BLOG: Wild Week With Rain, Snow, Warmth, Cold

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Good Monday! First of all, in case you missed it, thanks to Annette from Austintown for this great shot of the Moon and Venus last night: moonThe sky was clear last evening for this celestial show, but clouds will thicken today. A weak system is diving southeast and may just clip the WFMJ viewing area this evening. Mid-morning radar: CaptureHere's the simulated radar at 9pm from the HRRR model: 9pmSome of the snow on the northern side of this may evaporate before reaching the ground ("virga"). Especially south of 224, there may be a coating of snow this evening.Temperatures will stay on the cold side through tonight. Tuesday will be a little more seasonable. On Wednesday, a warm front will cross the region in the morning, with some showers accompanying it. After that, it's off to the races! Temperatures will warm up quickly on a southwest wind. wedspmThe warmth surging north: wedstempsHighs locally can exceed 60 in some spots: highswedsMainly late in the day and at night, there may be some thunderstorms across the Mississippi and Ohio Valleys. Some could even turn strong or severe in the yellow area:day3Around the Valley, I doubt there is any thunder but it cannot totally be ruled out.It's March, a month that can bring wild swings. After a cold start to the week and a balmy midweek period, you guessed it...it's back to the cold stuf late in the week. In fact, as the cold air arrives, we can see snow showers Thursday evening through Friday. Here's the map Thursday evening: thursCheck out the cold air charging east behind that front: thurstempsHighs Friday will probably be no higher than the mid 30s: highsfridayThe overall pattern as we head into the last part of March and the first handful of days of April is a cool one. gefsRemember, average highs are climbing quickly at this time of the year. By the first week of April, average highs are in the lower 50s.BUT! Some good news, perhaps. There has been a trend on the long-range models toward a warm pattern for much of the rest of April. The Climate Forecast System (CFS) has a lot of orange across the country for April: cfsaprilLet's hope it has the right idea!Thanks for reading.Eric  

BLOG: A Review of Winter, Preview of Spring

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Meteorological Winter (December, January, February) is FINALLY in the books. The opening 8 weeks of 2015 were pretty amazing, I have to say. Cold and snow galore!It's easy to forget how mild and snow-free December was.As far as the numbers, here's the final tally: statsA couple of things to note. Precipitation was almost exactly average, even though snowfall was well above average. The departure from average in the temperature department was heavily, heavily influenced by February's departure of 14 (FOURTEEN!) degrees.Here's how this Winter compares to previous one: coldestwintersNotice that we have had 2 "top" 10 coldest Winters in a row. Much like the cold period from 1976-1979.How did the numbers stack up against our Winter forecast, issued at the end of October? Our forecast was for Winter to be about 3 degrees below average. tempforecastThe forecast would have been almost perfect had February even be "crazy" cold instead of CRAZY cold. Here's the temperature departure map for the whole country: djfOverall, not a bad forecast!What about March and Spring?If you are hoping for a super warm Spring, you are likely out of luck. Many of the same atmospheric drivers from Winter will still be present this Spring. That said, we are NOT expecting the crazy departures from average that we had over the Winter.In the short term, we WILL see a pattern change over the next couple of weeks that will finally bring some warmth into the region. Watch the pattern shift from this week to the middle of the month: mar5mar13That's more like it! The ridge that has camped out over the West Coast all Winter will finally migrate east and allow above-temperatures to take hold. Check out the GFS outlook: imageControlWow. Might as well say 90!That said, March OVERALL may end up being  below average if the latest climate models are to be believed. cfsLast Spring we saw that the colder and icier-than-average Great Lakes do have an impact on our Spring weather. That will be the case again this year. Air masses will get refrigerated as they cross over the lakes. modis1Thanks for reading!Eric

BLOG: Ice Threat Tuesday

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After another weekend snow storm, today we will be in between systems. Tuesday, another storm will rip through the East, but this one will be different. This one will bring WARMER air with it! Good news, right? Well, kinda.The bad news: the air a few thousand feet above our heads will warm at a much faster rate than the air at the ground. A setup for sleet and freezing rain.TIMING: This will NOT be a problem for the morning rush. Precipitation will push in around 10am-11am on average. The threat for wintry precipitation will past until mid afternoon, maybe 3-4pm.Here's the simulated radar at 1pm: 1pmPretty colors, but not pretty weather.SOME METEOROLOGY: How do we know that this will be sleet and freezing rain? One of the most valuable tools in a meteorologist's toolbelt is a "Skew-T" diagram, otherwise known as a "sounding". This gives us a snapshot of the entire column of air above our heads at a certain time. In these diagrams, we live at the bottom of the graph, at the Earth's surface. The top of the diagram is essentially the level at which planes fly. The green and red lines represent the temperature and dewpoint, respectively as you go up in the atmosphere.I have highlighted the freezing line.Notice as the precipitation arrives around midday, there is a small layer of above-freezing air. It's at around 5-6,000 feet. namipThis is a sleet sounding. A reminder of what the different types of precipitation are and how they are formed: 998809_10201188958473876_1604180183_n As the warm layer gets deeper, we should see a change to freezing rain: nam By late afternoon the surface temperature will finally rise above freezing. Now the atmosphere is above freezing from the ground up to 10,000 feet so we'll just have rain. namrain Simulated radar at 8pm: tuenight So will this be enough ice to cause a lot of problems? It might be. We are probably looking at around 0.10" or so of ice accumulation and that can make everything very slick. iceaccumimpacts Rain will fall for much of Tuesday night. While rain amounts will likely be under an inch....we will have to watch for street and highway flooding. Many storm drains are clogged with snow right now.Thanks for reading!Eric