February 2014 in the PNW

[Phil]

No frickin way... not even close.

Yeah, the GFS has been s**t at least for my area.

[GHweatherChris]

There is not even a discussion on the ECMWF surface maps.    So far superior its amazing.

It has had alot of misses for snow this winter.  Of course it has played catch up just like the HRRR has which only makes it look good in a fake way.

[epiceast]

Also Climatology would be very against a low sliding down the coast not followed by an arctic outblast. This would be unprecedent imo(Jim can correct me I'm sure he knows of an event like this if there is one). I would not be surprised if this event verified we would have a day where highs would be around freezing for a day sneak up on us completely unmodeled.

[GHweatherChris]

ECMWF is generally superior over longer time frames...there's certain runs where GFS or GEM will beat the ECMWF, however more often the ECMWF beats them both. What is surprising to me is how well GEM is doing lately. A lot of people seem to think the GEM should take a back seat to the GFS but the verification challenges that notion. At worst GEM appears to be a fair equal of the GFS, at best slightly superior.

All of the models have had their own glory this winter.

[IbrChris]

I suggest a little light reading on the strengths and weaknesses of ECMWF and GFS:

http://www.energyblogs.com/weather/index.cfm/2014/1/6/Differences-Between-the-GFS-and-ECMWF-Weather-Models

[TT-SEA]

I would have downed 7 Pina Colada's, 3 shots of Tequila and likely f*** my GF twice in the amount of time you have spent on this board discussing model superiority while in HAWAII

 

D****T Tim, you are on vacation

 

 

I can only manage a few drinks by the pool during the day... between the drinks and the hot sun it wears you out.

 

The family has pretty much stayed on our time schedule... going to bed by 8:30 or 9:00 here which is 10:30 or 11:00 at home.

 

I end up watching the Olympics about this time of night or sitting on the lanai and enjoying this incredible weather and browsing weather models.     Sitting outside now... 75 degrees of perfection here.   I am hoping the models are right about a pleasant split-flow regime later next week.    I don't want to go back to nasty rain and snow everyday.

[Phil]

Hard to believe how different the ECMWF and GFS are handling the surface low this weekend. Given the GEM is also much further south I would say a track south of the ECMWF is likely. Hopefully it will take the sweet track shown by the WRF. The ECMWF has actually been a disappointing model this winter.

The ECMWF has out-performed all other models this winter, according to the WxBell stats Ibhchris posted. WxBell gets it straight from the database.

 

Making things up won't change Mother Nature's mind. If anything she'll strap one on and do away with you. Not trying to be a jacka**, but please don't make things up to make yourself feel better. Eventually a bunch of posters will hop on your bus and then wonder what went wrong.

[IbrChris]

The ECMWF has out-performed all other models this winter, according to the WxBell stats Ibhchris posted.

 

Making things up won't change Mother Nature's mind. If anything she'll strap one on and do away with you. Seriously.

It may not be the most exciting activity to monitor and discuss model verification stats but it's very useful in conjunction with knowing the overall strengths and weaknesses of both models. I maintain that the GFS is not worthy of much trust right now and the stats back that up.

[TT-SEA]

The ECMWF has out-performed all other models this winter, according to the WxBell stats Ibhchris posted. WxBell gets it straight from the database.

 

Making things up won't change Mother Nature's mind. If anything she'll strap one on and do away with you. Not trying to be a jacka**, but please don't make things up to make yourself feel better. Eventually a bunch of posters will hop on your bus and then wonder what went wrong.

 

 

+1

+1

+1

+10

[Phil]

It may not be the most exciting activity to monitor and discuss model verification stats but it's very useful in conjunction with knowing the overall strengths and weaknesses of both models. I maintain that the GFS is not worthy of much trust right now and the stats back that up.

I agree. The GFS was predicting I'd get 1-2 inches of snow (flurries) during the blizzard last week, even as the snow was falling, while the Euro clobbered me. I ended up with almost 20", thunder/lightning, and 5ft drifts.

 

NCEP is going to upgrade the GFS big time this year..it'll have a 13km reso as opposed to the 27km reso attm. That'd put it above the current Euro.

[IbrChris]

The ECMWF has out-performed all other models this winter, according to the WxBell stats Ibhchris posted. WxBell gets it straight from the database.

 

Making things up won't change Mother Nature's mind. If anything she'll strap one on and do away with you. Not trying to be a jacka**, but please don't make things up to make yourself feel better. Eventually a bunch of posters will hop on your bus and then wonder what went wrong.

It took some convincing of Wx Bell executives by Ryan Maue for them to even offer the full ECMWF (above and beyond what you can view for free already). I guess they thought commentary from Bastardi and D'Aleo would be enough to draw subscribers. Paying the $200,000 a year for the full ECMWF grib files and Maue's graphical genius combined have made Wx Bell a big success.

 

Some of my personal favorite products on there are the Seattle and Portland sub-domains for ECMWF and GFS operational runs as well as the ECMWF location-based charts (both op and ensembles). Can't find those latter products elsewhere.

[Gradient Keeper]

What about the JMA or NOGAPS? I'm relying heavily on them to be the deciding factor!

[Phil]

It took some convincing of Wx Bell executives by Ryan Maue for them to even offer the full ECMWF (above and beyond what you can view for free already). I guess they thought commentary from Bastardi and D'Aleo would be enough to draw subscribers. Paying the $200,000 a year for the full ECMWF grib files and Maue's graphical genius combined have made Wx Bell a big success.

True that. They're apparently going to offer the full ECMWF ensemble suite as well (individual members too), plus the weekly/monthly products.

[Gradient Keeper]

00z WRF tonight shows very strong east wind with a crazy 850mb/925mb temp gradient between Portland and The Dalles
850mb: Portland +5c to +7c, The Dalles -6c to -8c
925mb: Portland +3c to +5c, The Dalles -3c to -7c
That’s an extreme inversion if I’ve ever seen one. The gradient looks to be at least 10mb. A peak of 12mb would not surprise me.

 

A solid Wind Advisory or High Wind Warnings are coming if this holds.

[IbrChris]

True that. They're apparently going to offer the full ECMWF ensemble suite as well (individual members too), plus the weekly/monthly products.

I don't know if you are a subscriber, but they already have the ensemble members on the location-based charts and the ECMWF Monthly runs. The Weeklies are more accurately described as the week-averaged values for the monthly run ensemble mean. While these maps aren't currently available, according to Maue they would be fairly easy to create as the coding is already in place. All the model output maps and charts are generated via GRADS scripts. Anyone on here with a working knowledge of grib files and GRADS could generate their own GFS maps on their home computer, it's not that difficult to do. They could do the same for the ECMWF if they had the grib files.

 

I usually get the Weeklies maps at a different vendor website through my work. What I do want is the 850 mb time-series charts similar to what WSI has (spaghetti plots of 850 mb temps from GFS and from ECMWF with the operational, mean etc). I am working on getting that through Wx Bell. I helped push for the PDX sub-domain soon after subscribing and Ryan had a great turnaround on that, so I am optimistic.

[Gradient Keeper]

00z WRF tonight shows very strong east wind with a crazy 850mb/925mb temp gradient between Portland and The Dalles

850mb: Portland +5c to +7c, The Dalles -6c to -8c

925mb: Portland +3c to +5c, The Dalles -3c to -7c

That’s an extreme inversion if I’ve ever seen one. The gradient looks to be at least 10mb. A peak of 12mb would not surprise me.

 

A solid Wind Advisory or High Wind Warnings are coming if this holds.

50kt Wind Barbs already showing up on the 12km Time Height. YEAH! Talk about a long duration event too! The scary thing is the 4km resolution likely will be 5-10kts stronger usually is. IF this holds with the next 2-3 WRF runs I'd think the NWS will take notice and a solid Wind Advisory east of I-205 G40-50+ if not the slight risk for High Wind Warnings really do not seem out of question, especially when you factor in the strong inversion between PDX/DLS. Real shallow east wind field too below 2500' This could be really huge, IF the GFS/WRF doesn't back off.

http://www.atmos.washington.edu/mm5rt/data/current_extended/images_d2/kpdx.x.th.gif

[bainbridgekid]

6z NAM looks very similar to the 00z NAM and Euro through hour 63.

 

Arctic front hangs up across the North Interior and really bullseyes Bellingham.

 

EDIT: The arctic front interacts with an approaching warm front Sunday night to make for a really moist run all around for Western Washington. Hard to say how much of this would be snow South of Everett though. Probably not much.

 

http://mag.ncep.noaa.gov/data/nam/06/nam_namer_084_precip_p48.gif

[VancouverIslandSouth]

The 6Z NAM seems to be on board with snow for NW WA/SW BC. If this does come to verify then give credit where credit is due, as far as I can tell the GFS was the only model that even entertained this possibility back on Tuesday and it seems to have stuck with it thus far; for Vancouver Island this is about 40 hours out now.

[Gradient Keeper]

Bellingham, 6z NAM: 850mb -6c, 1000/500mb thickness 533, and 850mb thickness 129 is cold enough for Snow(accumulating) in late February? .... well with help from Fraser Outflow maybe.... during the overnight hours. I guess it depends on exactly how cold southern BC gets....

[IbrChris]

Bellingham, 6z NAM: 850mb -6c, 1000/500mb thickness 533, and 850mb thickness 129 is cold enough for Snow(accumulating) in late February? .... well with help from Fraser Outflow maybe.... during the overnight hours. I guess it depends on exactly how cold southern BC gets....

Ya, 850 mb thickness is probably the single best predictor of snow vs rain as far as model output. 129 dam favors snow, 130 dam is about the 50-50 cutoff. A very good measure of the amount of cold air in the boundary layer.

[Gradient Keeper]

Ya, 850 mb thickness is probably the single best predictor of snow vs rain as far as model output. 129 dam favors snow, 130 dam is about the 50-50 cutoff. A very good measure of the amount of cold air in the boundary layer.

Thanks.

[VancouverIslandSouth]

Bellingham, 6z NAM: 850mb -6c, 1000/500mb thickness 533, and 850mb thickness 129 is cold enough for Snow(accumulating) in late February? .... well with help from Fraser Outflow maybe.... during the overnight hours. I guess it depends on exactly how cold southern BC gets....

 

Seems cold enough but to get accumulation precip intensity will probably be key. Seems like this is going to start off as light wet snow melting on impact transitioning into heavier accumulating snow as the low moves southward.

[BLI snowman]

Bellingham, 6z NAM: 850mb -6c, 1000/500mb thickness 533, and 850mb thickness 129 is cold enough for Snow(accumulating) in late February? .... well with help from Fraser Outflow maybe.... during the overnight hours. I guess it depends on exactly how cold southern BC gets....

 

It will be all snow up here, but probably all in the 32-33 range so it'll be rather wet and heavy. The low level air is easily going to be cold enough (925mb temps around -3c).

 

06z NAM looks great up here, ups Bellingham's total to about 6" and really stalls the front. All rain from Everett on south.

[bainbridgekid]

It will be all snow up here, but probably all in the 32-33 range so it'll be rather wet and heavy. The low level air is easily going to be cold enough (925mb temps around -3c).

 

06z NAM looks great up here, ups Bellingham's total to about 6" and really stalls the front. All rain from Everett on south.

Reminds me a bit of the 1/15/2012 storm.

 

Obviously some key differences like this trough is centered significantly further East and there will be more offshore flow this time, but that low definitely seemed to take a similar track slowly down the Coast as this one is progged.

 

Ended up with 9" of 31-33 degree snow with that one here at 300 feet but they only got a few inches downtown at Sea Level. 

 

http://www.meteo.psu.edu/~fxg1/NARR/2012/011512.png

[Weather101]

Reminds me a bit of the 1/15-16/2012 storm.

 

Obviously some key differences like this trough is centered significantly further East, but that low seemed to take a similar track slowly down the Coast as this one is progged to take.

 

http://www.meteo.psu.edu/~fxg1/NARR/2012/011512.png

Hope it actually gets cold enough for snow up here

[BLI snowman]

Reminds me a bit of the 1/15/2012 storm.

 

Obviously some key differences like this trough is centered significantly further East and there will be more offshore flow this time, but that low definitely seemed to take a similar track slowly down the Coast as this one is progged.

 

Ended up with 9" of 31-33 degree snow with that one here at 300 feet but they only got a few inches downtown at Sea Level. 

 

http://www.meteo.psu.edu/~fxg1/NARR/2012/011512.png

 

Yeah, the most key difference is that the south winds won't be buzzing like they were throughout that event, so elevation may not be much of a factor at all. The lower parts of Bellingham have a really tough time cooling when there is any southerly flow present. BLI was around 34 or 35 for most of that storm while it was 32 here.

 

That being said, orographic lift will probably favor the higher locales around here since accumulations will largely depend on precip rates.

[Phil]

I don't know if you are a subscriber, but they already have the ensemble members on the location-based charts and the ECMWF Monthly runs. The Weeklies are more accurately described as the week-averaged values for the monthly run ensemble mean. While these maps aren't currently available, according to Maue they would be fairly easy to create as the coding is already in place. All the model output maps and charts are generated via GRADS scripts. Anyone on here with a working knowledge of grib files and GRADS could generate their own GFS maps on their home computer, it's not that difficult to do. They could do the same for the ECMWF if they had the grib files.

 

I usually get the Weeklies maps at a different vendor website through my work. What I do want is the 850 mb time-series charts similar to what WSI has (spaghetti plots of 850 mb temps from GFS and from ECMWF with the operational, mean etc). I am working on getting that through Wx Bell. I helped push for the PDX sub-domain soon after subscribing and Ryan had a great turnaround on that, so I am optimistic.

Do you get the global interface? I'm subscribed but cannot find that option.

[Brennan]

I really hope it snows this weekend... Duhh, right? Our entire winter is going to boil down to this event. We’ll either be talking about it all spring and summer leading into next fall/winter... Or we’ll be talking about how it hasn’t ******* snowed in Whatcom County since January 2012.

 

[Radarwatcher]

Environment Canada statement this morning suggests 5cm possible at sea level for Metro Van and 10cm for higher elevations... and has it coming in early tomorrow morning for us up north

[catnip]

Environment Canada statement this morning suggests 5cm possible at sea level for Metro Van and 10cm for higher elevations... and has it coming in early tomorrow morning for us up north

 

Ya, looks like it gets going around this time tomorrow.

[westcoastexpat]

It's likely going to come down to nowcasting thru this weekend.

 

For Bellingham, the GEM (which has been the leader all winter) is spitting out ~9 to 10" of snow; however, one issue with the GEM is that, although it seems to be nailing precip types, it sometimes overdoes the QPF

 

NAM suggests 5"

 

GFS is pitiful with a sloppy 2"

 

Euro has done better the past couple days, as the GEM bombed this latest east coast storm (surprisingly). Actually, the Euro has nailed the last couple systems out here even though it has been a joke most of the winter. Euro is showing a solution between the GEM and NAM right now.

 

Interesting to see a northerly event for once. Areas south of Bellingham shouldn't expect anything of substance.

 

Right now I think 3-6" is a reasonable forecast spread for most of Whatcom/Metro Vancouver, with some geographically fortunate folks possibly reaching 8"+ if the right elements come together. Prime lowland areas are going to be just east of Bellingham away from the water and closer to the mountains. Mt Baker is absolutely going to CLEAN UP on this one, whoever said that.

[westcoastexpat]

The ECMWF has out-performed all other models this winter, according to the WxBell stats Ibhchris posted. WxBell gets it straight from the database.

 

Making things up won't change Mother Nature's mind. If anything she'll strap one on and do away with you. Not trying to be a jacka**, but please don't make things up to make yourself feel better. Eventually a bunch of posters will hop on your bus and then wonder what went wrong.

 

Anyone who has tracked storms this winter knows that the ECMWF has been highly inconsistent and has been inferior to the GEM this winter, no question. GEM's issue has been a slight exaggeration in track and QPF, but overall it has nailed precip types very well. Euro has been highly inconsistent from run to run with its tracks all winter (as opposed to its usual consistency in this regard) and has been hit and miss with QPFs (usually a bit too dry). A solution between the Euro and GEM has been the way to go all winter. GFS has been really awful.

 

The Euro has given way to the GEM's solutions closer to events much more than the other way around. GEM has been the track king in the short term this year. Euro as always is much better at pegging LLR pattern shifts, but it has been inconsistent even with this. Euro's main issue has been that the model has undergone a significant amount of "tweaking" this late summer/fall and it has resulted in some shortfalls unfortunately.

[luvssnow_spokane]

Had mixed snow and rain on my drive into work in the kent through Tukwila area this morning about 40 to 50% snow other half rain. This was at sea level.

[snow maniac]

frost in places this morning, windshield all frozen

[VancouverIslandSouth]

The GFS 6Z was somewhat underwhelming, Saturday day looks like a rain/snow mix for low elevations at best even up north, but Sunday would still be solidly snowy. Looks like they have the low sliding a bit further inland, which will warm things up a bit. The 12Z GFS shows something similar, but again Sunday looks snowy.

[TT-SEA]

12Z WRF looks farther north with the low... warmer for Seattle through Sunday morning.

 

Hmmmm... was the ECMWF solution so bad??

[westcoastexpat]

12Z WRF looks farther north with the low... warmer for Seattle through Sunday morning.

 

Hmmmm... was the ECMWF solution so bad??

 

I don't think anyone disputes at this point that Euro > GFS this winter; anyone who does, however, is nuts.

[bainbridgekid]

12Z WRF looks farther north with the low... warmer for Seattle through Sunday morning.

 

Hmmmm... was the ECMWF solution so bad??

The WRF brings a lot more Southerly flow even up to Bellingham.

 

Still says it would be snow but it would be awfully close and it has the bulk of the precip falling during the day Saturday which would make solid accumulations harder to come by.

 

http://www.atmos.washington.edu/mm5rt/data/current_extended/images_d2/slp.33.0000.gif

 

Experience tells us these types of lows are more likely to get hung up and move South more slowly than modeled than the other way around.

[TT-SEA]

I don't think anyone disputes at this point that Euro > GFS this winter; anyone who does, however, is nuts.

 

Jim does.

 

Maybe because the ECMWF has been closer to reality... which has had the Seattle are getting screwed over for much of the winter.   

 

Reality sucks sometimes... should not kill the messenger though!

[westcoastexpat]

Our first winter event in early December was better modeled by the GFS as opposed to the Euro, which threw a lot of people for a loop. Making blanket statements is nuts.

 

I had to double check my calendar and make sure I wasn't crazy.

 

It's February 21st.

 

An event handled nearly 3 months ago means very little after 3 months of GFS incompetence.

 

I recall that the Euro nailed Hurricane Sandy; as a result, the Euro must be the superior model today. Post hoc ergo propter hoc!