a short and long range forecast

Today I have for your viewing pleasure my thoughts on the upcoming winter and a quick look at what might happen this weekend. For those of you waiting for a fall pattern i’ll show you when the first sign of it will be.

I’ll do the next few days and weekend first. Temperatures through the weekend should average with highs near 80 and lows near 60.

Thursday: More scattered afternoon and evening thunderstorms thanks to a close by backdoor front over the great lakes and the leftovers of the low that cutoff earlier in the week over the plains.

Friday: More of the same with the scattered activity from these fronts. However the backdoor front reverses directions and becomes a warm front with the boundary from the old cutoff low becoming a cool front. As this front gets closer storm chances should increase Friday night with the mid south in the warm sector.  

Saturday: Periods of storms in the morning along this front with clearing later on in the day. In this set-up with us in the warm sector I would have a concern for severe weather but as of now timing of the storms does not look favorable for a widespread severe event. That does not mean an isolated strong storm or two can’t be ruled out. One thing to notice to is the eastern sections of the mid south are the primary target of the storms.

GFS late Fri eve and Sat am

Sunday-early next week: looks fair overall a blast of air from Canada should dry things out humidity wise and cool us off over the mid south by Monday. I could see a few days next week with highs in the upper 60’s and lows in the mid 40’s.

GFS early next week

Now onto my winter forecast

Let’s look at  my analog years, these are past winters that featured similar conditions to what is going on 6 months before them (now) and similar pattern indicators and projections to what might happen this winter and similarities to past winters. one example- similar nao’s now and projected nao values, climate models are projecting a nao of -.5 for jan the winter of 88 had a smilar value thus it can be considered an analog if others values match up.  The main component of these analog years is the state of the Pacific ocean.

analog years

06-07 

02-03

51-52

secondary

76-77

02-03 had fun and games lots of little snows but it did have above normal snow, nw flow and some cold spells. 06-07 went from mild and tranquil to harsh cold by feb not a lot of snow but still near norm. 51-52 was before my time but was mild. 76-77 was extreme cold and snow.

models

there several climate models I used to make this forecast. The two main ones are the cfs and euro. The cfs is predicting a dry and slightly cooler than normal winter with more precip early than late. The euro is predicting things to get going in a big way for winter lovers after a mild start.

tropical pacific

The nino state is a big player most winters in terms of the overall pattern. to determine my forecast for the nino state/ pacific ocean temps this winter I used a blend of computer guidance, observations and gut feeling on the strength of the upcoming el-nino, warmer than norm ocean waters in the tropical pacific.

There is currently a week to moderate el-nino in progress now and has been steady for several weeks. I think there is potential for slow strengthening of the el-nino to moderate or middle range of that moderate, before a weaking to high week by the end of the winter. This fits with the median of the computer guidance as well. All of this means that we will have several other factors to look at as well.

other factors

– Canada is very cold for the summer and should build a quick snowpack

– the pdo and amo are reversing from warm to cooler cycles

– the nao has been strongly negative for a while

 

 Other points

– active southern jet, may be suppressed

– storm track should shift from midwest to south as winter goes on

– clippers will likely stay north as pac air should make us miserable for a stretch or two this winter with the dry warmth not the entire winter by far though.

– on the flip side i could see flows that set-up lake effect conditions fairly well

– plenty of arctic air should be focused on the eastern half of the US

– not one  forecast has a warm winter now for us.

–  ice storm threat is still high for this winter in any overunning set-up as there will be plenty of systems  suppressed that have enough waa ( warm air advection) to warm the upper levels but not lower.

– no strong ridge off the east coast may limit waa effects.

– lots of phasing potential for the eastern US, huge ridge in the west and in the western third of Canada

– this is a dream set-up from State College Pa to Maine as i see now in terms of a cold snowy winter.

 for Kentucky

snow: slightly above normal

precip: near to slightly below normal

temps: below normal

 link to graphs of this.

MG ( final post for a while)