Feb 11 2013

Is it D.Cs Turn?

While a historic blizzard wiped out NYC-NE, could another major snowstorm be on the horizon in two days? Its seems very possible, but this time a disturbance will bring snow from the Texas panhandle to Jersey coast. This thing can really get going and bring 3-6 locally more to the places mentioned. And if you miss out on that one the GFS sees a Sunday Snowstorm that can bring a foot or more to place like D.C,Phil and Central Jersey. At this time New york will not be the best area for snow for both Events but can still see accumulations up to 4inches from either event. So with that there is still a lot of winter to go and i might just go out with a good thumping. Stay Tuned as we will keep you updated on both events.

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Jason Shaulov

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Armando

February 25, 2013 at 10:41 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment

Yea Eric is was very informative! Also speaking m of posts, are you making a new one or will be making one in the near future? It’s quite around here without dante and jason. Not sure, but they must be busy. So anyway whats your thoughts for later this week? I hope the models are just trying to “see” the blocking and strong NAO. I mean we are in the perfect pattern with PNA positive and NAO deeply tanking finally so where the heck is the nor’easters lol! Joe hasn’t given up either nor joe d’aleo so i’m anxious to see how it will play out. For next week is another topic, and models are just playing their games so i’m not too much worried about that. Thanks as always!
Eric

February 25, 2013 at 11:06 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment

@ Armando
Yeah, even I am somewhat baffled by the lack of model support for at least something near the east coast under this pattern, very interesting considering we have a strongly positive PNA from the tanking 30 day sunspot cycles and the -NAO, partially due to the MJO earlier this month (and sunspot cycles even play a role in that as well), of course I did take note of a few of the analogs in the 6-10 day range that did suck for the northeast, in comparison to the great analogs of 1978, 1999, and 2010′s “snowmaggedon”. Just think it will be a wait and see to find out how the models respond to the increased blocking as they should begin to slow down the overall pattern some in response and lead to a sharper and more negatively tilted trough, that would in my opinion be farther west than they currently indicate. Plus, you brought up an extremely good point (very glad you did so) about ULLs and how this is usually one of the prime suspects into cases as to why model forecasts bust, and with models naturally having trouble with these features, there is reason to believe that these model forecasts may be due to drastically change soon, but we’ll see about that. Regardless, it is a good pattern, and of course as I has warned before, the severe weather season is beginning to show itself over Dixie Alley once again, and it is only a matter of time before it works northward, eventually into the northeast, (of course that’s a long ways from now)
Eric

February 25, 2013 at 11:07 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment

Here’s something I said on weatherbell, though I would add it here, kind of solidifying and reiterating some of my main points about the sun, magnetic fields, volcanic activity and climate. When I looked at the major volcanic eruptions and the sunspot cycles it just clicks, especially when you look at it over certain periods of time, great example being from about 1880-1920, during a period of relatively lower solar activity between the increased activity following the Dalton minimum of the early 1800s (which I think is linked to the Mt. Tambora eruption and a “Year Without a Summer” in 1816) and the increase in activity during the 20th century. Then from 1920-1960, volcanic activity took a huge plunge, perhaps being able to offer a viable explanation for the “Dust Bowl” and all of the US heat records during the 1930s at the exact same time solar activity was dramatically increasing in intensity, all the way up until about 1960, when activity peaked, and although activity just after 1960 it was higher than it was during the 1930s and 40s where sunspot activity was lower, volcanic activity of the 1970s and 1980s was still higher. This suggests that solar activity with influences on the sun’s magnetic field effecting earth’s magnetic field is NOT linear. More or less, it appears to be comparative to the surrounding time period and the surrounding solar cycles in which a specified period of solar activity occurs, which would only further support my theory that it is comparative changes in the sun’s magnetic field (the largest and most influential in the solar system) that force changes in the planetary bodies’ magnetic fields, and with decreasing solar activity that is associated with a weaker magnetic field, this forces the influence of the sun’s magnetic field to contract, and in response to this, earth’s magnetic influence would have an opportunity to expand, and considering that expansion of a substance, air, etc.. is indicative of higher amounts of energy, in which molecules move more freely, (warming), this would put the focus of this warming towards earth’s inner core (primary driver of the magnetic field), and with expansion of this layer, this would not only warm it, but also would put more pressure and heat onto the mantle and layers of earth above. A many of you know about increased heat and pressure from underneath in association with tectonic plates for example, subduction zones where oceanic plate slides under the continental, forming vast volcanic mountain ranges, this increased pressure would essentially like in the case of subduction zones increase the pressure of the earth layers above and the chances for major volcanic eruptions. In which, the ash from these eruptions, once they have reached the tropopause and into the stratosphere, are free to roam about throughout earth’s atmosphere, block incoming solar radiation, (which may already be low due to lower than normal volcanic activity), thus having a net cooling effect on the climate, and considering that the PDO is cold, the AMO will turn cold within a decade, and the sunspot cycles will only decrease from here, and knowing now that the sunspot cycles may have just what it takes to bring the final of the “big three” drivers of the climate into cold mode, perhaps a much colder period than anyone anticipated is upon us.”
Armando

February 25, 2013 at 11:30 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment

Wow so much info and i’ve learned a few things from that so thanks! Ok so I understand what you’re saying about how these ULL’s can be tricky and how a model could be a bust so something to watch out for. I just watched a video from accuweather, and this met named Bernie Rayno(excellent intelligent met who knows what he’s talking about) who explained about the ULL this week and what it could possibly do. Now both he and you said the same exact thing how these are tricky and models can’t be trusted to it could be suspicious. It seems i’m right on border of 2″ line with wed night storm so i’ll keep an eye out. Ok so i see your last statement that
Armando

February 25, 2013 at 11:33 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment

My bad i published it by accident: i see in your last statement that we could be in for even a more prolonged period of cold weather. Thats the question, how long will we be in this pattern for? Will march overall be below normal? Joe b did say “back to back below normal months” so i suppose winter wants to stay longer, but just how much longer? Will that “snap” occur later than anticipated? Thanks eric, have a good week!
Reid

February 26, 2013 at 2:10 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment

Eric, great write up. At what point would you say the models will catch onto this possible snowstorm for the east coast this weekend or should I say at what point do we need to get worried that it wont happen? BTW I live in the central part of SC so I’m not overly excited that this will happen for us here.
Rod Houston

February 26, 2013 at 5:09 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment

So Eric could future winters be colder than the winters of the Late 70s?Does the low sunspot activity cause major earth quakes?It looks like we could be seeing a lot of earth quakes in the next several years if the low sunspots is correct.
Mike D

February 26, 2013 at 8:07 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment

Armando, any snow by you? I’m just getting rain.
Derickeugeneree

February 27, 2013 at 4:00 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment

Eric why should the east coast be causes for march 5-15th what joe bastardi tweeted?
Tim Johnson

February 27, 2013 at 4:56 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment

I readied someone from AccuWeather and he said that CO2 will warm the temperatures a lot and decrease snowfall for the whole US outside of Alaska. With the biggest decrease in the East U.S and the West coast as well.. Could we be heading toward much warm weather in the next 70 years with no snow at all due to CO2?
Eric

February 27, 2013 at 6:54 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment

@ Armando
There’s still a lot of uncertainty precisely when this pattern would break, but perhaps, somewhat similar to how this winter started and how this cold pattern evolved towards the 2nd half of winter, the progression towards spring may be slow and steady in nature, at least for the next several weeks, and as long as the 30 day sunspot cycles continue to remain low, the PNA is going to continue to stay positive and keep heights low over the eastern US. Also, low sunspot cycle activity does have some linkage to the NAO as well, as it forces the natural positioning of the subtropical ridge farther to the north and weaker, thus allowing for blocking to build towards Greenland, and heights to crash towards the Azores, and according to the this very interesting paper I came across, the MJO going towards octants 6 and 7 surprisingly has a tendency to result in NAOs, a concept I’m still trying to digest. (link) http://www.cerfacs.fr/globc/links/presentation/Sieste_cassou_2008.pdf Combined with the fact that since the Atlantic MDR is warm, due in part to the low deep tropical Atlantic hurricane activity last year and the -NAO helping to lower the northeast trade winds, which causes less stirring of the tropical waters, thus allows them to warm significantly. Over time under ENSO neutral conditions where there limited temperature gradient causes the MJO to propagate throughout each octant of the MJO more freely, and with the MJO currently on the opposite side of the globe and considering it takes about 40-60 days on average foe the MJO to move through the entire global tropics, we may have to continue to deal with colder than normal conditions throughout much of March, as it would be about another 3-4 weeks or so (based off of the MJO’s natural propagation before it enters the cold Atlantic octants 1-3, of course there’s also concern given that the NAO is the #1 oscillation from mid Feb to mid April that as the MJO enters octant 3, which according to the article link I posted, favors a +NAO, that conditions may try to warm back up over the US, of course this may not occur for quite some time. Of course, as the cold hangs around longer, with a healthy snowpack over the US helping to keep the arctic air to the north well entrenched, while with a warm Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic to the south and east from the warm AMO, helps to establish a viable build up in the amount of warm air, and of course the 400 millibar temperatures from AMSU are very concerning as we are currently very close to 2008 and 2011 in terms of temperatures at that level, which both turned out to be very active tornado seasons, and if the cold hangs around longer than anticipated with a major clash between the warm AMO induced Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic to the south and east, then tornadoes, not snow will be the biggest concern, especially for areas farther south towards Dixie, Carolina, and the southern part of the traditional Tornado Alley.
Eric

February 27, 2013 at 7:02 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment

@ Reid
Models are going to struggle with this system until the last minute as we are dealing with an upper level low that will be initiating most of the snow across the southeastern US, or whatever is left of it, and as I mentioned above an referenced in many of the links I posted, upper level lows are hard for the computer models to handle because they are hard to initialize considering they originate aloft, not at the surface where significant surface observation is available to be input as vital data that helps in computer model forecasts. Also, upper level lows do not operate by the same atmospheric processes as lower level low pressure systems and tend to be somewhat variable in nature, and these systems are usually one of the, if not the main cause of many busted weather forecasts. There is a lot of uncertainty with this system at this point in time, thus you shouldn’t be concerned about unsupportive forecasts or model resolutions showing no snow, because these kinds of situations are particularly tricky to forecast, similar to determining the intensity, location and progression of cold air wedges in the Carolinas and the mid-atlantic on the east side of the Appalachians which are also very tricky situations to forecast.
Eric

February 27, 2013 at 7:18 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment

@ Rod Houston
Well, that remains to be seen, but we should at least see winters in the future become at least comparable to the winters of the late 1970s and 1960s as we begin to establish similarities in the overall state and pattern of the PDO and AMO, as both should simultaneously become cold towards the end of the decade or even into the 2020s. However, earthquakes themselves do not precisely correlate with low ends of the sunspot cycles, although the extremely devastating New Madrid series of earthquakes over the midwest occurred in 1811 and 1812, at the same period of time as the Mt. Tambora eruption and the Dalton Minimum in the sunspot cycles. The 1960s were especially active for major earthquakes across the globe, with many of the greatest earthquakes including the strongest recorded earthquake of all-time in Chile in 1960, at the exact same time period in which the sunspot cycles reached a maximum, of course I did notice a peculiar correlation with the strongest earthquakes since 1900 and the PDO. (link to earthquakes) http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/world/10_largest_world.php , where in the 1950s and 1960s, when the PDO was turning cold, the number and occurrence of these strongest earthquakes increased, then there was a considerable lull during the warm PDO of the 1980s and 1990s, then after the peak of the warm PDO in the late 1990s, strong earthquakes returned again in the 2000s and into the present, thus there seems to be some sort of mechanism between the cooling of the PDO and strong earthquakes, although a lot more research will be required to fully understand and comprehend the relationship and processes involved.
Eric

February 27, 2013 at 7:39 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment

@ Tim Johnson
But, didn’t those same people (the AGW supporters in general) claim snow was a thing of the past yet the 2009-10 and 2010-11 winters were some of the coldest and snowiest since the 1960s and 1970s. Not only that, but how can CO2 a change in CO2 by humans, which is on the order of 3-5% of the annual contribution to Co2, with the other nearly 95-97% because of natural causes. Of course this is 3-5% of the CO2 annually, which changes only a few parts per million or so per year, thus when taken into account we are contributing 3-5% of those few parts per million. Plus, CO2 makes up about 4 one-hundreths of ONE percent of the atmosphere, so the human contribution even to that are minimal alone, but of course water vapor is about 400X more abundant than CO2 in the atmosphere, and considering water has one of the highest heat capacities of any natural substance known, this makes carbon dioxide from the 3-5% of human emissions in the overall CO2 in the atmosphere look very minute. Of course, this is only on the scale of the atmosphere, we haven’t even started talking about the oceans which make up 71% of earth’s surface and have 1000x the energy capacity of the atmosphere per unit, thus you can take whatever minute effect is noticeable from CO2 and divide that by 1000x. Then you have to take into account that the sun gives earth well over 99.99% (you get the point) of its energy, changes, even very small ones in the output of the Sun have large effects in the overall energy budget of the earth, of which oceans have 1000x the energy capacity of the atmosphere, with greenhouse gases in the atmosphere somewhat dwarfed by the oceans in this aspect, with CO2 only a very minute contributor to the overall greenhouse effect as water vapor is 400x more abundant and has a significantly higher heat capacity than CO2. I explained how even very small changes in the sun’s energy output to earth (measured by TSI) have large effects on earth and in the longer ranges, effects on climate.Now, over longer periods of time, the sun has even larger roles on other factors in the pattern like the NAO, and to better understand this, you need to understand how the sun operates. The sun itself is a giant ball of burning gas several thousands of degrees celsius, and supplies over 99% of earth’s energy and contains over 95% of the all of the mass in the solar system, so it is obvious that changes in the sun also will have dramatic changes here on earth. One of the main measurements used to study solar activity and the energy output of the sun onto earth is Total Solar Irradiance (TSI). This essentially is a measurement of the amount of radiant electromagnetic energy across the ultraviolet, visible, and infrared radiation spectrums that falls on one square meter outside of earth’s atmosphere every second, measured in watts. The average amount of TSi (solar constant) is 1,367 watts per square meter, and this energy output varies about .1% over the course of the 11 year sunspot cycle (overall is a 22 year cycle because this is the amount of time it usually takes for the sun’s magnetic field to flip twice back to the way it was before), although this may not sound like much, think about just a .1% change in the amount of energy outside earth’s atmosphere, which is denoted as the edge of the exosphere which can expand and contract from as much as 1,000 to 10,000 miles based on contact with solar storms, so for this purpose, I’ll use the median value of 5,000 miles in either direction from earth’s surface.” So, when you calculate the energy change over the surface on the outside of earth’s atmosphere, using a base value of 5,000 miles from the surface in either direction, and a .1% change in energy from 1,367 watts (since 1,367 watts is average energy, .1% reduction or increase from that, so you multiply 1367 watts by .1%=136.7 watts. Earth’s mean radius of 3,960 miles + 5000 miles gives you radius of the outside of the atmosphere at 8,960 miles. From here use surface area of a sphere (4(pi) r^2) and you should generally get 1,008,848,339 miles convert to meters and then multiply by number of watts received per square meter to get total energy input, then take that number and subtract from other value with a lower or higher watts value (136.7 watts more or less), and you multiply that value by a factor of 2 to get total change in energy from peak to minimum, you get a change in energy of around 450,000,000 watts or so, which is staggering.
“One of the main contributors to this energy received to earth is through sunspots which can alter the luminosity and energy output of the sun. Sunspots are essentially formed because the sun’s upper layers rotate faster towards the equator than at the poles. This helps to concentrate the sun’s magnetic field and stretch it out in other areas, and once this altered magnetic field comes into the photosphere (the visible layer of the sun to the human eye) then, sunspots are formed and these sunspots can last for up to 200 days or so.”

In considering the information above, I seriously challenge you to do some research for yourself on this topic and look very closely at both sides of the argument, but of course you know exactly where I stand on this as I see it as complete nonsense and fraud, but just based off of what I have gathered over my many years of research on this.
armando

February 27, 2013 at 8:21 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment

First of all tim, that is the most complete nonsense. We all have our opinions, but logically if you think about it, why would CO2 affect the weather when it makes up not even 1%? Anyway Eric i’m impressed that you know so much about this, and their are so many liberals out their with outrageous comments about “going green” and global warming, which I can’t even get started on because it makes me go nuts. Anyway lol Eric going back to weather I see the euro bombs out something mid week next week which gave me lots of hope and plus we will be in a favorable pattern by then so it has HIGh potential. The GFS is of course shearing the energy and being too progressive so nothing to worry about. I mean we do have everything in place so like what are the reasons this storm won’t happen right? time will tell, and anyway today I checked andrew’s new post about March. Now all i can tell you that he thinks like everyone else that march will below normal and as we near march’s end, it will warm up right away. The thing that doesn’t make sense that he was explaining all about the teleconnections and one thing that surprised me was that he mentioned the -NAO will be strong throughout march and as well as the –AO. The part that didn’t make sense was he said the PNA going into march will be negative? How could that be when the sunspot cycles are so low? That can’t be true unless their is something I’m missing, but I doubt it. I suggest you read his march outlook and tell me what you think. Anyway the next few weeks are exciting for us finally with a possible threat next week then the time period between the 8th and 15th so lots of winter ahead of us.
Eric

February 27, 2013 at 9:33 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment

@ Armando
Lol, you and me are in the exact same boat as far as that issue goes, but again, I hopefully will have a post on that sometime (probably towards summer break) where I can have several weeks at a time of peace where I can go through and analyze everything to make a “Super Post” (yeah, these posts now would be absolutely nothing compared to what I could unleash in that post on AGW), and of course I’ll have to do very extensive research and go through and read, understand, and be able to analyze the information within a stack of papers sitting on my desk over 6 inches high, the hundreds of pictures and graphics I will be building up (many of which are already piling up on my computer, and I have begun to notice already a reduction in my computer’s speed due to the vast storage of pictures I have on it now, lol, just going to need to organize and arrange them sometime so I can have a better idea of what I’m dealing with. So essentially a post like that would take several weeks, IMO to complete, but that’s a long ways from now, and of course who knows if I’ll actually have enough time to complete it. Of course conditions will be in our favor for a system to develop near the east coast, of course I did read Andrew’s March outlook, and yes I do not understand at all where he somehow thinks the PNA will push into negative territory when the 30 day sunspot cycles are absolutely in the tank and show no signs of coming to life (not a good thing on the front that we are supposed to be in the peak of a sunspot cycle, yet the sun is dormant, this is very, very concerning to me as I really hope we do not enter another Dalton or Maunder Minimum (remember what I said about the sun’s weakening magnetic field effects on the earth’s magnetic field in relation to its main driver, the inner core, which also plays a large role in volcanic activity, which could bring a deadly 1-2 punch to the climate system to go along with the PDO and AMO in its cold cycles, but that is on the extreme side of things and let’s just hope we don’t see things continue to trend in that direction), because an ice age is a lot worse than AGW, one would discover this when looking at the evolution and overall state of the human race during periods of cold and warm, and it is not just coincidence that humans finally began to prosper at the END of a major ice age 10,000 years ago, and of course we’ve all heard of the “Dark Ages” which were of course during a colder climate period, then were followed by the medieval warm period, which allowed major expansion and significant advances in technology as well as the viking settlements of Greenland, of which are inhospitable due to the cold climate, and let’s not forget the little ice age and all of its hardships including the Potato Famine in Ireland and the “Black Death” which occurred during the 14th century during the transition period to the little Ice Age, and this killed off up to 200 MILLION people 25-60% (somewhere in the vicinity of one-half of Europe’s total population died), and the “Plague of Justinian” occurred during the “Dark Ages” cooling period that ran from around 5th to 10th century AD, and this plague is known as one of the worst in all of human history, claiming up to 5,000 lives PER DAY near Constantinople, and killing off one-fourth of the eastern Mediterranean population. If you think global warming would be bad, one only needs to look at human history and history of plagues to find out that this quite the contrary, where the worst of human suffering has come during periods of cold & ice, not during periods of warming.
On the aspect of the coming pattern I also like Armando do not understand why the PNA would jump into positive territory, (as many like to just stare at models for oscillations which is not a good idea) unless the 30 day sunspot cycles recover substantially during the month of March, as long as they remain low, the PNA will only continue to climb higher into positive territory, which would be a good thing going for more cold & snow in the eastern US. The GFS in my opinion is as usual too flat and trying to string out energy in accordance to this system coming around the 5th-6th, although the ECMWF does seem a bit aggressive for my tastes at this point as far as bombing out that particular system, although the same could not be said later down the road as we get into the 2nd week of March as the PNA is more than likely only going to continue to climb more positive as long as the sunspot cycles remain in the tank, and of course we’ll have the NAO only further entrenched into the negative side as the MJO continues to push through the western Pacific and begins to approach slightly more favorable octants 7, 8, and 1 in the longer ranges. This all points towards a slightly more favorable pattern in the longer ranges, and more than likely as we have seen all winter where areas that were in a “snowhole” get filled in and whacked by several winter storms, I would anticipate the mid-atlantic to follow suit of the midwest as far as seeing significantly more snow as the mean trough is forced to shift east in response to the building surface pressures from the increased snowpack over the midwest, and with the block remaining in place near the Davis Straits and Hudson Bay, this will help to focus the lowest pressure falls directly underneath it towards the eastern US, where there may also be a fight between the warm AMO induced Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic to the colder arctic air trying to press in from south-central Canada as the -AO and minor stratospheric warming event over Asia aid in slightly displacing the polar vortex southward from its normal position, a favorable set-up for the the strengthening of mid-latitude cyclones.
Rod Houston

February 27, 2013 at 10:05 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment

@Eric Global warming cause bigger storms to form and more serve Hurricanes and heat waves. I know that Ice age is worse than Global warming but do you think the East coast coast be see more Hurricanes in the future if Global Warming does exist? And if we somehow unfortunately enter an Ice Age could the the Midwest see snow year around or the south get more snowstorms?
Eric

February 27, 2013 at 10:16 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment

@ Rod Houston
Yeah, lol, that’s total BS, because one only has to look at the record of hurricanes during the 1950s and 1930s to discover things were much worse for the east coast, and GW has nothing to do with it as there is a very clear and distinct relationship between east coast hurricanes and the cold PDO, warm AMO combination that we have now, which was also experienced in the 1950s, and you can look at some of my previous posts to see this is certainly the case, but I’m not even going to bother with ice age speculation though because I’d rather look at factual information and conditions at hand to make forecasts, and of course there are way too many variables and possibilities if one is to really try and predict the future climate with a considerable amount of accuracy, thus even with a vast array of weather and climate knowledge, the climate easily could and most likely will turn out in such a way that you don’t expect it to.
armando

February 27, 2013 at 10:27 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment

Just wow that post would be amazing lol! I’m so glad we’re all in same boat and can relate our similarities. Honestly if you did make the “super post” i’s be thrilled to read all about it and educate myself even more on all this hype of global warming and “going green”. It’s starting to become real nonsense especially with Al gore, can’t even get started on that topic! Anyway i just don’t get that andrew’s post is always opposite of what we think, and he can be bias sometimes so hopefully he’ll see with the sunspot cycles because as long as they stay minimum and keep decreasing, winter will only stay longer lol, but the thing you mentioned about volcanic activity(which is really fascinating and never knew that) could be bad in terms of the earth’s inner core. What I do find interesting for next’s weeks storm is that on the Euro, it’s energy is coming from pacific northwest and not the STJ, which means that euro is known for holding back STJ energy. This time it’s showing energy elsewhere like I said so something that caught my attention. Another thing is that GFS ensembles look similar to Euro, which is saying something! I think euro is overdoing it, but hey it’s showing one heck of a storm. The week after could be the monster storm that Joe b has been mentioning! When all of you mean’t “back loaded winter” no one was joking because this winter has been absolutely wild and continues to do so with back to back storm hitting plains and midwest. Our turn is finally coming up soon and i’m getting so anxious lol! Thanks for your time eric, glad you can get to our posts!
Eric

February 28, 2013 at 6:50 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment

@ Armando
Yeah, I am going to try and investigate further into that, of course also about severe earthquakes & PDO, and what is also very interesting is the amount of human suffering during the periods of cold with some of the worst plagues in human history occurring during periods of cold, with humans thriving during periods of warmth, it just amazes me about how some of these AGW supporters and elite fail to look and acknowledge the past to recognize just how bad it was back then. Yes, the euro still has my attention overall as it continues unabated now for the third day in a row indicating the potential for a mid-atlantic storm although Joe Bastardi notes that this could be a model error in the ECMWF in handing the energy off to quickly to the south and east, however, I think the models are going to struggle with this system as they try to adjust to the significant increase in blocking developing towards the Davis Straits and eastern Canada, which would force a push farther to the south and east as far as storm track goes, and may cause some problems in model forecasts, of course given the fact that this trough of low pressure is still towards the Bearing Sea, where surface observations are limited in nature, such vital model data, could lead to inaccuracies in forecasts, and we may need to wait until this system at least pushes onshore western Canada to start getting into precise scenarios, but the pattern as a whole, as shown by some of earlier posts with analogs, and of course knowing the conditions that are at hand, and the tendency this year for winter to “fill in that gaps” per say of areas that have seen little winter thus far, like the midwest, one can certainly come to the conclusion that this pattern is going to become much more favorable for the mid-atlantic, towards areas like Washington DC, Baltimore, Philadelphia, Richmond, Dover, etc..
Armando

February 28, 2013 at 7:33 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment

Ok yea you should look into it more and present the info on this site and followers could educate themselves on it. About the euro, i saw joe’s post and yea he said that their is an error. The thing i’m worried now it won’t make it up north where now we won’t get affected. I see canadian and ukmet show a reasonable situation for us, but still its like we are always on that borderline either if its north or south, if its north we get the rain/snow line. If its too far south, we get flurries! Just can’t win and i hope next week’s storm isn’t the case and it makes it north to where we get affected and it cuts out so it its a near miss for boston. Whats your thoughts on that happening and do you think blocking will weaken a little or something happens so that it does push north to at least LI so we’re in the storm. I hope so, but its still many days out so not panicing yet lol!
Eric

February 28, 2013 at 4:50 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment

@ Armando
I have certainly taken note of the ECMWF’s consistency and in fact the CMC, at least has appeared to drift towards the south, and of course as I had feared, the models seem to be finally picking up on the increased blocking to the north in eastern Canada due to the increased snowpack, thus are feeding back with low pressure farther to the south and east, and of course in this current scenario, my area in south-central NC could be in the mix for a substantial winter storm, perhaps if it does end up far enough south and strong enough, even blizzard like conditions, but there’s uncertainty with that, however I do not think this blocking is going to weaken (looks like only strengthening from here as the models truly begin to “see” it and correctly handle it), and actually think Joe Bastardi may have to adjust his forecast farther to the south, of course very intriguing to say the least to see the ECWMF so far so south for so long, and with consistency like this day after day, and even though the GFS does support it, obviously the GFS would have a bias to be too far to the east, thus I do think this system may end up a bit farther to the north (hopefully not for my area to pick up a decent snowstorm , but I think if you are north of the Mason-Dixon line, chances are certainly dwindling away to pick up much, if any snow from this storm, and I do recognize that the storm is currently over the Gulf of Alaska, thus forecasts can not be completely justified or certain until this system arrives onshore of western Canada within the next few days.
armando

February 28, 2013 at 5:55 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment

Aww I was afraid you were going to say that. I see most models have trended south, but their are some mets that disagree with a complete southern slider, and their could be a situation where that storm thats stuck up in canada could move south, which would then lead to the storm coming up north. Please if you have time, I’m going to post links to these sites that show that it could still move north:http://www.accuweather.com/en/weather-news/midatlantic-snowstorm-potentia/7088979
http://www.liveweatherblogs.com/index.php?option=com_community&view=groups&task=viewdiscussion&groupid=4331&topicid=22401&Itemid=179

the first link it talks about the different scenerio’s. Their was a met named Bernie rayno that talked about the situation where it could move northward, but I can’t find his video. The thing is that the energy isn’t even on land so the models can’t be trusted this far out. It really comes down to a southern track, or it makes it up to the north by nantucket then pushes out to sea like every storm this winter has been doing. It looks from what you’re saying it will miss us, which it could, but of course when I couldn’t wait for this pattern to finally set itself up, now the blocking is too much (you’ve got to be joking) and we could get screwed. Anyway we still have time, and I just hope we can get in on the action and its a near miss for boston! Thats the scenario i hope pans out, but need to see the players on the field (as joe b says) and wait until the weekend. Do you think we have a shot at getting in on the storm? Also I want to bring up the topic of a “pattern breaker”. Now remember that met I told you about (henry margusity) that talked about the “vortex”? Well I watched his video today and he talked about how next’s weeks storm could break the pattern. He then said right after the storm it will warm up and as the PNA goes neg, the ridge will return and spring will be upon us?? That made no sense due to you and Joe talking about how the “snap” won’t happen until after mid march. All joe b said was it will warm up next week quickly then turn colder with a potential for a monster storm around the 10th or so. Here’s the link to the video, i was in full of surprise lol; http://www.accuweather.com/en/weather-blogs/meteomadness/storm-next-could-be-the-pattern-changer/7096393

so much going on…crazy!
armando

February 28, 2013 at 6:14 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment

uh oh my bad eric i posted the same thing twice thinking i erased my first comment. MY BAD
armando

February 28, 2013 at 6:22 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment

Ok eric I did post saying one of the links about bernie rayno, and that his video wasn’t there, but it’s updated so please I strongly recommend you to watch his video!

side note; scroll down to bottom and you will see him. The title of post is “snowstorm next week; fact or fiction”

http://www.accuweather.com/en/weather-news/midatlantic-snowstorm-potentia/7088979
Reid

February 28, 2013 at 8:29 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment

Hey Eric…Hope all is well with you…So I’m assuming this weekend there wont be much in the way of snow for central SC…So now I see on the models that another chance of snow may be head our way on the 5th and 6th…What would you say are the odds of this system making as far south as some of the models hinting at?
Eric

March 1, 2013 at 6:34 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment

@ Armando & Reid
Armando, thank you for the info and the videos, and Reid, yeah even if it does snow, it will be nothing more than a few flurries, but I am going to try and form and opinion on this storm later this afternoon and evening as I look over more data and models, as I’m still trying to figure out how this will all play out, but I do currently favor a track similar to the very historic “Ash Wednesday” storm of 1962.
Armando

March 1, 2013 at 6:47 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment

Wow! Eric and everyone else, the Euro has now a monster all the way up to NYC and GFS has come around to the Euro! I don’t know how this will play out, but it’s getting very interesting!!