However, it's time to turn our full attention to a big storm that will affect the Eastern U.S. next weekend. The forecast models have flip-flopped around since yesterday...
GFS now shows a primary low pressure system moving through the Ohio Valley before the energy gets transferred to a secondary low pressure that goes out to see. Due to the transfer of energy, the precipitation shield never quite gets up to us.
ECMWF now shows the big low going out to see, but shows a pretty nice clipper system moving through our area. The two storms almost phase (combine together)...if that happened, it would have been a big storm with the main storm going well to the west.
UKMET is well to the south and east.
GGEM (which I don't really have any good images for) shows the storm tracking inland, with the precipitation shield similar to that shown by the GFS.
In summary, the forecast models on average have trended a little to the northwest from this time yesterday, but almost all of them have changed their solution from yesterday. The GFS is well to the north of where it was yesterday, the ECMWF and UKMET well to the south and east. The GGEM has stayed fairly consistent, with the precipitation shield a little to the north of where it was yesterday, but the storm track a little to the south.
In addition, the models have some serious differences in the upper levels of the atmosphere at this timeframe. The GFS never drops down any energy from Canada, which leads me to question the accuracy of its solution at the surface. On the other hand, the ECMWF drops in a nice clipper from Canada, and as I mentioned earlier, it comes thisclose to phasing (combining together) and giving us what would likely be a big snowstorm.
So what does it all mean? At this point, not too much. If anything, it looks better for us today than at this time yesterday, as most of the models have shown the potential for the northern stream energy and the southern stream energy to phase (combine together), and as I mentioned yesterday, phasing means everything in us getting this storm.
In conclusion, the forecast models still have some big differences to get worked out, so it appears to be a wait-and see situation for the next few days. I believe we have five extremely wide ranging scenarios with this storm.
(1) No phasing, with the main storm being supressed well to the south.
(2) A partial phase, with the main storm going up the East coast but some moisture being thrown back towards us, resulting in minor accumulations.
(3) A full phase, which would likely result in our area receiving a notable snow event.
(4) A primary low pressure system tracking through the Ohio Valley, and energy being transferred to a secondary low pressure system which would either track up the East Coast or out to sea.
(5) The main storm goes up the East Coast or out to sea, but we get some decent accumulation with a clipper system that moves through our area.
With all these as possibilities, this is definitely a wait-and-see situation.
That's all for today, I'll have a new post up tomorrow evening.
1 comment:
Option #1...just like this entire winter, nothing is going to happen.
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