Friday, February 20, 2009

Snow Tomorrow?

The Region 8 Storm TEAM is going out on a limb with our snow forecast for tomorrow. Other weather sources are just going with rain. We'll see what happens! EDIT- NWS ended up putting minor accumulations in the forecast too. We mayboth be wrong! lol


I am fairly confident about flakes falling from the sky. I'm just not sure how well it will "stick". It's harder to get snow to stick in the daylight hours and temperatures will likely be above freezing. So, do you wonder how it can snow with temperatures above freezing? Well.... the below image is a forecast sounding. More or less, it is a profile of the temperature and dewpoint as you go up through the atmosphere. I have clearly marked the 0° Celsius line for you. If you notice, the temperatures will be below freezing at 600 feet. Snow will probably form between 12-16K feet in the atmosphere and will fall to the ground. It will hit the air above freezing and will continue to fall. Now, it's unlikely the snowflakes will melt in only 600 feet of above freezing air.

This is why the Region 8 StormTEAM is going to forecast snow for tomorrow. Another limiting factor for snow will be the speed of the storm. This stuff will only last a couple of hours.

So, my official forecast is for some areas to see an inch or less. Some areas may see a little more, mainly north. The roads will only be wet. Any accumulations would be on grassy surfaces.

I'll keep you posted if things change... and they probably will!

Ryan

PS- There is NO RISK for ice! This temperature profile is COMPLETELY opposite of an ice storm. During an ice storm, the temperatures on the ground are below freezing and the temperatures above are above freezing.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

your snow forecast is not looking so hot. looks like the precip will be out of here before it gets cold enough. chalk one up for the nws guys in memphis. i like your optimism though.

Ryan said...

It's still not over anonymous, but the rain is moving out fast...lol

The NWS ended up going with minor accumulations too.

We'll see