December 2014 Observations for the Pacific Northwest

[IbrChris]

I spend a day away from the site and this happened.

 

I'll clean things up in a bit, but I'll leave what "IbrChris" said because it matches a sentiment that I hold. I can understand the need to question those that bring up pretty grandiose claims, but there just needs to be a point where you just have to stop. We all know that some members here will not dive into the details of their black magic, and so be it. As long as I don't have to deal with a member threatening others (or Facebook) or another member blatantly falsifying their location or past just because they have to add to their credibility then I think it is a good day on the forum.

 

Richard - If you so feel the need to question Phil's claims, please try to keep it to a separate thread. Make sure that when you postulate a question with reasoning as to why it was asked, three word responses don't count and only seem to hurt your image than to add shine to it.

 

Phil - For the love of all things holy, don't contribute to the back and fourth in the observation thread, and if you feel like you are getting harassed, then don't respond to him at all. If you can do this and the responses are still at a constant tick, then I'll go down the mod preview route for the offending member.

Actually that was the first question my boss asked me in the interview process.

 

Boss: "Hey, it says here you beat out your professor in the forecast contest portion of Meteo 5120: Synoptic Meteorology II."

 

Me: "Ya, that was a lot of fun."

 

Boss: "Would you mind divulging what kind of astrological divination you utilized to achieve that? Daily tarot readings? Magic 8 ball? Peyote?"

 

Me: "I know a guy..."

[Jesse]

35 at PDX this morning. They did better than I would have guessed.

[ShawniganLake]

We really need something to track.

If you like tracking rain, maybe some river flooding, could be your week. If you're looking for arctic air, keep waiting.

[Accuweather.com]

It looks like it will get colder at the end of the month in the Seattle area.

[MossMan]

If you like tracking rain, maybe some river flooding, could be your week. If you're looking for arctic air, keep waiting.

Yeah anything would work...besides Split Flow hell. When there are down times in the weather it always leads to pages of bickering over things not really relevant to this thread. I almost forgot about the atmospheric river event of next week, nobody on here has really talked about it.

[ShawniganLake]

I love accuweather and their super accurate pinpoint 450 day forecasts.

[stuffradio]

I love accuweather and their super accurate pinpoint 450 day forecasts.

I don't even think that account is actually from Accuweather.

[ShawniganLake]

Yeah anything would work...besides Split Flow hell. When there are down times in the weather it always leads to pages of bickering over things not really relevant to this thread. I almost forgot about the atmospheric river event of next week, nobody on here has really talked about it.

Olympics, north cascades and BC look super soggy.

[westcoastexpat]

The waiting game is always tough, but maybe everyone can catch up on their Christmas shopping before the weather turns exciting once again.

[IbrChris]

So I've decided to put together a Power Point (I know...roll your eyes) of the major arctic events in PNW history dating back to the 1870s. My methodology for now is to have a slide for each with a 500 mb height anomaly chart and a 300 mb mean vector wind chart from the ESRL 20th century reanalysis (1871-2012). For later events post-1948 I'll use the higher resolution NCEP reanalysis dataset. I'm also adding a listing of coldest lows at selected PNW locations from that event on the slide. Yesterday I completed the Jan 1875, Jan 1888 and Jan-Feb 1893 events (latter one was more BC and WA centric rather than the entire PNW but I included it due to it being quite severe from Olympia northward...low of -6 at Eastsound, -3 at Olga, -1 Port Angeles, 8 Neah Bay. Vancouver, BC region was around -2 in that one).

So, give me some ideas of others to include from 1870s to present with start and end dates. I'll share the presentation when its complete. Feel free to suggest some which affected mainly Washington as well as others that affected mainly Oregon too. My goal here is also selfish, I'd like to learn more about the overall pattern in each event. Each was unique...Jan 1875 had a vastly different pattern than Jan 1893 for instance.

Thanks in advance.

[SilverFallsAndrew]

So I've decided to put together a Power Point (I know...roll your eyes) of the major arctic events in PNW history dating back to the 1870s. My methodology for now is to have a slide for each with a 500 mb height anomaly chart and a 300 mb mean vector wind chart from the ESRL 20th century reanalysis (1871-2012). For later events post-1948 I'll use the higher resolution NCEP reanalysis dataset. I'm also adding a listing of coldest lows at selected PNW locations from that event on the slide. Yesterday I completed the Jan 1875, Jan 1888 and Jan-Feb 1893 events (latter one was more BC and WA centric rather than the entire PNW but I included it due to it being quite severe from Olympia northward...low of -6 at Eastsound, -3 at Olga, -1 Port Angeles, 8 Neah Bay. Vancouver, BC region was around -2 in that one).

 

So, give me some ideas of others to include from 1870s to present with start and end dates. I'll share the presentation when its complete. Feel free to suggest some which affected mainly Washington as well as others that affected mainly Oregon too. My goal here is also selfish, I'd like to learn more about the overall pattern in each event. Each was unique...Jan 1875 had a vastly different pattern than Jan 1893 for instance.

 

Thanks in advance.

 

Sounds awesome. Can't wait to see it!

[The Weather Channel]

I don't even think that account is actually from Accuweather.

 

They're probably legit. Too bad their forecasts are not.

[snow_wizard]

So I've decided to put together a Power Point (I know...roll your eyes) of the major arctic events in PNW history dating back to the 1870s. My methodology for now is to have a slide for each with a 500 mb height anomaly chart and a 300 mb mean vector wind chart from the ESRL 20th century reanalysis (1871-2012). For later events post-1948 I'll use the higher resolution NCEP reanalysis dataset. I'm also adding a listing of coldest lows at selected PNW locations from that event on the slide. Yesterday I completed the Jan 1875, Jan 1888 and Jan-Feb 1893 events (latter one was more BC and WA centric rather than the entire PNW but I included it due to it being quite severe from Olympia northward...low of -6 at Eastsound, -3 at Olga, -1 Port Angeles, 8 Neah Bay. Vancouver, BC region was around -2 in that one).

 

So, give me some ideas of others to include from 1870s to present with start and end dates. I'll share the presentation when its complete. Feel free to suggest some which affected mainly Washington as well as others that affected mainly Oregon too. My goal here is also selfish, I'd like to learn more about the overall pattern in each event. Each was unique...Jan 1875 had a vastly different pattern than Jan 1893 for instance.

 

Thanks in advance.

You absolutely must include December 1871. That was an awesome region wide event. In the 1880s there are a ton of them. Feb 1884, Dec 1884, Jan 1886, Feb 1887 being some of the biggies. I think there were a couple of other Feb blasts early in the decade also. From what I've seen the ESRL maps are dubious from the early events. The maps from Jan /Feb 1893 didn't look nearly severe enough to me. There are also some from the 1890s that would be fun to look at. Feb 1891, which was supposedly kind of an oddball in that it was a much lower pressure environment than a typical Arctic event, November 1896, late Dec / early Jan 1898-99 (which was an awesome event in Seattle), and Feb 1899. Then of course you have multiple events in the winter of 1889-90.

 

You should probably do a separate thread for this once you get your material put together.

[snow_wizard]

The 12z GFS has a much nicer look to it today with heights trying to come up a bit over the NE Pacific. It looks especially nice right at the end.

[snow_wizard]

Today's SOI update shows the highest number in many weeks.

[MR.SNOWMIZER]

I'll buy that for a dollar.

[TT-SEA]

Beautiful morning!    Sun is shining and offshore flow taking hold.

[snow_wizard]

"The maps from Jan /Feb 1893 didn't look nearly severe enough to me."

 

Actually I got a classic arctic blast look @ 500 mb when I took the mean of Jan 25-Feb 7, 1893. Fairly impressive. Try pulling the 500 mb height anomaly and overriding the color table with the settings: step = 20, min = -300, max = 300. I use this color table for all my searches because it standardizes the look and colors of the maps for comparison purposes. I note a -160 m departure over WA in the 1893 event.

That's actually pretty good for a mean of that many days. I was looking at just the individual days when I thought it should have looked the most extreme.

[snow_wizard]

The ECMWF is sticking to it's guns in showing the MJO collapsing and re-emerging in NW friendly territory in a couple of weeks.  Very interesting to note the wave was amplified in Nina friendly regions and shortcuts through Nino friendly ones.  I'll be quite surprised if the ENSO SST's don't drop over the next couple of weeks, especially given the recent lack of WWBs and the fact the warm subsurface water under the ENSO regions is waning.

 

[IbrChris]

That's actually pretty good for a mean of that many days. I was looking at just the individual days when I thought it should have looked the most extreme.

Ok. I've been taking the event mean. I establish a "start" and "end" date by looking at the obs I have for the event. Generally I take the days that Portland is below about 35 for a high and other regional stations were likewise cold. It's not a perfect method but seems to capture a good reanalysis output.

[Phil]

Phil - For the love of all things holy, don't contribute to the back and fourth in the observation thread, and if you feel like you are getting harassed, then don't respond to him at all. If you can do this and the responses are still at a constant tick, then I'll go down the mod preview route for the offending member.

Thanks for the advice. I do my best to explain myself here, and provide peer reviewed literature to verify my statements when asked. It's just hard to respond politely someone who seems to have an ulterior motive.

[Phil]

Just for fun, here are the CFS snowfall maps going into January...lol @ the snow down to the gulf coast:

 

http://catchmypicture.com/f/YPdDHd/800.jpg

 

http://catchmypicture.com/f/9JMrfa/800.jpg

[Jesse]

12z Euro is icky.

[snow_wizard]

Just for fun, here are the CFS snowfall maps going into January...lol @ the snow down to the gulf coast:

 

 

Wow! We should all be happy if that verifies!

[snow_wizard]

12z Euro is icky.

Not entirely. It goes a little different direction than the GFS though. At least the Euro has some fake cold potential at times. I think we will start to see some good model runs this week. The CFS is showing cold for us in early Jan very consistently now. That model does have some usefulness when it's consistent for a period of days.

[Deweydog]

GLAAM update???

[TT-SEA]

Last Sunday we had lots of snow and it was freezing cold. This Sunday it's almost 60 degrees and feels like March.  Dog broke his leg last weekend running around in the snow in the woods... now he sits nicely wherever my daughter takes him.   

 

http://s28.postimg.org/kdx4p89mk/10750223_734083763326501_1492887315941411579_o.jpg

[VancouverIslandSouth]

The 12z GFS has a much nicer look to it today with heights trying to come up a bit over the NE Pacific. It looks especially nice right at the end.

 

Yep, it's pretty far out there so not worth a lot at this point but there are some things I like to see on the 12z and other recent runs. Energy from the north surpressing any sort of amplification of the ridge over the West Coast; a pretty common precursor to big Arctic events because the ridge is going expand somewhere, and if it's blocked from expanding here and the PV is expanding south it'll phase with the PV and a ridge will popup around the Bering Strait. If we start seeing signs of amplified western ridging again in the long range then it's hard to see us getting anything fun at the end of the month.

[Deweydog]

Last Sunday we had lots of snow and it was freezing cold. This Sunday it's almost 60 degrees and feels like March. Dog broke his leg last weekend running around in the snow in the woods... now he sits nicely wherever my daughter takes him.

 

http://s28.postimg.org/kdx4p89mk/10750223_734083763326501_1492887315941411579_o.jpg

Poor pooch!

[Deweydog]

Yep, it's pretty far out there so not worth a lot at this point but there are some things I like to see on the 12z and other recent runs. Energy from the north surpressing any sort of amplification of the ridge over the West Coast; a pretty common precursor to big Arctic events because the ridge is going expand somewhere, and if it's blocked from expanding here and the PV is expanding south it'll phase with the PV and a ridge will popup around the Bering Strait. If we start seeing signs of amplified western ridging again in the long range then it's hard to see us getting anything fun at the end of the month.

I think western ridging/-EPO going into the end of the year would be a good thing, assuming there's something to the idea of something cold in the west in January.

[TT-SEA]

Poor pooch!

 

Yeah... he is being showered with attention from the kids now.

[Phil]

...because the ridge is going expand somewhere, and if it's blocked from expanding here and the PV is expanding south it'll phase with the PV and a ridge will popup around the Bering Strait. If we start seeing signs of amplified western ridging again in the long range then it's hard to see us getting anything fun at the end of the month.

I assume you're referring to the polar low(s), and not the PV itself? The PV is a stratospheric entity..an expanding PV sucks for everyone

[Phil]

CPC analogs highlight the Nino-esque December very well..this is the exact opposite 500mb orientation relative to you guys need..

 

http://catchmypicture.com/f/KJNSR1/640.jpg

[Deweydog]

Yeah... he his being showered with attention from the kids now.

Dewey soaked his last surgery for all it was worth. We weren't sure how he was gonna make it on the other end so he got the royal treatment.

[snow_wizard]

I think western ridging/-EPO going into the end of the year would be a good thing, assuming there's something to the idea of something cold in the west in January.

I think western ridging/-EPO going into the end of the year would be a good thing, assuming there's something to the idea of something cold in the west in January.

It always seems like the magic spot for an upper ridge to center itself is off the coast of CA. So many times energy will drop down from the N or NW and cause the bulk of the energy in such a ridge to push westward and cause a highly amplified offshore block.

[Deweydog]

It always seems like the magic spot for an upper ridge to center itself is off the coast of CA. So many times energy will drop down from the N or NW and cause the bulk of the energy in such a ridge to push westward and cause a highly amplified offshore block.

Relatively flat west coast ridging with anomalously high 500mb heights is the predominant precursor for a true pattern breaker retrogression with a tanking EPO.

[snow_wizard]

CPC analogs highlight the Nino-esque December very well..this is the exact opposite 500mb orientation relative to you guys need..

 

Very true. It is interesting to note 1979 and 2006 have been coming up as analogs for days now though. They worked out nicely a bit down the road and were warm ENSO.

[VancouverIslandSouth]

I assume you're referring to the polar low(s), and not the PV itself? The PV is a stratospheric entity..an expanding PV sucks for everyone

 

Yeah, I may be a bit lost in translation here, but yeah what I'm referring to is the switch to -AO and the PV-associated energy splitting off and moving south (an upper level polar low might be more appropriate terminology?). Definitely didn't mean expanding PV in the sense of strengthening +AO.

[wx_statman]

You're on a binge, Chris!

[IbrChris]

CPC analogs highlight the Nino-esque December very well..this is the exact opposite 500mb orientation relative to you guys need..

 

Looks chilly in Oymyakon though.