Jan 3(Thurs)              min      max      avg

Bitt 2nw valley      28.2        40.1      34.0

Garrett College       32.8        41.3      37.0

Can-Heights            27.2        37.4      32.3

Cabin Mt

Cabin Mt north x

Spruce Knob         24.6        34.3      29.5

Snowshoe              27.0       38.8     32.9

Can-Valley Floor   28.8       41.2     35.0

Can-Valley Floor N 22.8    39.7     31.2

7Springs               25.1        35.6     30.3

Cloudy brisk day…A few tiny random flakes late morning. Skies did brighten and break a little late day. Some high ground rime in Wv. Had my first below freezing temp today as temps trended down through the morning.

Temp profile this afternoon

Nothing to show radar wise

Satellite

Flow

Surface features and 500mb height anomalies and flow

Few pics by David Carroll today from Spruce Knob and Bald Knob at Canaan as he did station maintenance and a install.

 

Beginning today, the new northern Canaan Valley site will be listed to compare with the original frost pocket site at Timberline Rd

On the models…

Short term, some rain pressing in tomorrow and on Saturday that rain should end as wet snow across the mts. Flakes to 2500-3200′, slushy coatings to 1″ 3200-4000′, 4000′ + 1-2″.. The key will be how fast it zips through.

Longer term, this dreadful zonal flow, southeast ridge combo, trough in the SW continues awhile longer and while dominant the next 2 weeks, it may begin to break down somewhat. Now models have shown this awhile to only back down and reverse course  So, keep an eye on SE ridge, the EPO, MJO, and the effects of the strat warm. Tonight’s weeklies breaks it down as follows

  The winter lovers blues….

Living in the mid Atlantic, these dismal periods are frequent, this current one is exceptionally so. But,  does that mean all is lost? No hope for a good winter? Oh. if we have to wait another 12-15 days, it may as well not snow feeling? I get it, but, some of the most memorable, bad winters and ones that set the standard bar were not all as great as some remember .

Around a month ago I was browsing through my great Aunts scrapbook of photos. I came across a message she wrote above some photos.  “Winter of 1958, worse winter we had for years. We were snowed in for the whole week, mailman or milkman couldn’t get through” 

Why for 1958, the worse winter in years, that is pretty significant. Stop right now. What are you picturing about that Winter? I would guess unrelenting snow? Brutal cold. None of this BS of rain, mild 40s, 50s. That’s back when winters were winters November until spring. In reality, that in most cases is a  false image that is rare in this part of the country.  Let’s look at that winter of 57-58. Why was it so bad?

It started out I  bet gangbusters

Oh…a November that was much warmer than this year. Snow sparse, minimal days with any cover. Temps routinely in the 50s. Ehh, November is early. December no doubt turned around…

Bare ground for Christmas, 6 days of 50s and plenty of rain leading up to Christmas day. We end December with 5.4″ of precip on the month, we stand at 26.2 inches of snow on the season.  We just ended this December at this site using midnight obs time with 5.4″ of precip and I stand at 25.2″ on the season. This December overall was colder than the 57 December.

What did those SST anomalies look like. The Dec-Feb blend had a fairly healthy Nino, weakening to a modiki Nino look , a warm NE Pacific., cooler towards the dateline, cooler west coast of Australia… that should been a cold signal. It wasn’t one early  December was well above. 

This year we have , warm NE Pacific, a overall warmer north Pacific, but a small below anomaly area near the dateline at 40N at the dateline. That should be enough as wave lengths shorten to get some trough digging, near the dateline,ridge pumping east of that into Alaska and western Canada and we lose the broad fast west to east flow. One bugaboo, I dislike which I think helps delay the trough going east, the cooler waters off the west coast of Mexico and coolish vs its surroundings off Cali, helps to continue to reform allowing that trough to reposition in the SW, and that helps keep the heights pumped up along SE coast. As wave lengths shorten, and the north Pacific pattern evolves, cold comes. That SE weakens and becomes a friend vs foe as it is now. What hurts at one period, helps another. 

So in January of 58, if it was the worse winter in years, it no doubt had to turn fast. We ( I wasnt alive yet, so they) did run a cold spell for early month, but mainly dry, and that gave way to favorable snow pattern in the 15-20th period. So it took until week 3 of January until good snows came, and a consistent active snow pattern arrived.

In February , now that’s what I’m talking about. Minimizing mild temps and holding a snowpack now for a month and a half  by the end if the month. 

But wait, theres more, March remained in an active period. Typically modoki el Ninos back winter off in March, but just as multiple good ingredients do not equal a good start to winter, one bad ingredient towards the end of the season doesn’t wipe out other good factors. That is the north Pacific for late winter. I think that warmth there is a bigger factor for cold as we go later in the season. 

While this zonal flow was expected, it’s now also much longer lived than expected, and is depressing the minds of those winter lovers, but do you think anyone who lived the winter of 57-58 recalls much what occured November, December, and the brown wet warm 50s Christmas week? A Cold but mainly dry Jan start. Not at all. For a ” worse winter”  in years ,  and having it occur mid Jan through March,  it shows how 6-8 weeks of good winter erased the memory of the start…  this is what the images left in the minds of those folks are for winter 58… 

This is not saying we are going to that. We do not have a pattern that in any way is far different than what delivered that.  We have a pattern that can deliver a good week 3 Jan through March (Anything earlier is a bonus) and put some snowy images in your mind when all is said and done that 18-19 was one to remember. Only time will tell.