Texas Winter 2025-2026

[snownado]

The 12z NAM is in. Regardless of the precip type you get expect a Major winter storm for the northern half of Texas.

https://i.ibb.co/hJBWCykD/IMG-0601.jpg
https://i.ibb.co/Lzn9kcPy/IMG-0602.jpg
https://i.ibb.co/pV7sbP1/IMG-0603.jpg

Those maps don't tell the whole story.

The temps in the Metroplex proper hover between 30-32*F for the bulk of the event, which would help to keep accretion / accumulation in check.

I agree it's still going to be an impactful event, but the hype we've had the past 48-72 mgiht end up being overblown in hindsight if the current trends continue.

Even with GHD 2011, it was mainly a travel impact locally.

[cheezyWXguy]

Still thinking this is a bit too far north with the freezing line/warm nose, but who knows how much. The front always advances south faster than modeled, and more often than not it seem north Texas gets missed to the south instead of the north. I do wonder about the warm air advection though. In the past I’ve been happy to write it off as overdone, but last year’s event does make me wary…

[Texas Snow]

I assume data from the sampling that the NOAA plane did last night is part of the model guidance.

I don’t think the flight last night actually dropped anything according to prior post in this forum. The first scheduled one is at 19:00 today. It was reported last night that the flight was preposition it for today’s reconnaissance not actually sampling but again that info is from me reading every post in this thread, not outside sources.

Edit: From Cycloneye. viewtopic.php?t=125040&start=3220

[rwfromkansas]

Well, frustrating we can't just get some consistency from many days out. Creates this mental roller coaster. Yesterday I said KS wouldn't get much, and the NBM has them getting a lot, lol. At least it has some for DFW still.

Just trying to stay calm, some past storms had a freak out, so trying to keep things in perspective. It's a big storm no matter what happens IMBY.

[Ntxw]

If we believe the new phase, how far south the ULL travels matters now too. At this rate there might be trends to a raging blizzard in west Texas and shifting east, the further south it goes.

[snownado]

If we believe the new phase, how far south the ULL travels matters now too. At this rate there might be trends to a raging blizzard in west Texas and shifting east, the further south it goes.

There's also the possibility that could lead to an even sharper left turn of the surface low, putting places like Chicago & Detroit at play for quite a bit of snow (wild to even imagine)...

[Portastorm]

I assume data from the sampling that the NOAA plane did last night is part of the model guidance.

I don’t think the flight last night actually dropped anything according to prior post in this forum. The first scheduled one is at 19:00 today. It was reported last night that the flight was preposition it for today’s reconnaissance not actually sampling but again that info is from me reading every post in this thread, not outside sources.

Edit: From Cycloneye. viewtopic.php?t=125040&start=3220

Thank you for correcting me and clarifying the timing! Keep hope alive and let’s kick the NAM to the curb!

[rwfromkansas]

If we believe the new phase, how far south the ULL travels matters now too. At this rate there might be trends to a raging blizzard in west Texas and shifting east, the further south it goes.

Do you think the phase is likely from your experience?

Also, I'm a little confused since the other day we said a phase would bring cold air down sooner. Now it delays it. Why?

[Quixotic]

Sounding is today. Yesterday was a test run.

[Quixotic]

If we believe the new phase, how far south the ULL travels matters now too. At this rate there might be trends to a raging blizzard in west Texas and shifting east, the further south it goes.

Do you think the phase is likely from your experience?

Also, I'm a little confused since the other day we said a phase would bring cold air down sooner. Now it delays it. Why?

Amplifies the sw flow and pushes back or moderates the cold. Again, models have difficulties with shallow dense air masses and this is why midrange is so difficult to stomach.

[cheezyWXguy]

If we believe the new phase, how far south the ULL travels matters now too. At this rate there might be trends to a raging blizzard in west Texas and shifting east, the further south it goes.

Do you think the phase is likely from your experience?

Also, I'm a little confused since the other day we said a phase would bring cold air down sooner. Now it delays it. Why?

My understanding is that the phase doesn’t occur as cleanly as was depicted the other day. The low hangs back a bit and stays a little too separated from the main trough, leading to warm air advection overwhelming the cold aloft. Could be wrong though.

[Ntxw]

If we believe the new phase, how far south the ULL travels matters now too. At this rate there might be trends to a raging blizzard in west Texas and shifting east, the further south it goes.

Do you think the phase is likely from your experience?

Also, I'm a little confused since the other day we said a phase would bring cold air down sooner. Now it delays it. Why?

I would pass on an ice storm (frzing rain). But I would take the chance of a 2011 redux storm because just to our west were blizzard warnings in Abilene and conditions in our western counties. A colder, further south track I would give a shot again. Just looking at it from what's on the field currently on the guidance.

[TheAustinMan]

Just to tag along with the recon clarifications, the mission is this afternoon/evening. Yesterday's flight was just for repositioning. We can verify this in the model ingest status for the 12z GFS... no "dropw"s (dropsonde datasets) were eaten by the model. I would imagine they will start showing up in the 06z run tomorrow.

[iorange55]

Feels like this happens every single time. Models are rarely going to show the same exact scenario every run, especially when it comes to winter weather this far south. We're talking temps being off by 2-3 degrees, which happens all the time in forecasting... it's just with this storm, it means a lot more.

[BAY29]

need it to run a few degrees colder to get in on the action in Houston.

[cheezyWXguy]

Interesting to note, the nam 3k has the 2m freezing line farther south in west Texas at hour 60 than the nam 12k does, despite the low looking very slightly more separated at 500mb. Pattern hair -splitting aside, this might signal that higher res guidance may depict a faster onset of freezing temps in future runs than the courser models show right now. Of course, this could be hopium, but I guess we’ll see.

[CaptinCrunch]

[JDawg512]

I'm rooting for just liquid as I always do. This back and forth is annoying, but I'm just taking everything today with a grain of salt, tomorrow is when I will pay closer attention.

[Tireman4]

Just to tag along with the recon clarifications, the mission is this afternoon/evening. Yesterday's flight was just for repositioning. We can verify this in the model ingest status for the 12z GFS... no "dropw"s (dropsonde datasets) were eaten by the model. I would imagine they will start showing up in the 06z run tomorrow.

https://i.imgur.com/8wy2GUy.gif

Yeah, I was thinking they would run those on Thursday's models. It was just a hunch.

[jasons2k]

The 12z NAM can’t be trusted, sorry, it’s lagging way too far behind on the plunging shallow air. Wait ‘till tomorrow at least - it may not catch up until Friday, if ever, with this one.