Thursday, January 5, 2012

StormWatch- The Next 16 Days

January 10-15
A disturbance coming off of the Alaskan Low regime in Alaska looks to come southward and rapidly deepen when it hits the Great Lakes. Seeing as how it is coming from Alaska would indicate that the Alaskan Low may be weakening. Another thing to watch for this storm is how cold it may be. Because it is coming from Alaska, it can be expected that cold temperatures will be present as the system moves southward. What you see on the left are the 6z GFS Ensembles at hour 180- January 12. We extended the dates to provide the days for when the storm affects the North Plains and eventually the Eastern Great Lakes. Something interesting is how all of the ensembles are showing this, which greatly raises my confidence level. So here's my prediction for this storm.
Up to 10 inches in the Upper Great Lakes. Rain for the Mid-Atlantic and far eastern Ohio Valley. Blizzard conditions possible in Wisconsin and parts of Minnesota. Depending on the rate at which the storm rapidly strengthens, accumulations may exceed 12 inches.

January 16-20
Some GFS Ensembles are showing a storm system forming across the US. There is some indication that the Eastern Half of the US. I would not be surprised with this storm formation, as the persistent ridges interrupting the Polar Vortex would be pushing small parts of the Alaskan Low out into the Pacific or Canada to affect the US. Those ensembles are on the left at hour 324- January 18. In case you don't know, the storms are in the blue. If there are deeper shades of blue, or even pink, that indicates a stronger low pressure system. My confidence level is too low to forecast for this storm.

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

For the first storm how much rain/snow are you expecting for Chicago IL? Are we in that 10 inch zone that you spoke of?

Anonymous said...

Hey Andrew, I am on your blog page all the time. Love the good reads and forecasting you do. My local weather guy is saying no winter outbreak in the forecast until at least end of January? I live in the Great lakes of Ohio.

Mike Paulocsak said...

Hello Andrew.Would my area in Ohio recieve rain or snow from this system?Holmes county Ohio.

Mike Paulocsak said...

Hello Andrew.What location would you put the far eastern ohio valley in?

Aran Jacobs said...

The 16-20 snowstorm might just be the cutoff storm I was talking about.When do you think you will be able to confirm your confidence level on the 16-20 storm?

Andrew said...

Anonymous: it is possible Chicago may be affected.

Anonymous #2: thank you for the kind words. I believe mid January into late january will be the pattern switch.

Mike: your area might get rain.

Aran: I will. Confirm my confidence in a few days.

Mike Paulocsak said...

Hello Andrew.This goes with the 16-20 timeframe storm.Would this bring rain or snow to Ohio?

Mike Paulocsak said...

Hello Andrew.I just checked the ECMWF model and it indicates an -NAO after the 10-day period.Do you think this could be the start of the pattern change or not?

eddie said...

would detroit get a decent amount of snow from this

Andrew said...

Mike: I believe the NAO is adjusting accordingly with the pattern change.

Eddie: Possibly. Details still have to be ironed out.

Mike Paulocsak said...

Hello Andrew.This Ronnie Babbit is a very rude individual on Facebook.He's just trying to get undeer your skin and irritate you.Like i said before,i personally believe you strive your best to deliver accurate forecasts day in and day out.