NWA Conference

I will be at the NWA conference in Norfolk Virginia for the next week so depending upon whether the hotel has free WiFi controls my blogging. Ill try to blog if anything exciting happens, but after this weekend it looks like things get boring.

You also might wondering why I haven't blogged about this weekends storm. And that's because I just don't believe much snow is coming. The soundings are just showing me that the atmosphere won't be able to support much frozen precipitation. You need to live high up to get accumulations with this one. There is always the possibility that all models could be wrong, I'm wrong, and we get 8 feet of snow. But I doubt it, winter is still coming.... :)

Check out this map

This is the predicted snow cover 36 hours from now: (Bull's eye over Sussex)

Snow swath shifts east?

This is from the 00z NAM (just came out at like 10:40 PM). Anyway, it's now bringing in the colder air and heavy precipitation into our area. If this stays consistent by tomorrow morning then expect heavy snowfall. Check back for updates sometime tomorrow.

First snow of the season?

Yeah, that's right. It's going to snow across the higher terrain of Northwest Jersey in October yet again! The issue is that the area is right on the edge of the rain/snow line so I don't expect any accumulation at the lower elevations, as of right now that is. Sorry Newton, Branchville, Vernon Valley, Sussex, and the rest of the central valley in Sussex County it's not your storm. If you live along the High Point ridge then expect accumulating snowfall and that goes for the highlands from Mount Olive, Hopatcong, Jefferson, and up to West Milford.

As of right now it's hard to tell how much snow will pile up, and that reason is because if it's 31.5 and snowing then your in good shape, but if it's 32.5 then you may have some issues. That's just how early season snowfall works. Places like Mountain Creek will be snow capped and that could lead to downed trees if the worst case scenario happens. And after last years ice storm, that is the last thing they want.

This is what the latest NAM is showing for the surface for Friday at 2:00 A.M:

Saturday, 8:00 AM

Now let's move to my smoking gun of the storm. The atmospheric soundings. Now imagine this as a vertical model of the atmosphere, the surface is 1000mb and then pressure decreases with height. Now look at the two white lines. The one on the left is dew point and the other is temperature. The first thing you see is how the two lines seem to merge together, this tells you the atmosphere is saturated and can really support heavy precipitation. Ok, no big deal, that even happens in the summer. But look at the bottom of the Skew-T, you see those blue numbers? That's surface temperature in Celcius, and it's forecasted to be right on the freezing mark. That means the atmosphere at Andover Airport can support snow at an elevation of 583 feet, if you like at 1,000 feet things could get interesting. And at 1,500 feet, prepare to potentially shovel...

It's going to be a close call, and if you get A LOT of snow don't be surprised. If you get no snow, don't be surprised either. Local conditions will vary and the usual "snowy spots" will yet again be the big winners.

Check back for more updates, I'm in winter storm mode...

Year without a summer, and a year without fall...

This is quoted from Joe Bastardi on his blog this afternoon. It's something that has been something I have been watching and we might get another major October snow event, and elevation is crucial. This winter is going to come early...

MONDAY 4 PM

"MAYBE NOT THE YEAR WITHOUT A SUMMER, BUT MAYBE THE YEAR WITHOUT A FALL FOLIAGE DISPLAY.

It does not take much wet snow to fall a tree still full of leaves. Late last week I started opining that there could be one heck of a winter event in the interior northeast... and it will be an event in the I-80 corridor in the plains and midwest, but for the northeast above 1500 feet from WVA to New england there is more at stake here as the period Thursday pm into Sunday could bring 2 wet snow events as a major trough pivots through the northeast with 3 separate storms over a 5 day period. The one in the middle, For Friday, should just turn into an out and out noreaster but at this time of the year, there is so much warm air around, that storms can develop quickly back near trough axis and so a second weekend storm may follow.

So here is the deal, if you live above 15 hundred feet in Pa NJ, New York, and New England I would be concerned you have enough accumulating snow to have trees breaking around you. That goes for Maryland too and into the central high ground of WVA> but the fact is it snows at this time of the year more often in places like Beckley and Bluefield so its not as big a deal."

Latest Fall Foliage Update

This is from the Fall Foliage Network:

As you can see the state is very diverse when it comes to color. You have some areas where the color is low, to places where the color will most likely peak in the next few days. Surprising, the elevation really matters. Tomorrow I will get some pictures of mountain side in the Allamuchy's and the top of half is at peak color, where the bottom still has a lot of green. And that is representative of pretty much the whole northwest corner of Jersey. Updates tomorrow.

I have also been working on my winter season forecast. Which is really long right now, sorry about that. It's almost done and will be posted in the coming week. And I'll also be talking about how our first snow could just be days away.

Cold snap coming, with snow?

As of now all of the long range weather models see a cold shot coming down out of Canada and a storm coming up from the south. Each one is most certainly showing snow for most of the northeast, even in the big cities. The GFS, CMC, NOGAPS, and EURO are all having the same idea and are staying consistent. There is a possibility of snow, but as of right it is unsure what will happen on October 12th.

GFS model:

Euro model:

NOGAPS Model:

CMC model:

Check back in tomorrow for latest updates to see what evolves out of the models!