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Wintry January 23rd-27th 2026

jim gandy set the precedent this morning showing the overnight icon and his thinking. if you're around CAE, probably prep. I know the euro was looking better for us, but now we are starting to get consensus down here. it took a shift south with the ZR and now the canadian/gfs... i think we are gonna set up a bit stronger on the wedge side and it's going to be hard to remove

i expect winter storm watches 3pm today for us around here, maybe they wait until tomorrow morning, but they're coming

our local office is noting that the ensemble members more than half are a bad situation for us

also, the NAM is struggling with the cold air and thinking the precipitation can't over come the dry, do not believe what it shows. the warm air advection that is being depicted will have no problem blossoming precip
 
GaWx said:
You know how it goes. Speak incorrect info enough times and many people start assuming it is true even with no evidence. Unfortunately, it’s human nature to an extent. So, my goal in these cases is to try my hardest to do my part in attempting to reduce the spread of misinfo along with my own objective evidence if I’m able to post it.

More on ICON precip types that have been mentioned. It on WxBell keeps on showing snowfall on Sunday for Columbia, Augusta, and Charlotte, but 850s are well above freezing! This is a common problem with WxBell Icon snow maps going back a ways:
View attachment 187568

850s at start: +4 to +9 in these cities
View attachment 187570

850s at end of period: +10 to +12
View attachment 187571
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The only time I can remember in this area seeing the warm nose this warm was during the February 1994 Ice Storm. That storm did have a long period of moderate to heavy sleet in the NC Piedmont, but I remember when things switched to ZR recorded 850mb temperature at GSO was 11c
 
jackendrickwx said:
Just for reference, this is a half inch of ice:

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And this particular storm (March 2014) didn’t even get a Winter Storm Warning until well after it started. It also had a ton of sleet. The Euro missed it, the GFS and NAM were the only ones to pick it up in the final couple days IIRC. We lost power for a few days IMBY. The good news is it was in the 60s a day or two later. It was in situ CAD, too, if I remember right. Another case where the wedge took longer to erode than the modeling suggested. I don’t think we got lower than 29 in the storm, either.
 
For Raleigh….the RGEM/GFS/CMC/UK/ICON all show solid overrunning into the meat of the cold which could be sleet. Hopefully that’s right…would be fun.

Below doesn’t include the big band that swings through…that will be rain or freezing rain.

IMG_5390.gif
 
Chazwin said:
The only time I can remember in this area seeing the warm nose this warm was during the February 1994 Ice Storm. That storm did have a long period of moderate to heavy sleet in the NC Piedmont, but I remember when things switched to ZR recorded 850mb temperature at GSO was 11c
Click to expand...

Thanks. My point is that the ICON keeps showing snowfall when it’s really ZR. Perhaps some of this is really sleet, but it certainly isn’t snow. This is nothing new. Last year it also did this on a number of cases.

I posted this only because there were comments during the “warm bias” discussion about Icon precip type.
 
jackendrickwx said:
I do not buy the dry NAM. This is taken from a "dry" area. This is a freezing drizzle sounding:
View attachment 187507
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Yep I do not either.

Moist upglide over the cad dome should keep at least shallow light and spotty precip going even in the dry slot, the models typically miss that.

That kind of precip is very efficient at producing freezing rain accumulations too
 
jackendrickwx said:
Hilarious differences in temps next week on modeling at the moment. Your guess is as good as mine
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Has to be something with the GFS seeing some sort of sleetpack and dropping temps in response. I have no clue what to expect. Some of the Carolinas don't get above freezing from 7am Saturday through the start of February at least. Got to be wrong... right?
 
Webberweather53 said:
Yep I do not either.

Moist upglide over the cad dome should keep at least shallow light and spotty precip going even in the dry slot, the models typically miss that.

That kind of precip is very efficient at producing freezing rain accumulations too
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The mesoscale modeling is the only thing picking this up right now. I would expect to see this expand as we get closer to the event and probably encourage a further push south on the southern edge of the wedge.
 
jackendrickwx said:
Has to be something with the GFS seeing some sort of sleetpack and dropping temps in response. I have no clue what to expect. Some of the Carolinas don't get above freezing from 7am Saturday through the start of February at least. Got to be wrong... right?
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It seems like the deterministic models love to overdo the radiational cooling with a snowpack. It’ll be cold, and possibly record breakingly so, but some of it seems quite overdone to me. With many without power, it’ll be dangerous regardless.
 
NBAcentel said:
Oof View attachment 187587
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I'm going to say this right now. I think the particular upper level features won't see much change, but as we near to the actual event, I really expect a lot of surface temperature adjustments and expansion of the south press of the cold air damming. I have seen some of the strong cold air damming events push south and even extend offshore of SC to 100 miles banked up against the western wall of the Gulf Stream. Many a times when transfers occur further south (lacking the insanely amped solutions of now) where the transferred low materializes..

It's quite possible, the SURFACE cold press keeps pressing all the way to go time.
 
jackendrickwx said:
Has to be something with the GFS seeing some sort of sleetpack and dropping temps in response. I have no clue what to expect. Some of the Carolinas don't get above freezing from 7am Saturday through the start of February at least. Got to be wrong... right?
Click to expand...
GSP must be buying into the cold the GFS is showing early in the week. They have CLT forecast a low of 8 Monday night
 
Mitch West said:
I bet a lot of areas that are expecting a significant ice storm will end up with ALOT of sleet.
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Agree, models tend to always underestimate sleet when they print these biblical ice maps. The issue will be areas where it’s more of a drizzle like Webb mentioned
 
Chazwin said:
GSP must be buying into the cold the GFS is showing early in the week. They have CLT forecast a low of 8 Monday night
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NVM figured it out. GFS counts all frozen in the snow depth map so it thinks there's like a foot of snow on the ground everywhere. Can't be trusted
 
Rain Cold said:
I don't think many people have a proper appreciation for the magnitude of what's coming.
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Great post RC. You’re right where I’m at. The problem is there have been splotchy isolated ice events over the years that get talked about in the small towns where they happened but no ones seen a widespread knockout blow like this in a quarter century. When the cannons start firing in the wood line on Sunday, they’ll know why they should have appreciated it a little more.
 
Mitch West said:
I bet a lot of areas that are expecting a significant ice storm will end up with ALOT of sleet.
Click to expand...
Ive seen these go both ways. Call for snow to start and never get a flake it would be all sleet. And ive seen mostly sleet and ZR forecast and it actually change over to snow early on and take all day to change back to sleet. Rates are going to be a factor in cooling the levels that the warm nose is prominent and could see some surprise snow amounts early on before the change over.
 
Jimmy Hypocracy said:
Great post RC. You’re right where I’m at. The problem is there have been splotchy isolated ice events over the years that get talked about in the small towns where they happened but no ones seen a widespread knockout blow like this in a quarter century. When the cannons start firing in the wood line on Sunday, they’ll know why they should have appreciated it a little more.
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And the people that usually come to help won't be able to, because they too are incapacitated
 
Packsox03 said:
Yes. I wouldn’t expect any power until midweek. It will take a long time to restore power and recovery will likely be very slow. Snow, you can just clear it off the road and travel is safe within 36 hours of the precip ending. Ice, you just have to wait for it to melt
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It took 7 days in 2002 at the same house my parents still live in now. Old infrastructure with above ground lines, large trees, etc. A lot of linemen came in from out of state back then. With this storm affecting a much larger area central and southern US, resources will undoubtedly be spread thin.
 
jrips27 said:
Fascinated to see if the Euro comes in degree or two colder than the previous run. Are we just gonna have a slow realization of CAD and its strength here over the next 24-36 hours?
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That usually seems to be what happens. I wish we had our 1053 high back to bully the pattern south again. ☹️
 
Jimmy Hypocracy said:
Great post RC. You’re right where I’m at. The problem is there have been splotchy isolated ice events over the years that get talked about in the small towns where they happened but no ones seen a widespread knockout blow like this in a quarter century. When the cannons start firing in the wood line on Sunday, they’ll know why they should have appreciated it a little more.
Click to expand...

For this one, for MBY, specifically just for me...I see it either going one of two ways... getting a bunch of sleet, OR, the Euro trend continues and amps everything west limiting ZR precip and hardcore cold air. Either way for me it's not a extreme event, IMO for MBY.

I'm still watching though.
 
Stormsfury said:
I'm going to say this right now. I think the particular upper level features won't see much change, but as we near to the actual event, I really expect a lot of surface temperature adjustments and expansion of the south press of the cold air damming. I have seen some of the strong cold air damming events push south and even extend offshore of SC to 100 miles banked up against the western wall of the Gulf Stream. Many a times when transfers occur further south (lacking the insanely amped solutions of now) where the transferred low materializes..

It's quite possible, the SURFACE cold press keeps pressing all the way to go time.
Click to expand...
Larry Cosgrove is still getting counseling for underestimating CAD. Seriously, though, on major CAD events, isn't the post mortem almost always: "Man, the models sure did underestimate the strength, depth and longevity of the damming." ???
 
Mitch West said:
I bet a lot of areas that are expecting a significant ice storm will end up with ALOT of sleet.
Click to expand...
And several, thinking they flip to plain rain, staying freezing rain longer. Cascading effect. I'm kind of jacked at seeing the end result of a pure sleet bomb with over an inch of qpf, perhaps 1.5+
 
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