Re: Winter 2011/2012 Pattern Discussion

by **Stovepipe** 2011-12-20, 12:56 pm

snowdog wrote:Hope everyone is ready for spring. After Xmas it looks like spring officially kicks off. To heck with Winter 2012. I think the Mayan calendar not only predicted the end of the world in 2012 but also the end of winter in North America in 2012. There is not one shred of evidence to hang your hat on right now if you are hoping for a turnaround. Fugly.

Winter 2011/2012 Pattern Discussion - Page 9 Lolwut

What shred of evidence do you have that winter is over? I hope you aren't basing your prediction on the ultra reliable long range forecasts of the GFS. Because that would just be silly considering it's track record recently. It's still finding and losing storms daily for the Christmas time frame for crying out loud. We are seeing two to three systems PER WEEK roll through the area. Odds are one of them is going to get hung up in some cold air before long, regardless of what "pattern" we are in. It was still December last time I checked.

Again for good measure:

Winter 2011/2012 Pattern Discussion - Page 9 Wutlolski

Winter 2011/2012 Pattern Discussion - Page 9 Wutlolski

by **snowdog** 2011-12-20, 1:47 pm

LOL. My post was more tongue and cheek than serious.

by **jmundie** 2011-12-20, 3:03 pm

The Euro is really close to being a decent storm for most of TN. Its not quite wound up enough, and just a tad warm. The euro actually has some snowfall down toward dallas, into southern arkansas, then nothing until west virginia and then a big snowstorm for the northeast.

Basically, we're gonna be watching this one up until it happens it seems. Modeling is beyond horrible.

by **Toot** 2011-12-20, 6:48 pm

snowdog wrote:Hope everyone is ready for spring. After Xmas it looks like spring officially kicks off. To heck with Winter 2012. I think the Mayan calendar not only predicted the end of the world in 2012 but also the end of winter in North America in 2012. There is not one shred of evidence to hang your hat on right now if you are hoping for a turnaround. Fugly.

First time I've used the roll eyes smiley on this forum Rolling Eyes

by **tennessee storm09** 2011-12-20, 8:34 pm

snowdog wrote:Hope everyone is ready for spring. After Xmas it looks like spring officially kicks off. To heck with Winter 2012. I think the Mayan calendar not only predicted the end of the world in 2012 but also the end of winter in North America in 2012. There is not one shred of evidence to hang your hat on right now if you are hoping for a turnaround. Fugly.

i am not ready to throw the towel in by no means, but i am worried about this long range pattern... and im not basing this off any gfs models either... but if this is the case about this winter not going to pan out, yes bring me the spring severe weather early... i think we are heading into a explosive late winter early spring severe season.. i will be updating more on the severe aspect in my playhouse toot made for me. rock on

by **Toot** 2011-12-20, 8:57 pm

While there are still no signs of high lattitude blocking visible in the near future... it looks like there will be a northern hemispheric pattern change in the extended. The PV feature that was locked in over the Greenland area looks to move over towards Siberia and another PV feature moves in more around the Alaska area.

No big changes in the "here today gone tomorrow" weather pattern locally.... but thats not to say we cant get winter weather because we can..there's just not going to be ANY weather pattern that locks in here (cold or warm) without some sort of high lattitude blocking. You end up getting a trough and then a ridge and a trough and then a ridge etc etc etc etc etc whistle

The PV feature moving out of the Greenland area is a step in the right direction though...NAO blocking would have been hard pressed to form in close vicinity to such a powerful vortex of lower heights

by **snowdog** 2011-12-21, 8:23 am

I will say the ensembles look colder in the long range than does the OP. For what it's worth.

by **Adam2014** 2011-12-21, 8:33 am

For what it is worth, the EURO is trying to get the Pacific Firehose look through hour 180.

by **Adam2014** 2011-12-21, 8:34 am

The Euro was a piece of crap too.

by **snowdog** 2011-12-21, 8:49 am

Adam2014 wrote:For what it is worth, the EURO is trying to get the Pacific Firehose look through hour 180.

A strong -PDO usually favors just that, along with a -PNA.

by **Adam2014** 2011-12-21, 9:47 am

snowdog wrote:
Adam2014 wrote:For what it is worth, the EURO is trying to get the Pacific Firehose look through hour 180.

A strong -PDO usually favors just that, along with a -PNA.

Well it looks good.

by **Stovepipe** 2011-12-21, 1:29 pm

by **Toot** 2011-12-21, 4:58 pm

lol@stiove...on another note...If im reading the models correctly...there looks to be a more substancial shot of cold air near the new year and some indices would lead me to believe that there will also be a fairly signifigant storm system during this timeframe too. A few models are even developing a slightly negative NAO from a highly positive phase which is a pretty large swing.

by **Toot** 2011-12-22, 7:38 am

Gfs ensembles are now consistently developing slight NAO region blocking from New Years on out to 384hrs.... now just to get it locked in hurry

Winter 2011/2012 Pattern Discussion - Page 9 141pen5

by **jmundie** 2011-12-22, 7:47 am

You guys noticed the ensemble agreement around 10 days some a moisture rich bowling ball ull coming down the plains into the southeast. It's been showing up in the ensembles pretty consistently for the last couple days.

by **Toot** 2011-12-22, 7:50 am

Another look at forcasted ensemble mean High lattitude blocking

Winter 2011/2012 Pattern Discussion - Page 9 2hppuhh

Winter 2011/2012 Pattern Discussion - Page 9 REGION_DESIGNATIONS_FOR_BLOCKING

by **snowdog** 2011-12-22, 8:46 am

Just to give Toot's map (High Latitude Blocking) a little more explanation...

PNA is measured by basically taking a weighted differential of heights at the 500 mb level from the areas I have marked below. Using the Wallace/Gutzler equation.

Winter 2011/2012 Pattern Discussion - Page 9 Pna_lo10

NAO is measured by taking the SLP (Sea Level Pressure) difference between the points in the map below. For our purposes here in the southeast we would want more of a west based NAO so we would want the height anomaly around the southern tip of Greenland.

Winter 2011/2012 Pattern Discussion - Page 9 Nao_lo10

by **Stovepipe** 2011-12-22, 1:39 pm

Robert regarding 12z GFS:

I see some hope in that run. First, there's no sign to digging southwest Cutoffs. As long as they don't reappear, then we should avoid days like today, with strong southwest flow and well above normal warmth. Instead , it remains mostly zonal, with stratified temps and maybe temps holding a smidge above normal most days around here. Then in about a week, it develops briefly negative NAO and maybe blocking just north of Greenland, but there's not a huge sign of that. But the other big news is that it wants to carve out Eastern Trough at times. Thats the alarm bell right there..because without the pesky southwest lows, we'll open the door for the Arctic (or atleast colder air) to move more in our direction instead of the Rockies and western Plains thats been going on for so long now. And I have little doubt at all that one (or several) of the shortwaves will indeed amp up for us, and carve out more major systems, but the only question or doubt in my mind is where they do it. If its the Southwest or southern Rockies again, we'll keep repeating what we have. If its further east...Oh boy! could get fun. Just look how often the west has gone between warmth, then a low hits from the right direction and snow resulted. Same for Tenn. Valley earlier. But I'm not sold on where just yet. ...just a couple good possible signs I'm seeing as we enter January.

by **Toot** 2011-12-22, 4:19 pm

jmundie wrote:You guys noticed the ensemble agreement around 10 days some a moisture rich bowling ball ull coming down the plains into the southeast. It's been showing up in the ensembles pretty consistently for the last couple days.

Yep...not sure exactly how this system will play out but im really wanting to jump on board this timeframe for the first widespread wintry event here in TN...im gonna set back and watch models for a few more days but it appears that this will be a more legit threat...with alot of indices forcasted to become favorable. I just cant believe all those forecasters have changed their whole winter forecast for nothing more than a relatively warm December evl

by **Stovepipe** 2011-12-22, 9:05 pm

Gotta love some hour 300+ fantasy land.

Winter 2011/2012 Pattern Discussion - Page 9 Gfs_namer_312_850_temp_mslp_precip

Also, man that is a serious low approaching Alaska at 276. Is that 12 contours I count?

Winter 2011/2012 Pattern Discussion - Page 9 Gfs_namer_276_850_temp_mslp_precip

Winter 2011/2012 Pattern Discussion - Page 9 Gfs_namer_276_850_temp_mslp_precip

by **Toot** 2011-12-23, 1:12 am

0z ensembles still very bullish with the NAO block and a PNA ridge resulting in persitent troughiness from New years into the extended as far as the eye can see.

Here is the mean centered over North America
Dec 31
Winter 2011/2012 Pattern Discussion - Page 9 00zGFSEnsembles500mbHeightAnomalyNA240

Winter 2011/2012 Pattern Discussion - Page 9 00zGFSEnsembles500mbHeightAnomalyNA240

Jan 2

Winter 2011/2012 Pattern Discussion - Page 9 00zGFSEnsembles500mbHeightAnomalyNA192

Jan 5

Winter 2011/2012 Pattern Discussion - Page 9 00zGFSEnsembles500mbHeightAnomalyNA324

Jan 8

Winter 2011/2012 Pattern Discussion - Page 9 00zGFSEnsembles500mbHeightAnomalyNA384

Fun Times look to be ahead evl

by Guest 2011-12-23, 6:49 am

Todd Howell did say the pattern changer will be late this month or early Jan, last night during his forecast

by **jmundie** 2011-12-23, 10:06 am

The ensembles are all over an event of note somewhere in the 180-216 timeframe. I'm surprised not much is showing up on the op. The storms aren't digging on the op, instead, they are moving way to progressively through new england (which has been our problem all winter with the positive nao)

I'm with you Toot... I'm not ready to call for a new years storm, but that's certainly a time period that bears watching

by **Toot** 2011-12-23, 10:37 am

jmundie wrote:The ensembles are all over an event of note somewhere in the 180-216 timeframe. I'm surprised not much is showing up on the op. The storms aren't digging on the op, instead, they are moving way to progressively through new england (which has been our problem all winter with the positive nao)

I'm with you Toot... I'm not ready to call for a new years storm, but that's certainly a time period that bears watching

Yep...this could be the first really powerful ULL that in addition to making its own cold air will also be surrounded with decent amounts of cold air Foothills ( AKA Robert Gamble at Amercian wx) has been all over that scenario and im really starting to bite onto his idea...Just Saying

Not sure though...as there will have to be a very powerful cold front around this timeframe if the gfs ensembles are correct with their pattern change and they dont seem to be backing down from their idea anytime soon evl

by **Stovepipe** 2011-12-23, 11:05 am

I'm trying to read the stratospheric warming thread but I keep running out of popcorn. Fascinating stuff and it does appear that change is on the horizon.

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