Texas Winter 2024-2025

[South Texas Storms]

Good points/comments! It’s not easy decision-making to be certain. But IMO the call didn’t need to made so early, especially with today being a holiday. They had time. And granted, I make these comments assuming the model trends for less QPF verify. Of course it doesn’t take much to create travel havoc … I’ve seen 0.05” of FZDZ shut this town down. So we shall see.

Meanwhile we have a very good, astute TV met here named Avery Tomasco. This morning he’s been all over this coming event and has noticed greater moisture return inland and earlier than anticipated. Furthermore the NAM is now showing more moisture inland and reversing the meso model trends for less precip. Yeah, I know it’s the NAM … lol … but one must hang his hat on whatever hook he can find.

It’s interesting and for some reason the Canadian has held firm with bringing solid accumulation to the Austin area. I’ve been waiting for it and the RGEM to cave but it hasn’t happened as of yet.

Some of these models are obviously going to be wrong in a big way and so we wait to find out which one.

The cloud deck advancing northward several hours ahead of schedule gives me some hope of a little more snow for areas along and north of IH-10. We're also already seeing areas of precipitation develop across south TX, which is also a bit earlier than expected. Promising trends this morning...we'll see how it all plays out tonight!

[SoupBone]

It’s interesting and for some reason the Canadian has held firm with bringing solid accumulation to the Austin area. I’ve been waiting for it and the RGEM to cave but it hasn’t happened as of yet.

Some of these models are obviously going to be wrong in a big way and so we wait to find out which one.

The cloud deck advancing northward several hours ahead of schedule gives me some hope of a little more snow for areas along and north of IH-10. We're also already seeing areas of precipitation develop across south TX, which is also a bit earlier than expected. Promising trends this morning...we'll see how it all plays out tonight!

You will either become famous like wxman, or become infamous.........like wxman with this type of forecast.

[TomballEd]

Schools have started making those calls almost too early here recently. Last week we were canceled and only ended up with 34F rain. There is a balance between waiting until 5am on the day of and doing it days ahead of time. At least with this storm they did it based on pretty aggressive official forecasts, that may have ended up premature. I will withhold judgement until the event occurs though as there still can be last minute surprises. I go back to last week when Tulsa got 6" while forecast 12 hours before bare showed any snow for NE OK at all and DFW was forecasted by some for 6" and they got basically nothing. There is societal pressure for ISDs to make the call early but then major backlash when they make the wrong call. It is not an enviable spot for superintendents.

Good points/comments! It’s not easy decision-making to be certain. But IMO the call didn’t need to made so early, especially with today being a holiday. They had time. And granted, I make these comments assuming the model trends for less QPF verify. Of course it doesn’t take much to create travel havoc … I’ve seen 0.05” of FZDZ shut this town down. So we shall see.

Meanwhile we have a very good, astute TV met here named Avery Tomasco. This morning he’s been all over this coming event and has noticed greater moisture return inland and earlier than anticipated. Furthermore the NAM is now showing more moisture inland and reversing the meso model trends for less precip. Yeah, I know it’s the NAM … lol … but one must hang his hat on whatever hook he can find.

It’s interesting and for some reason the Canadian has held firm with bringing solid accumulation to the Austin area. I’ve been waiting for it and the RGEM to cave but it hasn’t happened as of yet.

I suspect the RGEM locally suffers from being near the edge of the grid where boundary conditions are set by the Canadian Global. RGEM works well in the NEUSA.

[Ralph's Weather]

Schools have started making those calls almost too early here recently. Last week we were canceled and only ended up with 34F rain. There is a balance between waiting until 5am on the day of and doing it days ahead of time. At least with this storm they did it based on pretty aggressive official forecasts, that may have ended up premature. I will withhold judgement until the event occurs though as there still can be last minute surprises. I go back to last week when Tulsa got 6" while forecast 12 hours before bare showed any snow for NE OK at all and DFW was forecasted by some for 6" and they got basically nothing. There is societal pressure for ISDs to make the call early but then major backlash when they make the wrong call. It is not an enviable spot for superintendents.

Good points/comments! It’s not easy decision-making to be certain. But IMO the call didn’t need to made so early, especially with today being a holiday. They had time. And granted, I make these comments assuming the model trends for less QPF verify. Of course it doesn’t take much to create travel havoc … I’ve seen 0.05” of FZDZ shut this town down. So we shall see.

Meanwhile we have a very good, astute TV met here named Avery Tomasco. This morning he’s been all over this coming event and has noticed greater moisture return inland and earlier than anticipated. Furthermore the NAM is now showing more moisture inland and reversing the meso model trends for less precip. Yeah, I know it’s the NAM … lol … but one must hang his hat on whatever hook he can find.

It’s interesting and for some reason the Canadian has held firm with bringing solid accumulation to the Austin area. I’ve been waiting for it and the RGEM to cave but it hasn’t happened as of yet.

I don't see huge difference in the models, Canadian just has a touch more consistent moisture throughout the column. Forcing and overall moisture do not vary much model to model. Goes to show how fine of a line it is between nothing and heavy snow. We are really almost into nowcast mode.

[JDawg512]

I was gonna say to your point TxTwister78 that your right. EXW forecasted even as late as yesterday that at least the first half of the day would be sunny, the clouds came in early this morning. I had a small medical procedure done and I was noticing at 8:45 that it was overcast. Current temp is hovering around freezing. I figured we'd be above freezing by now and definitely seeing some light returns on radar and it's not even noon. Will be interesting to see how the rest of the day goes.

[Stratton23]

Moisture is ahead of schedule and temperatures are colder than anticipated due to the cloud cover, very interesting, could make a big difference later this evening

[TeamPlayersBlue]

Moisture is ahead of schedule and temperatures are colder than anticipated due to the cloud cover, very interesting, could make a big difference later this evening

My only worry with that now is that colder temps mean more suppression. Such a fine line for perfection down there. Hate being that guy.

Jason had a good point on the potential for a second band to the north. The 700mb level will be close to the DGZ, and maybe that can help increase totals to the north.As of now, they will not have anyhwhere near as much moisture or lift as the south Houston area.

[Ralph's Weather]

For N TX into N LA, we need to watch the 700mb front and if it can overcome the low level dry air via strong forcing. That is the reason that models have been showing light but widespread accumulating snow up there wherever it generates strong lift. As that front pushes south it will enhance the snow over SE TX. SE TX falls apart in SE TX on the NAM because that front kinda dissipates as it moves south. That seems to be the biggest difference on models for where gets decent snow.

In short, follow the 700mb front tonight and tomorrow morning. It starts off along I20 around midnight and moves off the coast by midday tomorrow. That is your window for snow across the eastern half of TX. These situations can lead to localized heavy snow which we in N TX experience a few times per winter.

[bigddstranny]

It’s interesting and for some reason the Canadian has held firm with bringing solid accumulation to the Austin area. I’ve been waiting for it and the RGEM to cave but it hasn’t happened as of yet.

Some of these models are obviously going to be wrong in a big way and so we wait to find out which one.

The cloud deck advancing northward several hours ahead of schedule gives me some hope of a little more snow for areas along and north of IH-10. We're also already seeing areas of precipitation develop across south TX, which is also a bit earlier than expected. Promising trends this morning...we'll see how it all plays out tonight!

We've been cloudy all day here in Cedar Park.

[TeamPlayersBlue]

Its very light but the radar echos near Corpus Christi, are they reaching the ground?

[Ralph's Weather]

Its very light but the radar echos near Corpus Christi, are they reaching the ground?

MPing shows rain near Brownsville, nothing near Corpus.

[JDawg512]

It's finally above freezing here at the Rain Cave.

[TheAustinMan]

While it's a little unclear what the early push of low to mid-level moisture means for vertical lift and moisture in the dendritic growth zone, more moisture at 700-800mb (where this cloud deck is concentrated) may allow for an earlier onset of evaporating precipitation aloft, which may cool the below-cloud layer a little more than previously modeled. We can see a slight cooling trend in the trend animation of HRRR 850mb temperatures immediately below the cloud deck, mainly along the line from Waco/Lufkin and points south:
Source: PivotalWeather


This may make the low-level and surface-layer colder and more humid. If this holds, this could push precipitation types away from rain towards freezing rain/sleet, or freezing rain towards sleet, as the trend in the HRRR suggested below. For a better chance of snow, we'll need to see uptrends in moisture and lift between 500-700 hPa, above the current cloud deck.
Source:TropicalTidbits

[Ralph's Weather]

It is going to be a super interesting afternoon and evening of watching the evolution of the mid to low level moisture advection. Good trends this morning area wide.

[jasons2k]

12z GFS totals are unreal are I-10 corridor in Louisiana but match up with what the GRAF model has been showing the past day.

Another takeaway from this is the banding. There is a secondary band in Northern Harris County with a dry slot in-between. These features are virtually impossible to predict so we will variable totals as you progress from the coast to the NW.

Just like any other storm, whether it's a regular rainstorm or a snowstorm, there will be spots within the broader 'lighter' areas that still have small bulls-eyes or bands of heavier amounts of precipitation.

Don't you curse us Jason. This reads much like our drought discussions from 2 years ago. You and I had rain all around us, but nothing ever hit us!

While it’s pretty obvious by now the higher average totals will be closer to the coast, I am cautiously optimistic we will see some over-performing convective bands well inland, that will still give some locations north and west of the usual I-10/59 corridor some nice surprises and photo opportunities in the morning.

[txtwister78]

School districts closing for tomorrow across SA metro.

[sphelps8681]

Houston we have a problem. Jim Cantore is in Houston.

[ThunderSleetDreams]

NAM has snow as far north as Nacogdoches.

[pwrdog]

Houston we have a problem. Jim Cantore is in Houston.

If we get 6-8 inches he will be stuck here for a while..

[orangeblood]

Just catching up...The Texas Winter Weather Roller Coaster, nothing like it!

Looks like we may have another event to track in about a week, more noise coming from the GEFS individual ensembles for early next week. If moisture/lift are there, this one could be a sneaky low level cold event worth tracking! It's air originating in NW Yukon, not Arctic, so a little hesitant to get too bullish at this time.

But good analogs with this 500mb look!!