltimore

Strong East based: 

disaster, they are wall to wall torch winters, think 1998 

[Nomz]

3 hours ago, Weather Will said:

WB 0Z EPS for early next week.

Boston gets 18 again

[Terpeast]

17 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

 

 A couple of things I've noted when looking at SST's leading into all our Ninos and our snowfall results.  How the Nino starts has more impact than how it ends, unfortunately.  A true Modoki starts out west based (which is rare, most start east and evolve west but those don't have as much positive impact on our snowfall as ones that start and stay west based)  I think a true Modoki is unlikely at this time.

2002/3 was a perfect classic example of a Modoki nino

  If you ignore the anomalies right along the central america coast which were not completely related to the nino, those would actually have been slightly SW of there in a true east  based nino, the core of the warmest anomalies at the inception of the nino in September 2002 was clearly out near the dateline.  A true Modoki.  

But a basin wide representation ups our chances of a truly massive snowfall over an east based.  The strength matters.  The best seems to be a moderate basin wide.  2010 fell into this category. 

 

If a basin wide goes strong it becomes like 1983 and 2016, much warmer but still with an increased chance of a massive storm if we can just time one STJ wave up with just a cold enough airmass.  

 

Basin wide events actually have the highest correlation with HECS storms!  

Below is how I would categorize the different options.  I am only categorizing moderate to strong here because weak ninos are a wildcard.  IF they gain the necessary strength to impact the pattern they act like a moderate.  If they do not, the winter tends to behave more like an enso neutral.  Somewhere between weak and moderate is a tipping point where a nino actually behaves like we think of as nino.  But let's assume this next event is strong enough to reach that threshold...then the chart below is what I've noted looking at all our enso events

From best to worst although this is subjective 

True Modoki Event strong or moderate:  the strentgh of a true modoki doesn't seem to matter as much, but a true modoki event has never attained super nino status, they seem to cap at borderline moderate/strong.  A true modoki typically ends up more EPO driven than NAO, colder, more moderate snow threats, but with more events due to the enhanced STJ. 

Moderate basin wide: 

Our best chance at a HECS storm AND a colder nino if we get the NAO to cooperate.  2010 is the perfect example of when this type goes right

Strong basin wide:

elevated chance of a HECS but overall a warm winter is likely, Think 1983 and 2016

moderate east based: 

These tend to be somewhat warm winters but have produced some snowy periods if we can get cold for a few weeks with the enhanced STJ but overall they average out to slightly below avg snowfall for Baltimore

Strong East based: 

disaster, they are wall to wall torch winters, think 1998 

Great post, thank you. We’ll keep an eye on how the nino develops and how much it strengthens. I don’t know how we will end up categorizing the type, but I don’t think we go higher than moderate based on RONI.

[bncho]

21 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

 

 A couple of things I've noted when looking at SST's leading into all our Ninos and our snowfall results.  How the Nino starts has more impact than how it ends, unfortunately.  A true Modoki starts out west based (which is rare, most start east and evolve west but those don't have as much positive impact on our snowfall as ones that start and stay west based)  I think a true Modoki is unlikely at this time.

2002/3 was a perfect classic example of a Modoki nino

  If you ignore the anomalies right along the central america coast which were not completely related to the nino, those would actually have been slightly SW of there in a true east  based nino, the core of the warmest anomalies at the inception of the nino in September 2002 was clearly out near the dateline.  A true Modoki.  

But a basin wide representation ups our chances of a truly massive snowfall over an east based.  The strength matters.  The best seems to be a moderate basin wide.  2010 fell into this category. 

 

If a basin wide goes strong it becomes like 1983 and 2016, much warmer but still with an increased chance of a massive storm if we can just time one STJ wave up with just a cold enough airmass.  

 

Basin wide events actually have the highest correlation with HECS storms!  

Below is how I would categorize the different options.  I am only categorizing moderate to strong here because weak ninos are a wildcard.  IF they gain the necessary strength to impact the pattern they act like a moderate.  If they do not, the winter tends to behave more like an enso neutral.  Somewhere between weak and moderate is a tipping point where a nino actually behaves like we think of as nino.  But let's assume this next event is strong enough to reach that threshold...then the chart below is what I've noted looking at all our enso events

From best to worst although this is subjective 

True Modoki Event strong or moderate:  the strentgh of a true modoki doesn't seem to matter as much, but a true modoki event has never attained super nino status, they seem to cap at borderline moderate/strong.  A true modoki typically ends up more EPO driven than NAO, colder, more moderate snow threats, but with more events due to the enhanced STJ. 

Moderate basin wide: 

Our best chance at a HECS storm AND a colder nino if we get the NAO to cooperate.  2010 is the perfect example of when this type goes right

Strong basin wide:

elevated chance of a HECS but overall a warm winter is likely, Think 1983 and 2016

moderate east based: 

These tend to be somewhat warm winters but have produced some snowy periods if we can get cold for a few weeks with the enhanced STJ but overall they average out to slightly below avg snowfall for Baltimore

Strong East based: 

disaster, they are wall to wall torch winters, think 1998 

do you think we'll ever get a winter as good or better than 2009-10, or did literally everything go right with that season?

[yoda]

1 hour ago, WxUSAF said:

End of next week continues to look torchy. 

Good.  Bring the torch.  I'm ready for 60s

[dailylurker]

Just now, bncho said:

do you think we'll ever get a winter as good or better than 2009-10, or did literally everything go right with that season?

Imo we just had a winter as good as 2010. Their wasn't much winter that winter. Just big snows that melted within a week or so. Those were fun storms but I had more fun this winter. 

[psuhoffman]

3 minutes ago, Terpeast said:

Great post, thank you. We’ll keep an eye on how the nino develops and how much it strengthens. I don’t know how we will end up categorizing the type, but I don’t think we go higher than moderate. 

Thank you.  A moderate basin wide would probably be our best case outcome right now.  The winter AO has been trending more negative over the last couple years and the PDO is heading in the right direction, not to a true positive but out of the ridiculous super negative winter cycle we were in.  If we get a moderate basin wide next year I'll be pretty optimistic.  

[psuhoffman]

9 minutes ago, bncho said:

do you think we'll ever get a winter as good or better than 2009-10, or did literally everything go right with that season?

In terms of snowfall, it was Baltimore's snowiest winter out of about 150 years of records.  That alone is a significant data point.  Is it possible to get more snow, sure.  But that was an anomaly greater than 1 in 150, we don't know how much greater since we don't have more records than that.... so while possible it would take a crazy ridiculous amount of good luck and everything going absolutely perfectly.  

We have had other winters with a mean pattern almost exactly like 2010 and they didn't end up with that much snow.  They were snowy but that took a lot of good luck on top of having a good pattern.  

[psuhoffman]

9 minutes ago, dailylurker said:

Imo we just had a winter as good as 2010. Their wasn't much winter that winter. Just big snows that melted within a week or so. Those were fun storms but I had more fun this winter. 

I'll take 103" of snow and I DGAF how warm it is. 

[bncho]

3 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

In terms of snowfall, it was Baltimore's snowiest winter out of about 150 years of records.  That alone is a significant data point.  Is it possible to get more snow, sure.  But that was an anomaly greater than 1 in 150, we don't know how much greater since we don't have more records than that.... so while possible it would take a crazy ridiculous amount of good luck and everything going absolutely perfectly.  

We have had other winters with a mean pattern almost exactly like 2010 and they didn't end up with that much snow.  They were snowy but that took a lot of good luck on top of having a good pattern.  

so what you're saying is 09-10 had a perfect pattern paired in tandem with some incredible luck, that's why it was so extremely rare?

[understudyhero]

15 minutes ago, dailylurker said:

Imo we just had a winter as good as 2010. Their wasn't much winter that winter. Just big snows that melted within a week or so. Those were fun storms but I had more fun this winter. 

There was still a snow mound from where they plowed the parking lots on Mother's Day where I worked.

We remember 2009/2010 vastly different.

We were single lane in and out of our townhouses for at least two weeks.

[weatherbook]

14 minutes ago, bncho said:

so what you're saying is 09-10 had a perfect pattern paired in tandem with some incredible luck, that's why it was so extremely rare?

In late February 2010, we just missed a huge snowstorm that hit New York City, so not everything went perfect that winter.  I feel that this winter had the potential to rival 09-10, but bad luck with storm tracks and surface temperatures being 5-10 degrees too warm for a couple of the storms spoiled our chances for a historic winter.  But the sleet storm in January was historic along with the glacier that followed for weeks.

[psuhoffman]

2 minutes ago, bncho said:

so what you're saying is 09-10 had a perfect pattern paired in tandem with some incredible luck, that's why it was so extremely rare?

Don't get me wrong the pattern was perfect.  We timed up an extremely perfect AO/NAO with a moderate basin wide Nino which is our perfect STJ configuration for elevated chances at HECS level storms.  That right there is the prerequisite we needed to even have a chance at that.  

But then it also took good luck yes.  Put it this way...the pattern was so good that it produced 5 HECS level events somewhere in the east that winter.  That was the pattern not luck.  BUT...Baltimore got flush hit by 3 of the 5 and a pretty good SECS level snowfall from 1 of the other 2.  Out of the 5 huge snowstorms that affect the east coast that winter only 1 missed Baltimore and 3 were flush hit bullseyes!  That is good luck.  That is us scoring way above our average hit rate.  

 

With bad luck maybe we only get 1 of those to hit... average luck maybe 2, getting 3 flush hits was very good luck on top of the perfect pattern.  We also got flush hit with some weaker waves, a clipper that put down 2-3" and that little thing in early Feb that gave us 3-6".  Perfect pattern plus good luck and...most snow ever.  

[Cobalt]

20 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

In terms of snowfall, it was Baltimore's snowiest winter out of about 150 years of records.  That alone is a significant data point.  Is it possible to get more snow, sure.  But that was an anomaly greater than 1 in 150, we don't know how much greater since we don't have more records than that.... so while possible it would take a crazy ridiculous amount of good luck and everything going absolutely perfectly.  

We have had other winters with a mean pattern almost exactly like 2010 and they didn't end up with that much snow.  They were snowy but that took a lot of good luck on top of having a good pattern.  

The Feb 5-6 and 9-10 storms being back to back is simply mythological, it's astounding that any sort of pattern could enable 2 big dog storms not even 4 full days apart at our latitude. That being on top of an almost as-rare December HECS and the already regionwide 28"+ winter totals is the stuff of weenie lore. I don't care if we get a winter that rivals 13-14 in totals but with snowpack on the ground from December to St. Patrick's Day. If it doesn't have at least 3 big dog storms, it's not topping 09-10.

[Kay]

1 minute ago, Cobalt said:

The Feb 5-6 and 9-10 storms being back to back is simply mythological, it's astounding that any sort of pattern could enable 2 big dog storms not even 4 full days apart at our latitude. That being on top of an almost as-rare December HECS and the already regionwide 28"+ winter totals is the stuff of weenie lore. I don't care if we get a winter that rivals 13-14 in totals but with snowpack on the ground from December to St. Patrick's Day. If it doesn't have at least 3 big dog storms, it's not topping 09-10.

At the risk of starting a memory lane posting spree...yes. And in particular, for me, the period BETWEEN the two storms, when we knew the second one was coming, too...it was all just unbelievably exciting and amazing! @bncho I hope you and other younger folks get to experience something like that winter.

[Cobalt]

8 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

Don't get me wrong the pattern was perfect.  We timed up an extremely perfect AO/NAO with a moderate basin wide Nino which is our perfect STJ configuration for elevated chances at HECS level storms.  That right there is the prerequisite we needed to even have a chance at that.  

But then it also took good luck yes.  Put it this way...the pattern was so good that it produced 5 HECS level events somewhere in the east that winter.  That was the pattern not luck.  BUT...Baltimore got flush hit by 3 of the 5 and a pretty good SECS level snowfall from 1 of the other 2.  Out of the 5 huge snowstorms that affect the east coast that winter only 1 missed Baltimore and 3 were flush hit bullseyes!  That is good luck.  That is us scoring way above our average hit rate.  

 

With bad luck maybe we only get 1 of those to hit... average luck maybe 2, getting 3 flush hits was very good luck on top of the perfect pattern.  We also got flush hit with some weaker waves, a clipper that put down 2-3" and that little thing in early Feb that gave us 3-6".  Perfect pattern plus good luck and...most snow ever.  

Basically every other modern A+ winter illustrates how rare 09-10 was. 95-96's 2nd biggest snowfall at DCA was 8.4". In 02-03 it was 6.6". In 13-14 it was 7.0". In 09-10.. A snowfall of 10.8 inches was the 3rd largest snowfall of the winter. 

[Cobalt]

In an attempt to break the cycle of nostalgia posting (which I am very guilty of..), the 12z AI GFS looks interesting for that early March window. 2-wave system, looks like it drops 0.6-1" QPF over the course of both of those waves. Subfreezing the whole time, though no idea about 850s. 

[AlexD1990]

1 minute ago, Kay said:

At the risk of starting a memory lane posting spree...yes. And in particular, for me, the period BETWEEN the two storms, when we knew the second one was coming, too...it was all just unbelievably exciting and amazing! @bncho I hope you and other younger folks get to experience something like that winter.

It was definitely something special to experience. I remember people trying to tell me(as i was trying to warn them) that there was no way we would get another storm that big so soon after the 1st one.... I can remember working at the grocery store the morning of the 2nd one, which started as rain down here, and you could ,literally see the changeover line to snow begin at one end of the parking lot and sweep across it towards the building. When it hit the building, the windows literally shook from the force of the wind! We closed immediately, and I was the lucky one to announce to a grocery store full of already storm weary shoppers, trying to pick out what they could from shelves bare and not restocked from the first storm(our warehouse was in PA and buried from storm 1...we had almost nothing on the shelves to begin with) that we were "closing....right now". It almost started a riot, lol. We didn't do anything for a week after storm 2. Truly once in a lifetime, although i hope the kids get to see something remotely like it.

[Kay]

2 minutes ago, AlexD1990 said:

It was definitely something special to experience. I remember people trying to tell me(as i was trying to warn them) that there was no way we would get another storm that big so soon after the 1st one.... I can remember working at the grocery store the morning of the 2nd one, which started as rain down here, and you could ,literally see the changeover line to snow begin at one end of the parking lot and sweep across it towards the building. When it hit the building, the windows literally shook from the force of the wind! We closed immediately, and I was the lucky one to announce to a grocery store full of already storm weary shoppers, trying to pick out what they could from shelves bare and not restocked from the first storm(our warehouse was in PA and buried from storm 1...we had almost nothing on the shelves to begin with) that we were "closing....right now". It almost started a riot, lol. We didn't do anything for a week after storm 2. Truly once in a lifetime, although i hope the kids get to see something remotely like it.

I will reply in banter tbc

[87storms]

50 minutes ago, dailylurker said:

Imo we just had a winter as good as 2010. There wasn't much winter that winter. Just big snows that melted within a week or so. Those were fun storms but I had more fun this winter. 

This might be because you were chasing the storms this winter that missed us lol. 2009/10 is the gold standard for epic stretches imo. As far as wall to wall winters, 2013-15 were top shelf. Too many missed opps so far this winter for me to grade it any higher than a B…and imby it’s probably a B-. The frozen lakes were the big show. 2022 was better here.

[mitchnick]

Next week on the Gfs in mby is sufficient for me to forget 2 days ago and end the winter looking forward to next year's Niño. 

[WxUSAF]

2 minutes ago, mitchnick said:

Next week on the Gfs in mby is sufficient for me to forget 2 days ago and end the winter looking forward to next year's Niño. 

Verbatim would be an impactful mixed precip event north of DC with temps in the 20s.