sooner101 wrote:Steve McCauley mentioned that the NWS issued the winter storm warning because they think DFW will get 1 to 2 inches of sleet followed by 1 to 2 inches of snow. Steve says the Stat Method he uses doesn't see that coming, but he's not too confident in the Stat Method yet. Can anyone follow up on any of this?
Well - I don't have access to Steve's statistical model (or what he has developed on his own) - however, in general terms, there might be two problems with the forecast.
Temperatures - Temperatures might struggle to get below freezing and stay there. Some places in the DFW area (according to the wunderground personal stations) are below freezing, but the city locations are still above freezing. If temperatures stay above freezing (don't wet bulb down), then while it might sleet (since the atmosphere is/will be cold enough), then it will not freeze. Likely with the next batch being more significant, this will not be a problem, that we will wetbulb and cool generally down below freezing. The temps might not get down into the 20s (if it got down to the 20s - more significant problems would result), but temps might hover around 30F or 31F (barring unexpected events) and in the morning it will at least stay around freezing I think while the precipitation stay around. However, it is likely to rise in the afternoon as the precipitation ends. Now, the Canadian Model is showing Surface Low development that would allow more cold air to filter in from the north, temperatures could get colder than forecast (into 20s), but this is unlikely possibility at the moment.
Precipitation - Precipitation will likely more of a problem - models are coming up a bit drier around the area. Instead of a inch+ of precipitation in previous model runs, we are getting around an 1.00" of sleet/freezing rain on latest runs. Whatever method Steve is using might be cluing him into this fact - still an inch of sleet or freezing rain would be significant - but it might be less than expected. We won't really know until the event starts to occur tonight on how my moisture is going to filter in from the pacific and the gulf. We could over-perform here (matching previous predictions of 1.25" to 1.50" of sleet), but we could only have 0.75" to 1.00" of sleet or freezing rain - still significant - but not what was expected initially.
-There are my thoughts - I'm not a meteorologist and these are just amateur observations.
This 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 the NHC and NWS products.
Is the precip showing up in southwest Texas the precip expected to move in overnight? I've come to realization that you just have to wait it out, but I am pretty anxious to see how it unfolds. When we had our DFW snowstorm in Feb. of 2011, we were only forcasted for a few inches I believe. Also, the winter (2010?) we got sleet, temps into the low teens and 6 inches of dry fluffy snow one night. We weren't supposed to get that much snow but we did, and I remember watching it unfold on the radar.
