PNW February 2022 - Winters Last Stand

[GHweatherChris]

Just now, Phishy Wx said:

CYA in December!!!

shhhh

[Gradient Keeper]

26 minutes ago, SilverFallsAndrew said:

EURO Snow. 

Welcome back, La Nina my long lost friend. Definitely not a foe. NOPE!

18z GFS in 2 hours

[SilverFallsAndrew]

EURO shows low-mid 30s for PDX Tuesday-Thursday next week. Overdone for sure, but maybe a couple sub-40 highs?

[SilverFallsAndrew]

Next Friday is cold too, but it actually warms up a couple degrees before midnight...

[SilverFallsAndrew]

What the EURO is showing for the Willamette Valley would be pretty close to 2011, seems unlikely, but who knows. 

[Gradient Keeper]

I want colder runs ahead. No watering down the trough. Not even a little.

[TT-SEA]

7 minutes ago, SilverFallsAndrew said:

Next Friday is cold too, but it actually warms up a couple degrees before midnight...

This is pretty crazy for late February...

 

[BLI snowman]

6 minutes ago, SilverFallsAndrew said:

What the EURO is showing for the Willamette Valley would be pretty close to 2011, seems unlikely, but who knows. 

Interesting thing about 2011 is that there was really no gorge component with that event. Wound up being a pretty straight northerly outflow event, which still produced highs in the lower 30s for the Portland metro.

[SilverFallsAndrew]

3 minutes ago, BLI snowman said:

Interesting thing about 2011 is that there was really no gorge component with that event. Wound up being a pretty straight northerly outflow event, which still produced highs in the lower 30s for the Portland metro.

2011 was very impressive. Coldest day at SLE was 36/17 on the 26th, which is pretty amazing for late February. What the EURO is showing would be pretty top tier for so late in the season, which is part of why I am skeptical. Obviously it will get chilly though. 

[SilverFallsAndrew]

9 minutes ago, TT-SEA said:

This is pretty crazy for late February...

 

Can someone do me a kindness and perhaps post SLE and EUG?

[Phishy Wx]

12z CFS (lol) going all in

[Phishy Wx]

11 minutes ago, TT-SEA said:

This is pretty crazy for late February...

 

got a KGEG?

[TT-SEA]

As requested... Salem, Eugene, Seattle, Spokane in that order.

 

[SilverFallsAndrew]

4 minutes ago, TT-SEA said:

As requested... Salem, Eugene, Seattle, Spokane in that order.

 

If that 34/17 at SLE verified it would be their coldest day since January 2017. 

[TacomaWaWx]

2 hours ago, BLI snowman said:

Generally anything under 522 is still good enough for lowland snow now. It's just that precip rates become much more important as we get further into sun angle fun season. Which is why stronger onshore flow is actually sometimes better starting about now in terms of driving more snow opportunities in the lowlands.

Yeah, kinda what happened in late February 2018. Precip rates just weren’t good enough and we kept having the bulk of it fall in the mid day hours. Finally did score on the night of the 21st. 

[gusky]

@Christensen87

[Phishy Wx]

17/7 ain't no joke for late Feb.  brrrr

[TacomaWaWx]

4 consecutive sub 40 highs on the euro here…2 days with high temps of 34 and 35. This isn’t close enough to lock in but it’s not fantasy land either. 

[SilverFallsAndrew]

12 minutes ago, Phishy Wx said:

12z CFS (lol) going all in

Wow, yeah it is...

 

[Phishy Wx]

one thing back in december that prevented the bottom from falling out in spokane was cloud cover.  nights are still long could easily approach 0 with a calm clear night.  I suspect the 'moderation' this time will probably be the lack of snow cover

[SilverFallsAndrew]

Wow. CFS showing a MAJOR arctic blast the 2nd week of March.

[TT-SEA]

3 minutes ago, Phishy Wx said:

one thing back in december that prevented the bottom from falling out in spokane was cloud cover.  nights are still long could easily approach 0 with a calm clear night.  I suspect the 'moderation' this time will probably be the lack of snow cover

This is projected snow cover by the 12Z ECMWF next Wednesday morning... not sure how it factors snow cover into the temperature projections.  

[SilverFallsAndrew]

Holy crap, today's 12z CFS is absolutely orgasmic. 

[TT-SEA]

Just now, SilverFallsAndrew said:

Holy crap, today's 12z CFS is absolutely orgasmic. 

So we should expect strong ridging around that time?  

[TacomaWaWx]

46 here currently…the way it’s looking right now we’ve got a decent shot at the least amount of +50 days for a winter since 2016-2017. This winters certainly had some boring stretches but here atleast it hasn’t been warm. 

[SilverFallsAndrew]

2 minutes ago, TT-SEA said:

This is projected snow cover by the 12Z ECMWF next Wednesday morning... not sure how it factors snow cover into the temperature projections.  

Doesn't seem like that's enough snow cover at the lowest elevations to have any impact on temp projections. It's projecting essentially no snow cover at Corvallis, so that might be one to check, to see if it is milder than say EUG where it shows 1" (And where there will likely be 0"). 

[MWG]

Hmm those lows but still into the 40's meh lol

[SilverFallsAndrew]

1 minute ago, TT-SEA said:

So we should expect strong ridging around that time?  

I'm really tired of people dumping on the CFS, it is often a trend setter. It does fluctuate wildly sometimes, but let's not just throw it out. Especially when it shows what we want!

[Phishy Wx]

so the Euro and GEM are both colder than the GFS I think, doesn't the new GFS supposedly have a cold bias?  We may be onto something here with this blast?

[SilverFallsAndrew]

Just checked out the EPS. The operational is pretty much exactly in line with the ensemble mean.

[TT-SEA]

7 minutes ago, SilverFallsAndrew said:

Doesn't seem like that's enough snow cover at the lowest elevations to have any impact on temp projections. It's projecting essentially no snow cover at Corvallis, so that might be one to check, to see if it is milder than say EUG where it shows 1" (And where there will likely be 0"). 

Here is Corvallis...

 

[Cascadia_Wx]

8 minutes ago, SilverFallsAndrew said:

Just checked out the EPS. The operational is pretty much exactly in line with the ensemble mean.

Looking good , I like the wetter bump toward the end too 

[SilverFallsAndrew]

8 minutes ago, TT-SEA said:

Here is Corvallis...

 

So that small amount of snow cover the EURO is showing for some stations may be having a small impact. A 34/17 at SLE just seems extremely unlikely... Like I mentioned earlier, their coldest day in February 2011 was 36/17. Mid-30s with a low in the teens after February 20th is rarified air in the modern era. 

[TT-SEA]

3 minutes ago, SilverFallsAndrew said:

So that small amount of snow cover the EURO is showing for some stations may be having a small impact. A 34/17 at SLE just seems extremely unlikely... Like I mentioned earlier, their coldest day in February 2011 was 36/17. Mid-30s with a low in the teens after February 20th is rarified air in the modern era. 

Also shows very little snow cover at OLM...

[Dave]

21 minutes ago, SilverFallsAndrew said:

Doesn't seem like that's enough snow cover at the lowest elevations to have any impact on temp projections. It's projecting essentially no snow cover at Corvallis, so that might be one to check, to see if it is milder than say EUG where it shows 1" (And where there will likely be 0"). 

Hey now! We have night time down here in Eugene occasionally. It can snow & stick under those rare conditions.

[SilverFallsAndrew]

Record lows next week at SLE:

2/21: 21 (1894)

2/22: 23 (1894)

2/23: 22 (1920)

2/24: 15 (1962)

2/25: 12 (1962)

2/26: 10 (1962)

 

That late 1962 arctic outbreak is kind of the benchmark for the modern era at SLE, They also had a significant snow event heading into that. The 17 on 2/26/2011 is impressive for the fact they had no snow cover. 

[SilverFallsAndrew]

1 minute ago, Dave said:

Hey now! We have night time down here in Eugene occasionally. It can snow & stick under those rare conditions.

The airmass will be cold enough for snow to the valley floor, but I think precip could be an issue...

 

Jim has mentioned 1971 a few times. SLE's all time March low was 3/1/1971 when they hit 12, also snow cover in play with that one. 

[Dave]

1 minute ago, SilverFallsAndrew said:

The airmass will be cold enough for snow to the valley floor, but I think precip could be an issue...

 

That's much better than winter cancel. At least there's one last chance for just about everyone. It's nearly impossible to predict where the sparse moisture will go this far in advance. I'll take it.

[TacomaWaWx]

2 minutes ago, Dave said:

That's much better than winter cancel. At least there's one last chance for just about everyone. It's nearly impossible to predict where the sparse moisture will go this far in advance. I'll take it.

Someone’s gonna score something. 

[Dave]

6 minutes ago, TacomaWaWx said:

Someone’s gonna score something. 

I'm just happy to have an excuse to look at the models and this forum for the first time in weeks. I was fearing my next post would be to comment about forest fires or record heat.