Stuck in the "Dry Slot?"
LIFT THOSE WINTER BLUES WITH YOUR MARYLAND "FLAG IN THE FOOT"
AND BE PART OF OUR 11TH ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATION THIS WEEKEND!
Wundermap Weather Station Obs and Radar as of 7:30 AM EST 1/24
8:24 AM 1/24 - What happened to the snow (and sleet, and freezing rain...??)
You've been caught in the most desolate land in all of forecastdom: Land of the DRY SLOT! Consider if our payback to the weather for being sacked last Sunday morning.
NO, REALLY -- What happened? The system coming north didn't tap the nearby cold as quickly as expected. Given lack of a surface High with this system, there was skepticism about it from the start by some on our team.
- Without the ability to really organize and pull in the colder components to our west, the eastern energy and precip generally separated.
- Two small surface lows formed - one off the Delmarva - one over West Virginia. This shut off the precip in between, dumping you into the Land of the Dry Slot!
- A simpler, non-scientific approach would be to glance out the window, observe little or no winter precip, and say, "Umm, I guess you were wrong??"
SO, WHAT'S NEXT? Snow is still expected this afternoon and early evening, but is not likely to be on the scale first projected.
- Temperatures are running 2-3 degrees above forecasted and the freezing line has moved into southern PA.
- Given what we see in the short range models for Monday and beyond, that is A OK. Today may be one of those reverse surprises, where snow is falling at different times, but it doesn't negatively impact your schedule.
- That said, the second system coming Sunday evening into Monday looks to be coming from the Land of the Big Kahuna. With temperatures for that event heading into the 20s overnight into Monday, the outcome is going to be a lot snowier than today. Dare we use that special word reserved for only "certain storms"? You know, the word starting with "S", with the letters -ignifican- and ending in "T".
LET THE FLAG LIFT YOUR BLUES! This weekend into Monday marks the start of our team's 11th anniversary celebration. We are very excited to formally announce the first ever "Maryland Flag-in-the-Foot" embroidered hoody!. (No worries to all our other Mid-Atlantic brethren... we haven't overlooked you. Those designs will be forthcoming.)
GET ORDER DETAILS AND PRICING TODAY with a simple message to our online store. Just email to store@footsforecast.org You'll get a no pressure message back in a few minutes outlining your options and links to the store page for more information.
Thanks to all our readers for being an integral part of authentic local weather with us these 11 exciting, stormy, powdery years!!
From all of us at the Foot's Forecast Maryland Team!
36 comments:
Dry Slot?! I don't think those words mean what you think they mean! Most places got an inch of rain last night -- nothing dry about it.
Nice to be back in the land of the living! I have been away from anything weather related for almost the last two weeks except what I could snag from my phone due to significant non-recreational obligations they call WORK! It sucks to be a member of the post-industrial proletariat.
As far as winter weather goes we are now after January 20th so it is game time for the next 6 weeks. Looking at some of the next weather makers for our region one thing sticks out and that is I'm not impressed.
Models have been terrible with handling these systems and we have marginal cold with no blocking. What that equals is mixy 1-3 inch events. We have had our share of this and I think we see much the same this week.
I'm not impressed with the Sunday into Monday snow threat but think we could see another 1-3 deal. I'll have a look at the overall picture this afternoon but nothing screams to me yet that this would be a big deal YET. Snowblower is getting bored!
I immediately thought of Army of Darkness with your land of the living comment. There's a certain dreariness to winter when it rains but snow seems to brighten things up. These 1-3" events are at least better than a whole day of rain.
That's odd, Andy. Considering that the NAM, GFS, RGEM all show at least a 3-5" event unfolding, I thought your outlook on the Sunday-Monday storm would be more optimistic. Also the fact that the models are forecasting that we'd actually have some cold come through to push the temps for a lot of the area below freezing before the storm comes is a huge plus. What do you see that's not there?
Nam also gave my area 7 inches of snow and the ground truth was 1.5 inches. Models busted VERY HIGH for this last system. The evolution of this storm is very complicated and there is no real consensus or track, redevelopment, dryslot etc. I am 100% confident in a 1-3 scenario this early. I have no confidence YET in anything above that. Now there is a huge upside possible with this system in that it could produce a moderate snow of 6-8 inches. I honestly have to watch the development of the system and see the evolution before I honk the horn. Monday morning will be snowy, but will it be a moderate snow or another nuisance strung out shot?
Foot's forecast team. Please clarify yor comments about the upcoming clipper system. "Coming from the land of the big Kahuna" and "Significant". Mr. Foot alluded to some things also. We are awaiting clarification because those words I feel, should not be used loosely around powderhounds.The weather has already disappointed us enough.
NWS BALT/WASH:
Long term /Sunday through Friday/...
increased probability of precipitation and modified forecast snowfall amtns for late sun
into Monday. The bulk of the activity still expected during the
overnight hours into the early morning hours/first half of Monday.
However...this looks to be a transitional system like the feature
from a few days ago - only more intense from start to finish. Most
clipper systems move quickly and this will be no exception...but
instead of a direct path to the middle-Atlantic - the upper feature will be
forced southward for a brief deceleration period over the upper Midwest.
While spreading snow showers across the Ohio Valley and waiting for the
other potent northern Atlantic system to move further off the coast...the
feature will make a dive toward the southern Appalachians.
All guidance is in good agreement on this...W/ only slightly varying
differences in the overall intensity and exact track. The Euro
however making a bigger effort for the transitional phase directly
over our area late sun into early Monday. The latest run and even more
recent ones have effectively dissipated the western precipitation to reconvene
it over the eastern half of the area/chespke Bay. The GFS on the other
hand wrings out most of it's precipitation - in this case snow - over the
western half of the area then displaces the forcing off the coast west/
only light/intermittent snows over the eastern half of the area during
the day on Monday. May need to consider winter storm watches for
portions of the area...espec the western sections of the County Warning Area - certainly
the Appalachians and possibly into the shen valley/Blue Ridge if guidance
comes in better agreement west/ qpf/timing/placements.
We could easily dry slot here and see a low end 1-3 event with western MD having a warning for 6 inches plus. It's a fickle set-up that can produce, but I am not ready to say that all the players are on the field. How this system evolves today will give us a better clue.
I agree with Andy 100%. I have been saying almost every new blog that the models are garabage. Even within 24 hrs,this busted too. It makes for weary powderhounds.
Mike,
This is a VERY complicated set-up. Our current storm is evolving and will act as a blocking low for this system changing its evolution. Current EURO is now picking up on this and showing a 6-12 inch snow. There are too many details to give a forecast but we should all know that the storm is now a possible KU based on earlier development and more western track. One more shift a we are all looking at a foot. This is one run of the EURO but if it is correct look out! It is best to watch and wait and that is what I am doing with this one.
CLIPPER-TYPE SYSTEM EVOLVING INTO A NOR'EASTER MON/TUE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
PREFERENCE: UKMET/CANADIAN COMPROMISE
CONFIDENCE: BELOW AVERAGE
THERE IS UNCERTAINTY WITH THIS SYSTEM, WITH SOME OF IT INTRODUCED
BY AN UPSTREAM SHORTWAVE STREAKING NEAR THE GREAT LAKES AND SOME
INTRODUCED BY ITS BURGEONING SIZE OF THE OVERALL SYSTEM AS IT
APPROACHES THE NORTHEAST/NEW ENGLAND. THE 12Z GFS IS THE
STRONGEST/MOST CONSOLIDATED ALOFT. THE 12Z ECMWF USES WHAT
APPEARS TO BE A CONVECTIVE FEEDBACK BULL'S EYE AT 60-66
HOURS/MONDAY NIGHT TO DRAG ITS SURFACE LOW DUE NORTH ONCE IT
EMERGES OFF CAPE HATTERAS, WHICH LOOKS UNREALISTIC. WITH AT LEAST
TWO NOTABLE SHORTWAVES MERGING TO CREATE THIS LARGE SYSTEM, IT
COULD TAKE A WHILE TO CONSOLIDATE ALOFT, IMPLYING THE GFS IS
PROBABLY TOO DEEP ALOFT. THE TREND IN THE ECMWF IS TOWARDS A MORE
SOUTHERLY SYSTEM, WHILE THE ECMWF/GFS/UKMET HAVE TRENDED STRONGER
ALOFT OVER THEIR PAST DAY OR SO OF RUNS, WHICH HAS FORCED A
WESTWARD TREND AT THE SURFACE. WITH THE STRENGTHENING TREND
ALOFT/WESTERLY SURFACE CYCLONE TRACK TREND, THE 00Z GLOBAL
ENSEMBLE GUIDANCE APPEARS TO HAVE LITTLE UTILITY TODAY. A
COMPROMISE OF THE 12Z GFS/12Z ECMWF, CLOSE TO THE 12Z UKMET/12Z
CANADIAN, IS PREFERRED WITH BELOW AVERAGE CONFIDENCE DUE TO THE
LARGE DAY-T0-DAY CHANGES SEEN IN THE DETERMINISTIC GUIDANCE.
There is no doubt now we are tracking a "MAJOR SNOWSTORM" Question is where and how it develops for us. The set-up was and is so complicated that no one knows what will happen. I am not CRAZY enough to guess at this range with this type of system. The purpose of my post is to alert anyone who cares that a double digit snow is possible Monday. The next 24 hours of tracking will be the most interesting we have had here in YEARS!
Manwich Monday for everyone!!!
Winter storm watches going up. Stay tuned!
This type of set up has happened before and it takes almost perfect sitautions to all come together for us here in Maryland. 6-12" is on the table with the northeast coast looking at a possible blizzard. I remember other clippers that have exploded in 6"+ storms for us but again, it must all come together at the right time for us vs. Those to our north get the benefit of the storm reaching the warm ocean, exploding then hitting them.
Thanks Andy, keep us updated.
Ahhh, sweet mysteries of life. So I went to the pantry and in honor of Andy once again moved the "Manwich" to the front. I love dynamic systems!
Thoughts Upon Viewing NWS Forecast Map
I'm always impressed at how the weather strictly adheres to that straight line between Carroll and Baltimore County.
Mooooove over Weather and let Baltimore County have some snow.
Julee- You may indeed get more than CC. This situation is one that the farther east you are maybe better. It's that complicated. The storm needs to transfer energy to the coast, bomb out and slowly hug the coast for us to get slammed with heavy snow. If any of that falls to happen it will be a 3-6". Right now the euro says it will. Gem model from Canada says it moves off and hits NewEngland hard.
Glad something will hit New England hard... Goodness know Greedell won't....
Bring on the snooooooooow!!
I hope this thing bombs out I want to break out the old yard stick and measure atleast once this season with it.
This storm is coming together nicely and trending further south with its development. It would behave more like a Miller A than a Miller B for this area if that is the case. I like the idea of 6-12 for the Baltimore Metro area and up to 16 for Cecil County points north east. This is assuming that the storm develops. We are tracking the largest storm threat in a couple years. Late night tonight? You bet!
Whoa. I live here in West Baltimore. Should I be panicking and hitting the grocery and liquor store Right Now. 6-12 inches is worthy of such a panic. This better be straight.
I just happened to go shopping today anyway...though we baught mostly wine.
Evening greetings all! We have another update in progress but it won't be posted until later tonight with a snowfall map projection Sunday morning. Thanks for your patience!
Mike ... I can deal with a slow hug.
Looking at other forecasts now. Not believing in a bomb for Bmore.
Julee.....Me too.
This looks like a jumping the energy storm to me, and the Baltimore/Washington area could be the area jumped.
If that low pops of the Sc Ga coast you are going to see some fireworks in the Baltimore area.
Andy- 330 update discussion NWS seemed less bullish.
Hey Mr. Foot. We are jonesing for your teams update !!
Models continue to trend higher with qpf. Gonna be a long night! 21z sref continue to head toward the Euro. I give the gfs more weight with northern stream systems but once you jump to coastal redevelopment the Euro does better. The next 5 hours will give us a clue. If the Euro is correct exciting times ahead, trends are heading that way.
So is it fair to say, DC and Southern, MD will be "annoyed" with 1 to 2 inches?
I love weather. So unpredictable. We live in such a dynamic area that it keeps you on your toes. If you're superstitious, wear those pjs inside out. If not, keep focused on the reports. I'll see what the consensus is in the morning. Good night all.
I love weather. So unpredictable. We live in such a dynamic area that it keeps you on your toes. If you're superstitious, wear those pjs inside out. If not, keep focused on the reports. I'll see what the consensus is in the morning. Good night all.
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