Monday Morning 1-31
>> Monday, January 31, 2011
Hey everybody, my first attempt at the blog post here so let's see how it goes. It's an honor to be asked by Matthew to keep up the blog while he's taking vacation so hopefully this goes ok. I'll let my buddy Andy handle most of the localized stuff for the Carolina area there since he's more familiar with how things work up there.
Ok let's talk about what we have to start off the week here. A huge storm system will be getting organized through today and tomorrow that will affect a good portion if not all of the country east of the Rockies over the next couple of days. Check out the warnings thumbnail that Matt has on the left side of the screen and you'll notice basically everybody northeast of Texas is under some sort of winter storm watch or warning.
The culprit for this? A big trough digging into the western half of the country as we speak. By later today and tonight a very strong area of low pressure will develop in Texas and lift northeast into the boot heel of Missouri by tomorrow evening. We are talking sub 1000 mb pressure with this low . . . which is not rare for a nor-easter but is not as common for the central US. Take a look at this . . .
I hope that worked right if not I'll try it again. That's a look at the GFS model for tomorrow evening. You can see the massive low in southeastern Missouri. Lots of cold air pouring in behind it with a lot of warm moist air out ahead of it.
What does it all mean? Well, a big time snow storm basically anywhere north and west of that low. Several places in the midwest could see 5-10 inches. South of that low is where you have the cold front. It will produce heavy rain from the gulf coast up towards the mid atlantic, and potentially some severe weather along the front tomorrow as well.
Note that this system is much farther north and west than the previous few that have brought snow to the Carolinas and much of the south. So this looks like a rain maker for everyone in the region. We'll keep an eye on this for the next couple of days.
Hope this worked ok for everybody. Will love to see any thoughts you may have or any questions about this storm. Have a great day!
5 comments:
Hi Hank,
I'm not very knowledgeable on all the models but I do check Matt's blog daily for my forecast and future weather patterns up and coming. So I just wanted to say welcome and thanks for filling in for him this week! First post looks great, and I have no doubt Matt left his blog in capable hands. From his post yesterday, seems that he thinks highly of you both! So thanks for today's post and keeping us in the loop while he's getting a well-deserved break. I look forward to seeing more posts!
Hi Susanna! Thanks so much for the kind words. I know Matt usually talks about the models in his video so I figured I'd throw on on the page there. Very excited to be a part of his blog. Thanks for reading and we'll have more this week. Have a great day!
Hi Hank-
Good job on the first post. Any thoughts on wintry potential for the end of the week?
12Z GGEM shows a massive ice storm for WNC and parts of the traditional cold-air damming regions. The 12Z GFS and Euro models don't look nearly as cold and would imply mainly rain with a little novelty frozen precip for WNC. Will cold air be able to penetrate east of the Apps after the mid-week storm or will it get caught to the west and leave us in the heater (relatively, speaking) over here? I guess I'll know for sure come Friday, but I was curious as to your thoughts at the moment.
Hey Jonathan . . . that's a great question. Sounds like you're on top of it already. I gotta tell you it looks like you are right on the border at this point. Checking the gfs and nam and even euro this morning it looks fringe for the wintry stuff. That 850 0 degree line is flirting with you. Although mos numbers by Saturday morning do have you sub-freezing. I'm going to say mostly rain at this point with maybe a little mix or freezing rain on the back end of this. Should be fun to watch the next couple of days though
Thanks for the reply, Hank! And good writeup on Tuesday's storm. Man, I wish I could experience one of those blizzards at some point in my life...
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