• Hello, please take a minute to check out our awesome content, contributed by the wonderful members of our community. We hope you'll add your own thoughts and opinions by making a free account!

Pattern January 2021 - Joyless January

KyloG said:
One of the CIP's analogs is 2/6/10. This is just a hair further south and 2/6/10 had marginal air mass like this potential...maybe worse.

View attachment 62097View attachment 62098View attachment 62096View attachment 62095
Click to expand...

I don’t know if you saw it above, but 2/7/10 was the last day there was a trifecta of a PNA of over +1, an NAO of sub -1, and an AO of sub-2. Today’s GEFS is projecting that to occur January 6-7+, which is about right on top of the progged upper low snow of January 7-8!
 
Storm5 said:
2e5cc354bdc8c91a889e308eb093ce4e.jpg



Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Lol seems set in stone right?
 
KyloG said:
Yeah, said this earlier, this is giving me flashbacks to Feb 2010. 2/6/10 analog for this potential but maybe further south. I do think 77 corridor in NC could see accumulating snowfall...north of I-40.
Click to expand...

I could too.

The GEFS z500 mean has the upper low tracking from about Nashville-Richmond, a good look if you're in far northern VA, Maryland, southern PA, & perhaps DC-BAL. Don't see anything to get real excited about outside the mtns in NC, maybe a few wraparound snowflakes but that would probably be the extent of it imo

1609694553396.png
 
This 1/9 threat looks to be destined for the mid-Atlantic imo unless we make some dramatic changes over the next day or two.

Pretty much expected evolution as I mentioned late last week:

Now let's just see if we can get the favorable window from Jan 15 & beyond.

Webberweather53 said:
Got a pretty good feeling that we’re gonna hand off the first storm or two in this pattern to the mid Atlantic. We could use a little snow cover to our north to help further lock in this great pattern. As we see a few storms run their course thru the first half of the month and lay some snow down to our north, the Greenland block begins to couple with the stratosphere, & continues retrograding poleward and westward, the air masses that plunge southward will become increasingly deeper/colder as we get into mid-January

Hence, I think the mid Atlantic and perhaps the mountains could score here inside the first 10-12 days of the January. Our window in the SE probably does not legitimately open up until about Jan 15 or so given the above info, but it should last for basically the rest of January at a minimum and given the SSWE, February is also looking favorable atm
Click to expand...
 
GaWx said:
And right on cue you can see the SER tries to resist it getting deep into the SE. Always a risk with that kind of setup, especially in La Niña with a very warm W PAC and a warm AMO.
Click to expand...

We're gonna have to take some chances to get legit cold injected into this pattern & give folks near & south of I-40 a real chance to snow. -NAO alone isn't gonna cut it as we're finding out in early Jan, but I doubt there would be much of a SE ridge if the -NAO also doesn't go away.
 
Dewpoint Dan said:
But i mean even there only 2 or 3" ? Not exactly a huge snow event.
Click to expand...

Still lots of variation in the exact track of the upper low hence lower snow amts. Ultimately, it's gonna be a large event for someone, looking like the mountains of VA/WV is the place to be, maybe DC-BAL east of the mtns as it currently stands
 
Here comes the cut-off anticyclone north of Alaska on the GEFS. When coupled w/ a strong -NAO I don't think we'll see much of SER & if there is one, it's going to be transient at best imo, unless the -NAO somehow disappears, which doesn't seem likely atm.

Some real cold air finally starting to get injected into the pattern by mid-month on the GEFS.

1609695993684.png
 
Webberweather53 said:
We're gonna have to take some chances to get legit cold injected into this pattern & give folks near & south of I-40 a real chance to snow. -NAO alone isn't gonna cut it as we're finding out in early Jan, but I doubt there would be much of a SE ridge if the -NAO also doesn't go away.
Click to expand...

I hope not but:

1. We now have sub -3 AO and +1 PNA along with -1 NAO. I’d take continuation of that combo anytime. The nasty SER has been so persistent the last few years that I’d rather not give it a chance by losing the +PNA.

2. I’m much deeper SE then you and thus am more vulnerable to control by the SER. For my area and nearby to have the best chance to stay with near or BN temps, the SER needs to stay away. I’m not even thinking about wintry precip here as that is quite rare. I’m just thinking about avoiding what had recently dominated here in winter until the wonderful Dec of 2020, AN temps. Just keep the +PNA and I’ll take my chances. But alas, that’s going to be tough to do.

3. I’m also keeping in mind that the models have quite often underestimated the SER in the medium range. Maybe a persistent -NAO would reduce that chance but I’d still rather just keep the strong +PNA.
 
I could see how this end up a bigger MA event than us in NC but you have to admit the trend has been our friend so we will have to see how much of that continues over the next couple days... also there’s just something about upper level lows man they are sneaky don’t count it out
 
GaWx said:
I hope not but:

1. We now have sub -3 AO and +1 PNA along with -1 NAO. I’d take continuation of that combo anytime. The nasty SER has been so persistent the last few years that I’d rather not give it a chance by losing the +PNA.

2. I’m much deeper SE then you and thus am more vulnerable to control by the SER. For my area and nearby to have the best chance to stay with near or BN temps, the SER needs to stay away. I’m not even thinking about wintry precip here as that is quite rare. I’m just thinking about avoiding what had recently dominated here in winter until the wonderful Dec of 2020, AN temps. Just keep the +PNA and I’ll take my chances. But alas, that’s going to be tough to do.

3. I’m also keeping in mind that the models have quite often underestimated the SER in the medium range. Maybe a persistent -NAO would reduce that chance but I’d still rather just keep the +PNA.
Click to expand...

With strong -NAO/AO remaining in place, good luck getting much of a SE ridge even if a giant -EPO goes up
 
GaWx said:
That’s IF the strong -AO and -NAO remain, a big if.

The good news is that the GEFS still maintains a decent +PNA. That’s what I want to see more than anything else:

View attachment 62110
Click to expand...

I actually don't think -NAO is a big IF here, arguably one of the more predictable features in the coming several weeks. When you have a strong -NAO that then couples to the stratosphere in the form of a sudden stratospheric warming event, that's the best recipe to get an extremely persistent and strong -NAO that lasts for weeks & weeks on end, very much like late Feb-Mar 2013, & late Jan-Feb 2010. Simon Lee's research has shown that even a 1 sigma below average polar vortex is 7x more likely to produce -NAO than "normal" conditions and we'll have a much weaker vortex than -1 sigma here so the odds are likely even more in our favor.
 
Webberweather53 said:
I actually don't think -NAO is a big IF here, arguably one of the more predictable features in the coming several weeks. When you have a strong -NAO that then couples to the stratosphere in the form of a sudden stratospheric warming event, that's the best recipe to get an extremely persistent and strong -NAO that lasts for weeks & weeks on end, very much like late Feb-Mar 2013, & late Jan-Feb 2010. Simon Lee's research has shown that even a 1 sigma below average polar vortex is 7x more likely to produce -NAO than "normal" conditions and we'll have a much weaker vortex than -1 sigma here so the odds are likely even more in our favor.
Click to expand...

Good point! I wasn’t thinking about the nice upcoming SSW. That indeed is encouraging to keep -AO/-NAO dominating.
 
GaWx said:
Good point! I wasn’t thinking about the nice upcoming SSW. That indeed is encouraging to keep -AO/-NAO dominating.
Click to expand...

Yeah there's no guarantee obviously but it's a great way to have the -NAO keep coming back again & again later in Jan & Feb as the circulation anomalies propagate into the troposphere. The SSW is a real game changer in that regard
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top