Texas Winter 2013-2014

[Cuda17]

please don't let the heat miser chime in, please don't let the heat miser chime in, please don't let the heat miser chime in, please don't let the heat miser chime in, please don't let the heat miser chime in, please don't let the heat miser chime in, please don't let the heat miser chime in, please don't let the heat miser chime in, please don't let the heat miser chime in, please don't let the heat miser chime in, please don't let the heat miser chime in, please don't let the heat miser chime in, please don't let the heat miser chime in, please don't let the heat miser chime in, please don't let the heat miser chime in!!!

[Rgv20]

NWS Brownsville afternoon discussion..

AS CAA CONTINUES TO FILTER IN COOLER AIR OVERNIGHT...LOW TEMPERATURES WILL
LOWER INTO THE LOW TO MID 30 OVER THE NORTHERN COUNTIES AND IN THE
MID 40S ALONG THE RIO GRANDE. LATEST GFS/ECMWF MODEL GUIDANCE
SUGGEST THE POTENTIAL OF POSSIBLE FREEZING RAIN OVER ZAPATA AND
NORTHERN JIM HOGG COUNTY EARLY FRIDAY MORNING. DID NOT INCLUDE THAT
IN THIS FORECAST PACKAGE AT THIS TIME AS TEMPERATURES STILL REMAIN
BORDERLINE FOR FREEZING RAIN TO OCCURRED AND WILL PREFER WAITING TO
SEE IF THE TREND CONTINUES DURING THE NEXT TWO RUNS. HIGH TEMPS WILL
STRUGGLE TO REACH THE MID 40S WITH BREEZE CONDITIONS AND WIND CHILL
FEELING IN THE MID 30S WHICH COULD REACH FREEZE CRITERIA FRIDAY.

[Ntxw]

Yes even for central Texas it's not a given. A couple of times lucy has pulled the football from Portastorm after days showing Austin buried but ended up a Midland to San Angelo event. This was never modeled as a major event but a novelty with the dance between low level moisture return and shearing shortwave. Keep expectations low!

A more intact system at 5h on the front end definitely would be ideal

[orangeblood]

12z European: Light snow beginning over west-central Texas at hour 60. Expanding eastward and in coverage at hour 66. At hour 72, light snow across much of west-central, central, southeast, and parts of south Texas. Some places northwest of the Coastal Bend (i.e., between CRP and San Antonio) have as much as an inch of snow. By hour 84, light snow has expanded to include all of Southeast Texas and parts of southwestern Louisiana. Keep in mind that the snow is very light, but the Euro has a tendency to underestimate QPF.

Something I just thought of, the Euro has "trended" wetter from its previous runs. Hopefully, this is the beginning of a trend and not just a blip.

Does your access Big O enable you to look at qpf values? I'd be curious if this 12z Euro is indeed "wetter" or not. The low-rez version I just saw on the Penn State e-wall site didn't look all that much wetter but what it did do was keep the precip around longer in south/southeast Texas. However, did y'all notice that the 12z does develop a surface low off the lower Texas coast, just as the CMC does? That's quite interesting to me.

12Z Euro has the freezing line reaching Austin Metro around midnight Thursday night....below is a copy of the text printout for the 12Z Euro, as you can see it only has .03 inches of qpf after reaching the freezing mark. According to the Euro, the bulk of the precip is south and east along the I-10 corridor so still very dry for Austin and points north and west.

Sorry for the formatting issues....

ECMWF Deterministic FORECAST FOR: AUS LAT= 30.30 LON= -97.70 ELE= 620

12Z JAN21
2 M 850 SFC SFC 700 6 HR 500 1000
TMP TMP PRS RHU RHU QPF HGT 500
(C) (C) (MB) (PCT) (PCT) (IN) (DM) THK
TUE 12Z 21-JAN 9.3 4.7 1028 37 5 0.00 573 550
TUE 18Z 21-JAN 12.4 6.8 1030 33 6 0.00 575 551
WED 00Z 22-JAN 10.4 7.1 1026 43 8 0.00 575 554
WED 06Z 22-JAN 4.0 9.7 1025 65 10 0.00 576 556
WED 12Z 22-JAN 3.3 10.8 1022 64 7 0.00 575 557
WED 18Z 22-JAN 15.2 10.1 1021 32 5 0.00 575 558
THU 00Z 23-JAN 13.8 10.5 1017 37 6 0.00 571 557
THU 06Z 23-JAN 9.7 8.5 1020 69 14 0.00 571 554
THU 12Z 23-JAN 7.8 4.2 1024 76 45 0.00 570 551
THU 18Z 23-JAN 5.6 2.4 1031 48 61 0.03 573 547
FRI 00Z 24-JAN 3.1 0.5 1035 37 86 0.01 573 545
FRI 06Z 24-JAN 0.7 -0.3 1040 39 99 0.01 575 544
FRI 12Z 24-JAN -0.7 -0.3 1040 45 99 0.02 575 543
FRI 18Z 24-JAN 1.6 0.4 1039 41 66 0.00 576 546
SAT 00Z 25-JAN 3.6 4.6 1031 52 31 0.00 575 550
SAT 06Z 25-JAN 1.7 7.6 1028 62 9 0.00 576 554
SAT 12Z 25-JAN 1.1 9.0 1025 70 2 0.00 576 556
SAT 18Z 25-JAN 14.6 10.6 1023 37 15 0.00 577 558
SUN 00Z 26-JAN 14.0 11.0 1019 48 27 0.00 575 559
SUN 06Z 26-JAN 5.6 11.1 1020 79 36 0.00 574 557
SUN 12Z 26-JAN 4.0 10.4 1018 84 13 0.00 571 556
SUN 18Z 26-JAN 16.8 11.4 1016 42 25 0.00 571 557
MON 00Z 27-JAN 14.6 10.5 1012 57 8 0.00 569 559
MON 06Z 27-JAN 9.6 11.2 1013 84 12 0.00 570 559

[Portastorm]

orangeblood, thanks for posting those numbers. That 0.03 amount of QPF is even drier than the 0z Euro run. And that is what I kinda expected after seeing even the low-rez version of the 12z Euro on the Penn State e-wall site. At least for south central Texas, the 12z Euro is not wetter at all but, in fact, drier.

Based on that output, I would be skeptical of much of anything falling here in Austin. Very, very minimal amounts at best. Perhaps enough freezing rain/drizzle to put the bridges and overpasses into some icy spots but nothing nearly as exciting as what the NAM is showing, or even the SREF.

Yep ... still a ways to go. The current PWC index is: neutral.

[stormlover2013]

18 nam is running now!!!! lets see what it shows!!!

[Big O]

orangeblood, thanks for posting those numbers. That 0.03 amount of QPF is even drier than the 0z Euro run. And that is what I kinda expected after seeing even the low-rez version of the 12z Euro on the Penn State e-wall site. At least for south central Texas, the 12z Euro is not wetter at all but, in fact, drier.

Based on that output, I would be skeptical of much of anything falling here in Austin. Very, very minimal amounts at best. Perhaps enough freezing rain/drizzle to put the bridges and overpasses into some icy spots but nothing nearly as exciting as what the NAM is showing, or even the SREF.

Yep ... still a ways to go. The current PWC index is: neutral.

You are correct that it is drier for central Texas, but it is wetter for south and southeast Texas. Problem for south and southeast Texas, however, will be the temperature profile. One must remember that snow in south and southeast Texas is highly unusual, to say the least.

[stormlover2013]

the cold will be there, like Bastardi said he thinks the models aren't clamping on good right now with the arctic cold that is coming down and he said dallas should prob be 5-9 degrees colder than what the GFS is showing... that arctic air mass is shallow so models have a hard time picking it up.

[Big O]

Another blast of cold coming Monday and Tuesday per the European ensemble mean 850 temperature anomalies.

[Portastorm]

Another blast of cold coming Monday and Tuesday per the European ensemble mean 850 temperature anomalies.

Someone better tell wxman57 ... he was crowing this morning about 60s and 70s next week! I believe he even used the phrase "short-lived cold."

[Stormnut]

Did the NAM just go way warmer or am I seeing things?

[TheProfessor]

Did the NAM just go way warmer or am I seeing things?

That's what it looks like through the 57 hours to me.

[TheProfessor]

Did the NAM just go way warmer or am I seeing things?

Did the NAM just go way warmer or am I seeing things?

That's what it looks like through the 57 hours to me.

And a lot less precipitation too.

[Tireman4]

Still early folks. Things do and will change. I am still waiting on the 12z Thursday models.

[Stormcenter]

"As The Models Flip And Flop"

[orangeblood]

Still early folks. Things do and will change. I am still waiting on the 12z Thursday models.

Models should begin to converge during tonight's runs as the system is coming ashore across the Pacific Northwest this evening.

[stormlover2013]

It's nam lol do we even call that a model

[srainhoutx]

Afternoon Update from the WPC Winter Weather Desk:

PROBABILISTIC HEAVY SNOW AND ICING DISCUSSION
NWS WEATHER PREDICTION CENTER COLLEGE PARK MD
328 PM EST TUE JAN 21 2014

VALID 00Z WED JAN 22 2014 - 00Z SAT JAN 25 2014

...ROCKIES INTO TX...

A SHORTWAVE TROUGH ARRIVING INTO WRN CANADA WILL DIG SOUTHEASTWARD
TOWARD THE GREAT BASIN/CENTRAL ROCKIES ON THURS BEFORE SHEARING
OUT DOWNSTREAM THROUGH THE SRN PLAINS ON FRI. MOISTURE AVAILABLE
WITH THIS SYSTEM WILL NOT BE IN ABUNDANCE...BUT SUFFICIENT FORCING
AND UPSLOPE FLOW WILL SUPPORT LOCALLY HEAVY SNOWFALL ACROSS CO
INTO ERN NM. FARTHER SOUTH INTO TX... A HUGE AND COLD SURFACE
ANTICYCLONE WILL CONSUME THE PLAINS ...EAST TO SOUTHEASTERLY FLOW
OFF THE GULF OF MEXICO WILL ATTEMPT TO BRING MOISTURE INLAND
ACROSS TEXAS. THIS MOISTURE OVERRUNNING INTO THE ANOMALOUS COLD
AIR MASS COULD SET THE STAGE FOR SNOW AND LIGHT ICING . THE THREAT
FOR THURS APPEARS MAINLY ACROSS WEST TX INTO THE HILL COUNTRY BUT
BECOMES MUCH MORE WIDESPREAD ON FRI FROM THE HILL COUNTRY TO
SRN/SERN TX. THOUGH THE AMOUNTS WILL NOT BE SIGNIFICANT...
HAZARDOUS DRIVING CONDITIONS WILL BE LIKELY FOR AN AREA OF THE
COUNTRY NOT VERY USED TO FROZEN PRECIP. WPC STAYED VERY CLOSE TO
THE MORE CONSERVATIVE OPERATIONAL GFS/ECMWF OVER THE MUCH MORE
BOLD NAM.

THE PROBABILITY OF SIGNIFICANT ICING IS LESS THAN 10 PERCENT FOR
ALL 3 DAYS.

MUSHER

[TeamPlayersBlue]

Correct me if im wrong mets, but the 850 temps do look warmer because of the formation of the Surface low. It sprouts up east of CC and moves north. (Winds coming Onshore at the 850) but the surface temps still look plenty cold, if not colder in my opinion all the way to the Rio Grande. Am i seeing this right?

[ndale]

My nws forecast for Thurs night and Fri morning is mentioning rain, sleet and snow, no mention of freezing rain. That is the point forecast, not the forecast discussion.