December 2017 Observations and Discussions

[St Paul Storm]

^ lol. O-K then.

[Minny_Weather]

Radar returns are showing up but most everything is virga.

[westMJim]

Getting nice fluffy lake effect snow here now, nice snow globe look to it. Temperature is now at 21° 

[westMJim]

I had a low of -2° this morning. The official low at the airport was 0° the record low for this date was -1° so that record will stand. I now have 8" of snow on the ground that is the same as the official snow depth was on this date last year. The NWS office in Grand Rapids has issued a WWA for tonight into Friday morning for 2 to 4" of snow 

[jaster220]

Nice but that was 2 runs ago

 

Ummm...how long you been trolling storms, aka model watching?? At that range you don't post an eye-candy storm porn or w/e you wish to call it map because you think "that's the final answer". You post it to say "this is one possible outcome and wouldn't it be awesome if just once, it came true?". Were you aware that a 384hr GFS run basically showed the exact outcome of GHD-2 for Detroit. Yeah, the blind squirrel found the nut that time, so nobody can say "it never happens" and I personally feel that models have improved in "flashing" something close to reality from further out than ever before, including the GHD-2 era. Now, back to clinging to the latest run, only (what'd she say?) 28 more til 0 hour?    

[james1976]

Ummm...how long you been trolling storms, aka model watching?? At that range you don't post an eye-candy storm porn or w/e you wish to call it map because you think "that's the final answer". You post it to say "this is one possible outcome and wouldn't it be awesome if just once, it came true?". Were you aware that a 384hr GFS run basically showed the exact outcome of GHD-2 for Detroit. Yeah, the blind squirrel found the nut that time, so nobody can say "it never happens" and I personally feel that models have improved in "flashing" something close to reality from further out than ever before, including the GHD-2 era. Now, back to clinging to the latest run, only (what'd she say?) 28 more til 0 hour?

Ummmmm.....yeah that wasnt my point. Was just saying there were a couple more runs since then. And no one should ever live or die from the latest model run.

[St Paul Storm]

I like the Blackhawks; especially the Uncheckable Czech...

 

Three Four likes (and counting!) for an "lol"...will probably have an all time board record by sundown...

 

I wish I could achieve such levels of popularity whilst incorporating such grammatical & syntactical brevity...

If I had put a smiley face after the lol would we still be having this conversation? Maybe you wouldn’t have taken it so seriously.

[St Paul Storm]

Now, back to clinging to the latest run, only (what'd she say?) 28 more til 0 hour?

 

Nah, only 14 more model runs. I’m clinging to the Euro. ; )

[Money]

18z still has a big storm for ia mn wi etc

[hlcater]

18z GFS has a system for much of the sub north of about I-80 7 days from now. Something to watch as the GFS has slowly been trending southward and more potent with this system over the past few days. Not sure what the euro is doing, haven't really looked. But the 12z Euro had things north of about I-90.

[bud2380]

Definitely starting to look more promising for something to track anyways.  Right now looks like some overrunning snows at the onset with the SLP coming in after.  Those are always interesting with the areas that can get snow from both ends really scoring.  GFS with plenty of cold air behind the system too.  

[Andrew NE]

Great trends all around at the moment, boy Texas could be looking a big ice storm right before xmas.

[hlcater]

Definitely starting to look more promising for something to track anyways.  Right now looks like some overrunning snows at the onset with the SLP coming in after.  Those are always interesting with the areas that can get snow from both ends really scoring.  GFS with plenty of cold air behind the system too.  

Yea that thing just cuts itself off down there for like 2 days. Would be a colossal travel disaster if anything close to that were to verify.

[Minny_Weather]

Tiniest raindrops I have ever seen are falling right now. With the humidity and wind outside right now it certainly does feel way colder than the actual temperature of 38°.

[bud2380]

Most of the AFDs I read today were pretty lame regarding this potential system, but DMX did have at least a little bit on it.

 

By Thursday the long wave trough will mature through the Rockies,
but as one would expect at Day 7 there are varied solutions among
the ECMWF and GFS deterministic runs and their associated
ensembles with uncertainty regarding short wave strength and
timing. Thus confidence is fairly high in some form of
precipitation around this time across the Midwest, likely snow of
some degrees over portions of IA, especially north, but
confidence in details is low. Confidence is also high in an
associated nearby frontal system and baroclinic zone, but the
aforementioned variability will result in low confidence down to
the scale of our forecast area with the surface low track anywhere
from IA to MO. This will result in a fairly wide range in
potential temperatures. Although it will be beyond the forecast
period, there is relatively high confidence in colder weather
behind the passage of this system to end the work week with what
would likely be the coldest temperatures of the season.

[Craig-OmahaWX]

GFS/EURO/CMC definitely have systems to track, but what they do and how they eject out is in question. GFS looks nice, has a system christmas day for the entire central Plains pretty much, but heaviest just south in Kansas. EURO is further north obviously. So still lots of uncertainty.

[OKwx2k4]

Weeklies look much improved.

[OKwx2k4]

I don't have time to share them but I bet someone else can find them.

[Minny_Weather]

Weeklies are meh. Of course the best period happens to be when I'm gone once again. Mean averages about 3" after Christmas so that's encouraging for those who will be here.

[Money]

Both gfs and cmc took a step back

 

Doesn’t really dig and it’s much warmer compared to 12z

[gosaints]

Northwoods have been raking pretty comparatively speaking

[Craig-OmahaWX]

The weeklies look great. Has the western US in below average temps, good for storminess and western troughs to possibly develop.

 

CMC further west with the trough near Christmas but the GFS so far pretty progressive with the trough later next week...still a lot could happen as we get closer to 240 hours...

 

[Craig-OmahaWX]

WOW gfs already considerably different at 174 hours compared to the 12z and 18z model runs. This is crazy lol;

 

0z

 

 

18z

 

[gabel23]

Lezak mentioned today in his blog to watch the base of the trough coming in from the southwest. You can see a piece gets hung out in the pacific; I would think we would either want these two pieces to come together or have one hang out far enough west and send out pieces of energy for a while. Regardless, I just hope we see the southwest flow set up shop for longer than a week so we all can stand a chance of storms riding out from the upper level flow. 

[Craig-OmahaWX]

Describes the GFS perfectly;

 

[Madtown]

Looking at the next 7 days on out....we got one chance for a white Christmas. Hope and a prayer next Thurs. night. Not liking the odds. Oh well.

[Craig-OmahaWX]

Looking at the next 7 days on out....we got one chance for a white Christmas. Hope and a prayer next Thurs. night. Not liking the odds. Oh well.

Chances are for late next week and on Christmas day itself depending on how many pieces rotate northeast.

[GDR]

[Money]

Euro looks nearly identical to gfs for next week

 

Low tracks through IA/S.WI

[bainbridgekid]

Euro looks nearly identical to gfs for next week

 

Low tracks through IA/S.WI

I'm only looking at the 24 hour increments on Tropical Tidbits, but the Euro is definitely South of the 00z GFS (which admittedly was well North of the 18z and 12z)

 

I'll be visiting my family in Chicago so I'm rooting for the Southern solutions!

 

GFS:

 

Euro:

[Craig-OmahaWX]

Wow...the EURO cuts off the low and sends it back southwest into the pacific ocean lol

 

[OKwx2k4]

Yeah. Toss it. I don't see that happening.

[Snowlover76]

Doesn't the euro always cutoff lows?

[OKwx2k4]

Doesn't the euro always cutoff lows?

The Euro is simply trash in this pattern period and the GFS is too progressive with the front at this point because at that range, its resolution still sucks. Still a ton of changes to go. I'm sticking pretty near the GEFS solution at this juncture as it's the storm I've been looking for and hinting about since November 29. I'm not too worried about this winter and haven't been since August. Going to be a good one for you too.

[OKwx2k4]

My call awhile back for wall-to-wall cold this winter is actually looking more realistic by the second as well.

[Tom]

00z Euro holding strong for the Winter Solstice storm...

 

http://wx.graphics/models/ecmwf/2017121500/mw/ecmwf_acc_snow_mw_198.png

 

http://wx.graphics/models/ecmwf/2017121500/greatlakes/ecmwf_acc_snow_greatlakes_198.png

[Tom]

00z Euro Control very similar to the Euro Op just a bit farther south...

[Madtown]

Looks like a rainer here. Should be good to get the tails open in the north though!

[Tom]

The likelihood of an impactful winter storm are increasing for later next week.  IMO, this should be the season's first widespread winter storm for our members.   The system will be forming out of CO and ejecting out towards the GL's.  There is still a lot of spread among the ensembles which is to be expected but an interesting storm is on the table.  At this juncture, I feel that places from I-80 across IA and north of the "cheddar curtain" are in a better position to see accumulating snow from this system.  Depending on how quick it develops, folks out in NE that haven't seen any meaningful snow are still in the game.  I don't think this storm cuts to quick due to the influence of a tanking -EPO, even though we have to deal with a +AO/+NAO during this period.

[Niko]

Currently @ 18F w cloudy skies. More snow for MBY w 1-3inches expected, locally 4" amounts in some locales.