Texas Winter 2012-2013

[Stormcenter]

Personally I hate Summer so hopefully Winter will hang on as long as possible this season even if it's not that cold.

[Texas Snowman]

Well put Ntxw.

As for the winter is over comments, I seem to remember several on here decrying any chance of meaningful snow on Christmas in North Texas.

Guess you don't want to see my pics from the two-inches of Bing Crosby certified White Christmas snowflakes that filled my front yard!

[somethingfunny]

It seems like a switch was flipped here around Christmas 2009. Sure, we had snow events before then - the 3" sleetstorm in 2003, the Valentines' Day snow of 2004, 3-5 inches down by Waco on Easter 2007, and the twin snowdumps on Grayson County in 2008... but since Christmas 2009, we've had: the epic event of February 2010, another snow south of DFW a few weeks later, a half-foot in March, a half-foot just northeast of DFW in January 2011, a half-foot just northwest of DFW to begin February 2011, and a half-foot in DFW later that week, and then after a brief hiatus, we've had a quality snowfall on Christmas 2012! I see no reason why the pattern should end anytime soon... Whereas snow events used to fail with regularity here, lately they've just been overperforming consistently. We've all been spoiled rotten.

[natlib]

From San Angelo NWS this afternoon....interesting....

BIG QUESTIONS STILL IN PLACE FOR THE POSSIBLE STORM FOR THE
MIDDLE OF NEXT WEEK. THE OPERATIONAL GFS HAS BOUNCED BACK AND
FORTH SEVERAL TIMES OVER THE SPEED AND STRENGTH OF THIS
SYSTEM...FROM A CLOSED SLOW MOVING UPPER LOW TO A FASTER WEAKER
TROUGH MOVING ACROSS. THE ECMWF HAS MAINTAINED A SLOWER CLOSED
UPPER LEVEL LOW SCENARIO. THESE TWO FORECASTS HAVE 2 VERY
DIFFERENT SOLUTIONS...WITH THE ECMWF MUCH MUCH WETTER....MUCH
COLDER...AND WITH ANOTHER CHANCE OF WINTRY PRECIPITATION.
BUT...CONTINUITY DOES NOT MEAN CORRECT EITHER...AND WITH THIS
SYSTEM STILL WELL OFFSHORE...FULLY EXPECT NEITHER MODEL TO BE
CORRECT. WILL PLAY A ROLE DOWN THE MIDDLE...SHOWING MORE CLOUD
COVER AND COOLER TEMPERATURES...BUT NO PRECIPITATION AT THIS
POINT...AND CONTINUE TO MONITOR.

[aggiecutter]

The 18z GFS has a snow-ice combination for the Texarkana area during the Monday night and Tuesday time-frame. As far as the bowling ball system shown on the EURO, those are often big snow producers for the state of Texas during the winter.
18z GFS precipitation type loop:
http://coolwx.com/cgi-bin/getptype.cgi? ... ield=ptype


The preceding post is NOT an official forecast and should not be used as such. It is just the opinion of the poster and may or may not be backed by sound meteorological data. It is NOT endorsed by any professional institution including storm2k.org. For official information, please refer to NWS products.

[Portastorm]

Interesting to note the latest 5-day and 6-day computer model forecast skills scores:

5-Day
UKMET -- 910
ECMWF -- 909
GFS -- 897
CMC -- 881
NOGAPS -- 837

6-Day
ECMWF -- 895
UKMET -- 876
GFS -- 860
CMC -- 847
NOGAPS -- 821

[Tireman4]

Interesting to note the latest 5-day and 6-day computer model forecast skills scores:

5-Day
UKMET -- 910
ECMWF -- 909
GFS -- 897
CMC -- 881
NOGAPS -- 837

6-Day
ECMWF -- 895
UKMET -- 876
GFS -- 860
CMC -- 847
NOGAPS -- 821

Forecast skills scores?

[Ntxw]

The 12z and 18z GEFS (ensembles) do not agree with the OP being progressive. They fall in line with Euro on cutoff low

Ens means


GFS

[bevolon]

What exactly does this mean for DFW area. I'm sorry i dont understand how to read any of these maps. I will leave that to the experts on this forum!!! Thanks in advance for the info. hoping for

[ravyrn]

Posted a few pics in the NW thread of my ongoing trip on Vancouver Island. Was fortunate to see some snow Tuesday morning but regrettably it changed over to rain. Will be flying back in next Friday evening to DFW. Hopefully any wintry weather can hold off until after my plane lands. Can't do much model checking but will keep an eye on this thread when possible. Nice job on the rain guys! Sorry I missed it!

[Ntxw]

What exactly does this mean for DFW area. I'm sorry i dont understand how to read any of these maps. I will leave that to the experts on this forum!!! Thanks in advance for the info. hoping for

It means so far the GFS is alone in forecasting dry and cold. The other models give some chance at wintry precip next week

Posted a few pics in the NW thread of my ongoing trip on Vancouver Island. Was fortunate to see some snow Tuesday morning but regrettably it changed over to rain. Will be flying back in next Friday evening to DFW. Hopefully any wintry weather can hold off until after my plane lands. Can't do much model checking but will keep an eye on this thread when possible. Nice job on the rain guys! Sorry I missed it!

Hope you are having a good time up there! I saw the pics and next time take us with you, Porta could use a trip to the motherland of cold for rehab. If the Euro is right there may be some problems on your way back but we have a lot of time to iron it out. Fly safely!

[NDG]

Interesting to note the latest 5-day and 6-day computer model forecast skills scores:

5-Day
UKMET -- 910
ECMWF -- 909
GFS -- 897
CMC -- 881
NOGAPS -- 837

6-Day
ECMWF -- 895
UKMET -- 876
GFS -- 860
CMC -- 847
NOGAPS -- 821

Yeap, I agree, the ECMWF has been kicking butt at the medium range forecast, it has been handling the negatively tilted trough pattern in the SW US better, as well with the strong mid level ridge in the SW Atlantic/SE US.

[dhweather]

Easy everyone ... E-A-S-Y! Just because the PWC isn't issuing Winter Storm Watches for next week doesn't mean I'm not somewhat optimistic about an active winter weather pattern for Texas coming up. I'm just a little more skeptical, maybe, than some of you.

Here ... to prove to you that I have mostly recovered from my Trip to Heat Miserville, here's some nice reading for you. If you want to believe Accuweather's Joe Lundberg, a big change is coming and it will eventually impact those of us in Texas and the Southern Plains.

http://www.accuweather.com/en/weather-blogs/lundberg/shiver-me-timbe/3888124

He lost me basing so much of it off of the Canadian model. No offense SS.

[dhweather]

Yeap, I agree, the ECMWF has been kicking butt at the medium range forecast, it has been handling the negatively tilted trough pattern in the SW US better, as well with the strong mid level ridge in the SW Atlantic/SE US.

The ECMWF has really been "on" more than the GFS in the last few weeks.

It's got to stink for the NWS, they can't (at least publicly) discount the NOAA "flagship" GFS, which has really struggled at times in the last month.


NWS Fort Worth ‏@NWSFortWorth

Next week will not be an easy forecast. Check out 2 models that we use - Completely different solutions #txwx #dfwwx http://ow.ly/i/1m7se

[dhweather]

Well it's a winter discussion board so we discuss about all potential weather long or short range! Right or wrong you learn from it, just because it's long range doesn't mean it has no use to discuss. That's how forecasting skills advance!

We need to get some snow into Porta soon, who's with me marching to pwc early next week with pitchforks??

I completely agree, it's for discussing the great possibilities that nature throws at us. That said, I also know there are people that read stuff and take it like its the scripture, even though there are disclaimers galore.

[GaryHughes]

Well it's a winter discussion board so we discuss about all potential weather long or short range! Right or wrong you learn from it, just because it's long range doesn't mean it has no use to discuss. That's how forecasting skills advance!

We need to get some snow into Porta soon, who's with me marching to pwc early next week with pitchforks??

I completely agree, it's for discussing the great possibilities that nature throws at us. That said, I also know there are people that read stuff and take it like its the scripture, even though there are disclaimers galore.

What? You mean this isn't the Church of Weather 2K... I was told this was the word ...

[Ntxw]

Also been seeing a lot of guests the past month. Feel free to join! There's no such thing as a bad post .

[Texas Snowman]

Well it's a winter discussion board so we discuss about all potential weather long or short range! Right or wrong you learn from it, just because it's long range doesn't mean it has no use to discuss. That's how forecasting skills advance!

My favorite two weeks on this forum - ever - were the two weeks leading up to the Christmas Eve Blizzard of 2009. There was a guy on here that year named Mississippi State Guy, he went to Midwestern State out in Wichita Falls. For two weeks, he painted the picture of why it was going to snow and snow big in parts of Oklahoma and North Texas. There was some model support, it went away, and then at the very end it came back. But he never backed down from his guns and told why he thought it would happen. Some on here got on to him a bit (as that model support died) but he stayed the course and explained what his thoughts were. And do you know what? He predicted exactly what happened, almost to the letter. Never will forget that.

[Rgv20]

Looks like a Cold 7 day period coming for much of Texas from Monday thru Sunday.. I expect for my area from Monday thru Thursday to be stuck in clouds and drizzle with high Temperatures in the low 50s..


12zGFS Ensembles Temperature Anomalies....South Texas running 12-15 degrees below normal from Monday thru Sunday!

[dhweather]

I personally think we are gonna get cold next week in DFW, not mega frigid, just under seasonal averages. I would hope by this time next week, we will know if the SSW actually made a significant difference.

I think its an outside shot at wintry precip next week.