January 2021 weather observations for the PNW

[Thurston Howell III]

Yes I have a Davis Vantage Pro in a decent location.  I have 2.5 acres so I put it in the best spot.  I'm only 2000' from Colvos passage/Narrows so real moderating effect.  Also on top of fairly steep hill so on a clear night when I go down the hill towards GH it will be 7-8 degrees colder.  However it we get 3-4" of snow there might be less than an inch of slush or nothing at the bottom of hill 1/2 mile away.

[Jesse]

31 minutes ago, Omegaraptor said:

Jan 1950 was the biggest Arctic cold and snow event of the last century. Nothing since it has even come close.

Here's PDX:

Falling snow nearly every day, -2F to finish off the month, and then in early February came a -3F reading. For comparison, the coldest temperature PDX has recorded in the last 30 years is 11F. Probably not even possible to repeat today, between our modern climactic state and UHI.

*climatic

[TacomaWaWx]

3 minutes ago, Thurston Howell III said:

Yes I have a Davis Vantage Pro in a decent location.  I have 2.5 acres so I put it in the best spot.  I'm only 2000' from Colvos passage/Narrows so real moderating effect.  Also on top of fairly steep hill so on a clear night when I go down the hill towards GH it will be 7-8 degrees colder.  However it we get 3-4" of snow there might be less than an inch of slush or nothing at the bottom of hill 1/2 mile away.

Similar effects here. Im about a half mile from the water (2500’) and at 300’ of elevation. It’ll be 3-5 degrees cooler about 1-2 miles south of here at night. Opposite effect in the summer time with 3-5 degrees of cooling here. In marginal snow situations we’ve gotten several snow events where there was a couple of inches of snow up here and just a trace-1” down at the waterfront. 12/25/17 we got 3” here and not even a full inch down on Ruston way. 

[Deweydog]

17 minutes ago, weather_fan said:

Thanks for all the responses on why 1950 was special but does anyone know why was that the case? What were the parameters causing the temperatures to be so colder than average for so long.

PNA was stupid low that whole month, among other things.  

[Gradient Keeper]

GFS not on board yet, at least through Day 6+

[Prairiedog]

56 minutes ago, weather_fan said:

Everybody brings up jan 1950. What was so special About it? Does anyone have Sea and portland temps for that month?

Portland had close to 60".  Many locations had lows below zero.  Oregon City hit -2 on Feb 2 for their all time low.  Many locations in the minus teens.  My dad said he didn't see the grass for 6 weeks.  It would snow then get a layer of ZR then more snow.  He said one day it was 19 and raining.  There's a good number of archived pics of guys in their cars on the Columbia between Portland and Couv. 

[Gradient Keeper]

18z is a huge limping turd

[Phil]

Goofus doing goofus things. Per the usual w/ an IPWP MJO transit.

[SalemDuck]

2 minutes ago, Phil said:

Goofus doing goofus things. Per the usual w/ an IPWP MJO transit.

What’s the effect of this? 

[snow_wizard]

Looks like the 18z GFS might pull it off this run, but still some problems in the day 6  / 7 area.

[Omegaraptor]

5 minutes ago, SalemDuck said:

What’s the effect of this? 

All the Arctic air goes east of the Rockies.

Euro actually sends it into the PNW. The difference seems to be how the two models handle MJO. The 12z of the new GFS also sends everything east of the Rockies.

[snow_wizard]

11 minutes ago, DJ Droppin said:

18z is a huge limping turd

At least it's better than the 12z...at least as far as the run has gone on pivotal.

[Blizzard777]

1 hour ago, weather_fan said:

Everybody brings up jan 1950. What was so special About it? Does anyone have Sea and portland temps for that month?

 

1 hour ago, MossMan said:

A much colder and much snowier version of February 2019

Everything was in black and white which made it better as well! 

[snow_wizard]

1 minute ago, Omegaraptor said:

All the Arctic air goes east of the Rockies.

Euro actually sends it into us. The difference seems to be how the two models handle MJO. The 12z of the new GFS also sends everything east of the Rockies.

I'm pretty convinced that's the case.  The ECMWF is much more sure the wave will progress into and stall in region 7.

[snow_wizard]

1 minute ago, Jginmartini said:

 

Everything was in black and white which made it better as well! 

Never seen that pic before.  It was a different city and a different world back then.

[snow_wizard]

The GFS is trying on this run.

[Slushy Inch]

Certainly has moved closer to the Euro this run. Hopefully the 00z brings it home.

[snow_wizard]

I also forgot to mention ice began to form along the Seattle waterfront in Jan 1950.  That would be something to see!

[Omegaraptor]

5 minutes ago, snow_wizard said:

I'm pretty convinced that's the case.  The ECMWF is much more sure the wave will progress into and stall in region 7.

 

Here are the GEFS and ECMWF graphs. ECMWF wants to go into Phase 7, GEFS is all over the place with lots of members staying in Phase 6.

[Front Ranger]

1 hour ago, TacomaWaWx said:

Just for comparison February 2019 was 35.2 avg. for the whole month here in Tacoma. Average low of 31 and 22.0 inches of snow. SEA numbers were pretty similar as well. 

And yet Feb 2019 was still SEA's third coldest on record (narrowly missing 2nd). And would have been good for a top 10 cold January at SEA.

Although January can definitely get colder than February, 1950 was such a huge outlier. 

[TT-SEA]

Bartells in North Bend still has shovels... going quick!  

[Slushy Inch]

GFS is really struggling with the handling off troughs moving into and around the Alaskan ridge and its messing things up. I have a hard time imagining a trough so isolated in a ridge, chances are this doesn't happen.

[Gummy]

I would wait for the GPS to come back around before pulling the trigger on one of those shovels.

[Gradient Keeper]

Onto 00z!

00z GFS in 4 hours 49 minutes

00z ECMWF in 7 hours 4 minutes

[Slushy Inch]

3 minutes ago, 12345WeatherNerd said:

GFS is really struggling with the handling off troughs moving into and around the Alaskan ridge and its messing things up. I have a hard time imagining a trough so isolated in a ridge, chances are this doesn't happen.

Correction, that thing in the ridge would be considered a cut-off low not a trough.

 

[Cloud]

How the GFS is doing last 12 hours. Yeah, get this shiet outta here.  Zero consistency so it’s a good thing no one takes LR all that seriously. 
 

 

[snow_wizard]

I just want to say the GFS looks like it's overthinking this.  The 18z is far better, but still has a lot of noise going on.

[MossMan]

10 minutes ago, TT-SEA said:

Bartells in North Bend still has shovels... going quick!  

Hopefully Matt’s wife doesn’t come plowing through that window with her Mazda to crush them all! 

[Deweydog]

5 minutes ago, MossMan said:

Hopefully Matt’s wife doesn’t come plowing through that window with her Mazda to crush them all! 

We literally just walked by these at Target.  She had a menacing look in her eye as she did.  She’s no longer onboard.

[snow_wizard]

This GFS run tries so hard to get there.  Pretty nutso looking overall.

[SilverFallsAndrew]

Do Models think?! 

[Cloud]

8 minutes ago, snow_wizard said:

I just want to say the GFS looks like it's overthinking this.  The 18z is far better, but still has a lot of noise going on.

How exactly does a model overthink? What causing it do so? 

[Slushy Inch]

1 minute ago, snow_wizard said:

This GFS run tries so hard to get there.  Pretty nutso looking overall.

Agreed troughs cut through ridges like butter in the GFS.

[snow_wizard]

Hard to believe that one little isolated low in the middle of the block causes all of the problems in this GFS run.  A feature that will probably disappear by tomorrow.

[MossMan]

4 minutes ago, SilverFallsAndrew said:

Do Models think?! 

Yes. 

[snow_wizard]

There might be hope for the parallel on this run.  Still pretty early in the run though.

[snow_wizard]

7 minutes ago, Cloud said:

How exactly does a model overthink? What causing it do so? 

I think it's making everything too complicated.  This is a pretty straight forward looking evolution on the other models.

[Winterdog]

The Parallel is stuck on awful at hour 186.

[Winterdog]

I just caught a quick shot of the 18Z a minute ago!

[TacomaWaWx]

50/40 today...0.06” so far as well.