Lets take a look..
We are currently under a much colder air mass thanks to a front that moved through over the weekend. This is the result of ridging of high pressure out west (haven't seen much of this yet this winter) seen below...
The image above shows the average pressure pattern over the next 6 to 10 days. Notice this ridge of high pressure wants to stay in place. This a big factor in supporting a wintery pattern for the east. Also notice some red or ridging over Greenland with a nice vortex of cold air in Canada. This will aid in supporting rounds of disturbances and light snow over the next 10 days. The stratospheric warming I have been talking about is definitely influencing the pattern.
Starting off tomorrow, a wave a low pressure approaches from the northwest and brings light snow to the region from late morning through afternoon..
Models vary on accumulations, but I would say a 1-3 inches in in the cards for areas of central NJ northward. I will have more on this tomorrow.
Moving on, things then stay on the chilly side through super bowl weekend. We then really have to turn our attention to a potential winter storm as we head into Sunday and Monday. As always we will have energy in the upper levels of the atmosphere to track and see how it comes together. Below shows the two projected disturbances that can combine..
You can see one diving in from Canada (supported by that ridge out west) and another moving through the plains. We also do have some blocking with a vortex in eastern Canada and some riding over Greenland. This means there is a chance these two pieces of energy combine. The track however can range between inland to just off the coast. At this time models are spread (as usual). The GFS is the most aggressive..
Again this would be valid for Sunday into Monday. I will be tracking this all week so be sure to keep tuning in.
So where to we go from there. Well, there is support the wintery pattern does continue into weeks 3 and 4 but I really would like to see how these storms pan out first. If we end up getting more inland runners that cause rain, it just isn't mean to be. The bottom line though is that there is hope for Winter weather lovers looking at this pattern. Now we just have to see if it delivers.
More tomorrow as I will be back home from Vermont.
Willy, the Tuesday AM models seem to back off on snow for next Monday here in the Jersey 'burbs. GFS looks like a dusting, Euro looks all liquid, as does Canadian. Of course it can and will change as the week progresses. After that, ensembles seem to indicate a continued zonal pattern, cold spells and warm spells, nothing predominant. The telecon forecasts I've seen keep the NAO + thru mid-month, in keeping with the progressive flow. The Pacific, eh, mixed bag, PNA goes + but so does the EPO, maybe. Call it a draw, as it's been most of this season. Now the AO and the polar vortex, that's interesting !! There is an incredible on-going temp spike at 10 mb in the 65-90N zone, and I see the AO telecon forecasts have clearly gone south, AO is supposed to be quite negative by mid-month. But without some strong upper-tropo structures building up over the Pacific and Atlantic to keep a trough in place over the east, things might remain zonal. But even with zonal flow, you could still get some big storms when things come together in the right way, and you might have a longer season to do so if the SSW plays out as you might expect. We could still have shots of freezing air into mid-March, I'd guess. So there could still be some snow shoveling this season, but the crocuses might not be far behind. Just my .02 WXSWAG. Jim G
ReplyDeleteYeah we are in the final stages here. If we got a big storm that would be a big bonus. I agree with the pacific and Atlantic needing more consistent upper tropo structures. This winter pretty much has been a non winter and if it continued that way i don't think anyone would be surprised. But looking back if we get one storm between now and second week of March I would be happy. It just want not in the cards this year. This was a west coast witner
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