Saturday, January 24, 2009

Discussion from Yesterday

Forgot, to post it yesterday. When I mention yesterday, that means thursday.

Alright, as you guys know we have two/three shortwaves heading into the region during next week. The models have been trending a bit north and better for many areas. The idea that is presented is that the storm is a cold storm, that moves through a zonal flow and nearly straight across the Continental United States. A few days ago this storm looked good for I-95 and AccuWeather made note of the possibility of a storm with snow and ice with rain to the south of it. Then the models trended into suppression and gave VA south good snows and light snow into Maryland.
Not only was there suppression but there was also the fact that the low was being kept back into the western CONUS. This caused a slower storm and the precip being delayed. The meteorologists up and down the Eastern Seaboard disagreed with the energy being left back in the west and the low closing off near the CA/NV border.
Yesterday, the trend began shifting in the other direction and the cut off low idea has been delayed or even eliminated in the past runs of the GFS, GEFS, and GGEM. The idea now is a more progressive idea taking the storm out of the Rockies traveling over the MW CONUS and heading through the OV and Southern Mid-Atlantic. What I am beginning to see more clearly is that the models will begin to follow the normal winter track, and head more north than currently modeled.
As of now, the impact areas would be MD, DE, and VA but I expect the trend to take things north. Now not as north as other storms have trended, so I think the low will go over Central VA giving MD, DE, and PA snows with DC getting snow but S MD getting mixing with the snow.
What I would like to say is that there is a good potential for a moderate snowfall event with totals over 4+ inches next week throughout the region and due to that I will go into Level 1 Alert Mode. Also, schools may need to be altered, but delay/closings are unsure so I will only issue a Winter School Statement meaning schools may be affected but it is unsure how and the storm is still a bit away. That is all for now, I will keep you posted.

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