Texas Winter 2010-2011

[Ntxw]

Great analogy Wxman57. I've heard the word ice storm thrown around several times lately. Everything just looks so suspicious. With these big highs plunging down model waffling (The euro went from one extreme suppressed to overly north in less than 12 hours) is a big red flag.

[Tireman4]

OK, allow me to gush for a bit (and I hope I don't embarrass the guy) ... but I hope everyone here realizes how amazing it is that we have a longtime professional meteorologist like Wxman57 who not only shares his wisdom with us, but also can offer this kind of historical perspective on a developing situation. Storm2K is very fortunate.

That is a fascinating post. Thank you VERY MUCH for sharing, Wxman57!

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to climb back down and off this ledge.

For the love of PWC, do not jump. Like I told Wxman57 on another station, thank you so much for your wisdom. Also, thank you for reminding me of the heartbreak of that game. Thanks. Sheesh...LOL

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P2kcpTmheM4

[Portastorm]

Blech ... my homies in NWS Austin/San Antonio are letting me down ... then again, whenever they do have wintry precip in the forecast, it seldom verifies. Maybe this snippet should encourage me!

********
THE FORECAST FOR TUESDAY BECOMES QUITE A CONUNDRUM DUE TO AN
APPROACHING COLD FRONT AND VERY COLD ARCTIC AIRMASS BEHIND THE
FRONT. WHILE MODELS ARE IN GOOD CONSENSUS OF MOISTURE POOLING
MONDAY NIGHT AND TUESDAY AHEAD OF THE FRONT LEADING TO GOOD
CHANCES FOR RAIN...THE SOLUTIONS FOR THE TIMING OF THE FROPA VARY
ENOUGH THAT HIGH TEMPERATURES FOR TUESDAY ARE QUITE AN ISSUE. THE
GFS ENSEMBLE FORECAST CONTINUES TO INDICATE A MID-DAY FROPA...WHICH
WOULD ENABLE TEMPERATURES TO WARM TO READINGS SIMILAR TO MONDAY
(POSSIBLY HIGHER). THE GFS IS ONE OF THE SLOWER SOLUTIONS WITH THE
FRONT...BUT IS NOT NECESSARILY TOO FAR OFF THE MARK AS FAR AS HIGH
TEMPERATURES ON TUESDAY. EVEN IF THE FRONT PUSHES THROUGH THE CWA
BY EARLY AFTERNOON...THE STRONGER PUNCH OF COLD AIR WILL LAG
SEVERAL HOURS BEHIND. FOR NOW HAVE GONE WITH A BLEND OF THE
PREVIOUS FORECAST...SURROUNDING OFFICES...AND THE 12Z GFS(X) FOR
TUESDAY...WITH LITTLE CONFIDENCE. WITH THAT SAID...THERE IS HIGH
CONFIDENCE THAT ALL OF THE MOISTURE WILL CLEAR THE AREA BEFORE THE
COLD TEMPERATURES SETTLE IN AND THEREFORE NO WINTERY PRECIPITATION
IS EXPECTED.

[Rgv20]

kind of surprising it seems to me they would be more confident on the cold weather and less confident on the moisture availability.....

[Kelarie]

From Shreveport...

20 CENTS WILL LINGER IN THE FORECAST ON MONDAY...BUT A BRIEF BREAK
FROM RAIN WILL LIKELY BE SEEN ON THIS DAY. THEN A STRONGER COLD
FRONT WILL APPROACH THE AREA TUESDAY AND INCREASE RAIN CHANCES.
MODELS ARE STILL IN DISAGREEMENT ON THE AMOUNT OF COLD AIR COMING
IN FOR TUESDAY NIGHT...WITH THE ECMWF BEING THE COLDEST OF THE
MODELS. ECMWF BRINGS IN THE COLDEST AIR...BUT NOW IS DRY SLOTTING
US BEHIND THE RAPIDLY PROGRESSING LOW. WHILE GFS HOLDS IN THE
MOISTURE...BUT DOES NOT GIVE US THE DEEP COLD AIR. SO FOR A
SCENARIO...I KEPT A LOW CHANCE OF SNOW IN THE FORECAST TUESDAY
NIGHT...AS MAYBE WE COULD GET THE ECMWF/S COLD AIR AND THE GFS/S
MOISTURE. ANYWAY...THIS IS RATHER ON THE OPTIMISTIC SIDE OF HOPE.

[Portastorm]

kind of surprising it seems to me they would be more confident on the cold weather and less confident on the moisture availability.....

I'm really not worried about the cold. Of course, I could be wrong but I think the cold (as in temps at or below freezing) is going to be there for at least half of the state if not more. It's the dang low and the possibility of it phasing north of us with the northern jet energy that has me concerned. If that happens, most of us are screwed ... although orangeblood believes that there will be some healthy precip in the immediate wake of the phased low.

[cctxhurricanewatcher]

NWS Corpus is NOT completely shutting the door on winter precip unlike Portastorm's Homies in Austin/SA. They are not even hugging the last run of the GFS like some offices are as far as temps.

.LONG TERM (SUNDAY THROUGH FRIDAY)...APPEARS THAT THE RAIN SHOWERS
AND/OR THUNDER SHOULD BE TAPERING OFF BY SUNDAY MORNING...UNLESS
MODELS PROVE TO BE TOO FAST. JUST HAVE SOME LOW CHANCE/SLIGHT CHANCE
POPS OVER THE EASTERN AREAS SUNDAY MORNING...THEN DRIER AIR PUSHES
IN. IF THINGS GO AS PLANNED...MOST OF SUNDAY SHOULD SHAPE UP TO BE A
NICE DAY DURING THE AFTERNOON...WITH WARM AFTERNOON TEMPERATURES AND
CLEARING SKIES. RETURN OF LIGHT SOUTHEAST WINDS OVERNIGHT AND
MOISTURE ADVECTION SHOULD RESULT IN FOG FORMATION BY MONDAY
MORNING...INCLUDING THE SEA FOG. MOISTURE ADVECTION IS PRETTY GOOD
AS THE NEXT UPPER TROUGH APPROACHES...SO DO EXPECT SOME CONVECTION
MONDAY NIGHT AND TUESDAY MORNING (KEPT THE SLIGHT CHANCE FOR SHOWERS
MONDAY) GIVEN AFOREMENTIONED ADVECTION...ALTHOUGH RAINFALL SHOULD BE
LIGHT IF RECEIVED. BEST SHOT OF RAIN (AS USUAL) WILL BE NORTHEAST AS
AREA BECOMES DRY-SLOTTED BY TUESDAY AFTERNOON. TUESDAY AFTERNOON
LOOKS TO BE THE LAST OF THE WARM WEATHER FOR A WHILE (I.E. GENERALLY
ABOVE NORMAL TEMPERATURES SUNDAY - TUESDAY)...THEN ARCTIC BLAST
COMES DOWN TUESDAY NIGHT. DO NOT THINK MUCH OF THE RAIN CHANCE WITH
THE ARCTIC FRONT AS MOISTURE GETS PRETTY SCOURED OUT AND PUSHED
SOUTH WITH THE WESTERLY WINDS IN THE BOUNDARY LAYER AND MID LEVELS.
MODELS PRETTY MUCH AGREE (AS MUCH AS MODELS CAN) WITH A FROPA IN
KCRP AROUND MIDNIGHT...GIVE OR TAKE A COUPLE OF HOURS. AFTER
FROPA... TEMPERATURES WILL REMAIN WELL BELOW NORMAL FOR THE NEXT FEW
DAYS. GFS HAS BACKED OFF ON ITS COLDER SCENARIO WHILE ECMWF AND
CANADIAN KEEPING IT COLD (GFS FETCH IN THE MID LEVELS PUSHING
COLDEST AIR FARTHER NORTHEAST THAN BEFORE). FOR NOW...WILL RELY MORE
ON THE ECMWF/CANADIAN SOLUTION AND KEEP SIMILAR TEMPERATURES AS
FORECAST. GFS IS ALSO WETTER THAN ECMWF (CANADIAN HINTS AT WETTER
TOO) AND FOR NOW WILL CONTINUE MORE WITH THE DRIER AND COLDER ECMWF
AND SEE WHAT TRANSPIRES (KEEP PREVIOUS FORECAST CONSISTENCY AND ISC
SIMILARITIES). HOWEVER...IF GFS IS RIGHT ON THE MOISTURE AND ECMWF
IS RIGHT ON THE TEMPERATURES...COULD NOT RULE OUT SOME WINTRY PRECIP
(ALBEIT LIGHT) THURSDAY OR FRIDAY MAINLY WESTERN AREAS. TOO MUCH
UNCERTAINTY TO GO WITH THIS SOLUTION BLEND AT THIS TIME.

[orangeblood]

I was just going through some old maps/forecasts I'd saved from previous events. One that I recall which looks VERY similar is the November 25th, 1993 ice storm across Texas. It was the Thanksgiving that the Cowboys were playing and Leon Lett made that bad play.

I'm looking at the projected upper-air flow and surface low/front projections from the models back then and they're nearly identical to the current projections of upper-air and surface pattern for next week.

In 1993, there was a large upper low that pinched off over Utah/Nevada and the southwest U.S. as Arctic air flowed down the Plains lee of the Rockies. The models back then developed a low center in northeast New Mexico and tracked it across the TX Panhandle and Oklahoma. The low was forecast to slow down the front until it moved off to the east, driving the front through southeast Texas by Friday, the 26th. Sound familiar?

What happened? The Arctic front just steamed on south, reaching the Gulf of Mexico before sunrise on the 25th, a day before the models had forecast it to arrive from 3-4 days out. Cold Arctic air invaded Texas a day ahead of "schedule". The thin layer of sub-freezing air resulted in widespread freezing rain across the state. I remember the Dallas are NWS office said "we just can't see the moisture" for any precip a day or two before the front moved through.

The current setup is quite similar to November of 1993, so we have to watch for the cold Arctic air to move south much faster than forecast. And we may not see a low development in the Southern Plains as the models currently forecast.

I do remember that storm quite well and it caught everyone off guard.

First off, I do apologize for having to disagree with you on this but I looked over the historical archived data of that setup and it looks quite different, at least to me. The large upper low came into the Pacific Northwest around the 22nd of November moved across Idaho/Wyoming into South Dakota out across the northern plains and deepened along the way. The upper low never got south of the Northern Utah border and there wasn't a separate piece of energy digging into southern California and moving across the mexico border like this upcoming event. Most all models, with this upcoming event, are depicting this upper low to move much further south and west compared to the 1993 event - this appears to be the main driver in keeping the majority of the cold air back across the rockies/central plains for next week's event. I'm sorry but I just don't see a lot of similarities with the upper air patterns.

And Please let me know if I'm analyzing those archived maps wrong.

here is a link of the archived data page for upper air patterns back to 1948 : http://www.hpc.ncep.noaa.gov/ncepreanal/

[DonWrk]

Reed Timmer seems to think something is going to happen. This was his tweet 5 hours ago. "Apocalyptic snow storm for OK into AR on Tues?? I'm going to miss out on another one!"

[CaptinCrunch]

FTW NWS AFD

OVERALL THERE IS BETTER AGREEMENT AMONG THE 12Z MEDIUM RANGE
MODELS THAN WE HAVE SEEN IN SEVERAL DAYS. HOWEVER THERE HAS BEEN
A PRETTY DRAMATIC SHIFT FROM PREVIOUS RUNS IN HOW THE MODELS ARE
HANDLING THE PRIMARY UPPER LEVEL FEATURES. OF NOTE...THEY HAVE ALL
INITIALIZED THE SHORTWAVE TROUGH OVER NORTHERN BRITISH COLUMBIA
MUCH STRONGER THAN BEFORE. THE MODELS NOW SIMULATE AN INTERACTION
WITH THIS SHORTWAVE AND AN UPPER LOW NOW ABOUT 1000 MILES OFF THE
OREGON COAST. IN ESSENCE...THE TWO SYSTEMS WILL ROTATE/DUMBBELL
AROUND EACH OTHER OVER THE WESTERN US. THE BC SHORTWAVE SHOULD
CONTINUE TO INTENSIFY THIS WEEKEND AND IS EXPECTED TO BECOME THE
DOMINANT SYSTEM. THIS SHOULD CAUSE THE PACIFIC UPPER LOW TO SWING
THROUGH OUR REGION FAIRLY QUICKLY...LIKELY EARLY TUESDAY...WITH
WIDESPREAD RAIN ACROSS THE AREA. YESTERDAY THE GFS/ECMWF MODELS
WERE FORECASTING A MUCH SLOWER PASSAGE AND INDICATING A THREAT
FOR WINTRY WEATHER OVER THE AREA. WITH THE FASTER MOVEMENT THERE
WILL BE LESS OPPORTUNITY FOR PRECIPITATION INTO SUB-FREEZING AIR.

THE MODELS ARE ALL FORECASTING THE ARCTIC AIR MASS TO WAIT UNTIL
THE PASSAGE OF THE UPPER TROUGH BEFORE ENTERING THE
REGION...SOMETIME DURING THE DAY ON TUESDAY. IN FACT...NO MODEL
TODAY SUGGESTS MUCH CHANCE FOR ANY WINTRY PRECIPITATION AS THE
RAIN ENDS BEFORE SUB FREEZING AIR ARRIVES. HOWEVER THERE REMAINS A
PROVERBIAL FLY IN THE OINTMENT. OUR SUNDAY FRONT IS FORECAST TO
HANG AROUND THE REGION INTO MONDAY NIGHT BY ONLY THE NAM...WITH
ALL OF THE OTHER MODELS INDICATING EROSION OF THIS SHALLOW LAYER
OF COLD AIR. THE NAM ONLY GOES OUT 84 HOURS...AND IT IS SHOWING
SUB FREEZING TEMPERATURES IN SOUTHERN OKLAHOMA AT MIDNIGHT MONDAY.
THIS FRONTAL POSITION GIVES THE LEADING EDGE OF THE SUB FREEZING
AIR A BIG HEAD START OVER THE OTHER MODELS...AND CONFIRMS A
POSSIBILITY THAT THE ARCTIC AIR WILL BLEED INTO THE NORTHERN ZONES
BEFORE THE PRECIPITATION ENDS. THE NAM IS USUALLY SUPERIOR WITH
ITS HANDLING OF SHALLOW COLD AIR...AND THUS WE WILL BE LOOKING
FORWARD TO GETTING WITHIN ITS FORECAST TIME RANGE FOR THE TUESDAY
EVENT. GIVEN THE NAM/S HINT AT THIS POSSIBILITY AS WELL AS THE
USUAL CAVEAT THAT SHALLOW ARCTIC AIR ARRIVES A LITTLE FASTER THAN
THE MEDIUM RANGE GUIDANCE FORECASTS...WE WILL RETAIN A MENTION OF
FREEZING RAIN IN THE FORECAST NORTH OF A COMANCHE- WAXAHACHIE-
SULPHUR SPRINGS LINE TUESDAY. ARCTIC AIR MAY BE TOO SHALLOW FOR
SLEET ACROSS NORTH TEXAS...BUT DID KEEP THIS POSSIBILITY MENTIONED
ACROSS THE FAR NW. ALL PRECIP SHOULD CLEAR OUT TUESDAY AFTERNOON.

THE BIG STORY WILL BE THE COLD TEMPERATURES BEHIND THIS FRONT.
THE UPPER LEVEL PATTERN WILL BECOME AMPLIFIED INTO A SEMI-REX
BLOCK CONFIGURATION ACROSS THE WESTERN PART OF NORTH AMERICA NEXT
WEEK. PRESSURE RISES OCCURRING NORTH OF MONTANA SHOULD YIELD A
1050+ MB HIGH WHICH BUILDS SOUTH EARLY-MID WEEK AND BECOMES
CENTERED ACROSS THE TX PANHANDLE WED-THU. GFS/ECMWF/CANADIAN
FORECASTS ALL INDICATE UNUSUALLY COLD AIR AT 850 MB WITH TEMPS
ACROSS THE PLAINS RANGING FROM -15C TO -24C. THE 500 MB PATTERN
WILL REMAIN IN A FAVORABLE POSITIVE TILTED TROUGH PHASE FOR
LIMITED MODIFICATION OF THIS AIR MASS NEXT WEEK. EXPECT TEMPS TO
PLUMMET DURING THE DAY TUESDAY INTO THE TEENS AND 20S BY WEDNESDAY
MORNING. HIGHS WEDNESDAY MAY STRUGGLE TO REACH THE LOW 30S. BRISK
NORTH WINDS SHOULD CONTINUE FOR A COUPLE DAYS...WITH WIND CHILLS
IN THE SINGLE DIGITS AT TIMES. WILL TEMPER THE MODIFICATION OF
TEMPS INTO NEXT WEEKEND...GOING WELL BELOW MEX MOS...WITH THE GFS
SEEMINGLY OUT TO LUNCH WITH THE AMOUNT OF AIR MASS MODERATION IT
IS FORECASTING. ALTHOUGH COLD...MODELS SHOW LIMITED MOISTURE FOR
PRECIPITATION BUT THIS WILL NEED TO BE WATCHED AS AN UPPER LEVEL
TROUGH REMAINS TO OUR WEST.

[txagwxman]

18z faster Tuesday, fz Rain SPS. But not DFW.

[txagwxman]

We will just make the assumption that all the models are wrong with the timing of the Arctic front, and it will hit Dallas by Tuesday morning with temps below 32F by 10AM just before precip ends?

How's that == make you feel better? Of course, it doesn't mean anything for us folk in Houston/Austin.

[Turtle]

Wow, looks like this cold isn't spreading east very much.

Athens, TX Forecast:
Wednesday: Mostly sunny, with a high near 35.
Thursday: Mostly sunny, with a high near 39.

Head east 33 miles:

Tyler, TX Forecast:
Wednesday: Partly sunny, with a high near 46.
Thursday: Partly sunny, with a high near 48

[Brandon8181]

Well I think I'm about to just go crawl in a hole until spring...

[BigB0882]

Well I think I'm about to just go crawl in a hole until spring...

But that means 6 more weeks of winter and you will miss all this fun!

[iorange55]

Well I think I'm about to just go crawl in a hole until spring...

I wouldn't feel bad about your prediction. It's a tough thing to forecast, especially this system. Plus even though we might not see snow we still might get some type of winter weather out of it.

Feels like one of those times where like 2 days before the threats of something icy go up. We'll see what happens I personally haven't given up hope yet, I think this system is too strong not to have a few surprises.

[Tejas89]

While the threat of winter precip is exciting, I'm kind of enjoying this La Nina pattern today. Growing tired of these Lucy models this winter.

Grillin' and chillin' weather..

[iorange55]

While the threat of winter precip is exciting, I'm kind of enjoying this La Nina pattern today. Growing tired of these Lucy models this winter.

Grillin' and chillin' weather..

I'd rather be sledding and freezing.

Oh Texas

[Brandon8181]

Well I think I'm about to just go crawl in a hole until spring...

I wouldn't feel bad about your prediction. It's a tough thing to forecast, especially this system. Plus even though we might not see snow we still might get some type of winter weather out of it.

Feels like one of those times where like 2 days before the threats of something icy go up. We'll see what happens I personally haven't given up hope yet, I think this system is too strong not to have a few surprises.

Well I haven't given up.. and I'm currently not in a position to completely alter my forecast based on 18 hours of model runs ...But if they don't figure something out within the next 24 hours, I'll be depressed lol.

And I think it would be great..if all of a sudden 2 days before the event everything changed back to the way it was

[Ntxw]

The winter that could've been! We're paying dearly for all the snow we got last year for sure. Probably another 5 years worth lol. But hey! The averages are rising now and pretty soon the sun angle will be similar to what it is in October. Not too long now before severe weather season. You can always count on those in Texas!