Monday, January 21, 2013

Close Call Thursday Night?

It's still early, but Thursday needs to be watched for parts of Region 8. The models are not agreeing too well, so we have to weigh out which model has done well this winter and which has not done well. There is a model we use called the NAM. Typically, it's not too shabby. this winter, it has been a dumpster fire. Other models include the GFS, Euro, and a few others we use from time to time. The Euro has done very well in short-range and mid-range forecasting. Both the Euro and GFS agree on the overall setup for Thursday night, but the Euro is a little colder at the surface. Let's first take a look at what the Euro thinks about temperatures early Friday morning. Click image to enlarge:
Notice, the white line is the freezing line. It goes right through Region 8. So, according to the Euro, the cold air is in place. Now, let's look at the amount of precipitation that will fall through Thursday night until Friday morning:
If you look at the maps prior to these, you will see that they also show sub-freezing air over parts of Region 8 with precipitation developing.

This does not look like a snow setup at this time, but could mean sleet or freezing rain for some areas on Thursday night in Friday morning. We need to watch it closely to see how this may impact our Friday morning. The good news is, even if we get some wintry weather, we should see the temperatures close to 40 Friday afternoon to melt anything that does develop.

We'll watch it closely.
Ryan

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