Absolute Vorticity

airwolf76 wrote: ↑Wed Mar 09, 2022 12:13 pm its hard for me to get excited about snows in March. its always marginal temps , warm ground and never sticks to roads or anything. its been snowing here for about 4 hours now and not much to show for it, so much for a cold March

90p/c of the time you are correct. Two things working for our advantage is the time of day which is when the sun sets until early morning Saturday. The second item is more important and that is we are seeing a spoke of the polar vortex involved and though its a narrow area it looks to have its biggest impact in our area at the correct time. So we end up going from wet roads to slush and then ice as temps drop quickly into the 20's and then probably upper teens by Saturday morning. By Sunday afternoon though temps will be in the 40's as the March sun does its dirty work.

I cherish snow whether it sticks or not. Always hope that it sticks as any sane person would.

tron777 wrote: ↑Wed Mar 09, 2022 12:47 pm I cherish snow whether it sticks or not. Always hope that it sticks as any sane person would.

Les could you give me the definition of sane lol

tpweather wrote: ↑Wed Mar 09, 2022 12:51 pm

tron777 wrote: ↑Wed Mar 09, 2022 12:47 pm I cherish snow whether it sticks or not. Always hope that it sticks as any sane person would.

Les could you give me the definition of sane lol

Ha! Most sane people don't root for snowstorms!

EU very similar to Gfs

So is this winter's last stand or does Pa Custer have something more around the 20th / 21st?

0.28" from the Euro at CVG QPF wise. So we've got the NAM, GFS, Euro, UKIE all in that 1-3" range. CMC, RGEM in the 3-6" range.

dce wrote: ↑Wed Mar 09, 2022 1:03 pm

tpweather wrote: ↑Wed Mar 09, 2022 12:51 pm

tron777 wrote: ↑Wed Mar 09, 2022 12:47 pm I cherish snow whether it sticks or not. Always hope that it sticks as any sane person would.

Les could you give me the definition of sane lol

Ha! Most sane people don't root for snowstorms!

We are all in the minority there!

MVWxObserver wrote: ↑Wed Mar 09, 2022 1:18 pm So is this winter's last stand or does Pa Custer have something more around the 20th / 21st?

As I said to Mike the other day, I wouldn't mind doing a Part 2 thread for that event. Seen it pop up off and on last couple of days.

tron777 wrote: ↑Wed Mar 09, 2022 12:47 pm I cherish snow whether it sticks or not. Always hope that it sticks as any sane person would.

The few, the proud, the snow weenies.
BTW ride the rgem till the fat lady sings.

15Z SREF shows about a 2" mean for most of us and nearing 3" out East say by CMH. We lost a lot of those silly weenie members so the avg came down by an inch from this morning as a result. Makes sense and in perfect agreement with the forecast.

Snowbrain2 wrote: ↑Wed Mar 09, 2022 2:17 pm

tron777 wrote: ↑Wed Mar 09, 2022 12:47 pm I cherish snow whether it sticks or not. Always hope that it sticks as any sane person would.

The few, the proud, the snow weenies.
BTW ride the rgem till the fat lady sings.

RGEM and CMC are the weeniest solutions for sure.

12Z EPS Mean has 2" for 3/4's of AV Posters and a 3" mean for our far eastern counties.

18Z NAM is rolling in and it's been holding at the 0.25" QPF mark for CVG.

I love our call folks... 1" NW 2" in the middle and 3" out East will be common. Cannot rule out a 4" amount in the furthest SE areas if we have anyone there lol So the 1-4" call is golden. I think CVG can do 2". That will be my personal call for my own hood as well. I'm just not seeing any support for the higher Canadian solutions at this time. Should be a solid winter weather advisory event for many.

Good Afternoon and here is my take of what I have seen today. The local forecast looks good and 1-3 inches look good imo. First the front itself may have a tad more moisture than some earlier models showed. Saying this I believe folks in the Indy area may see 1-2 inches as I believe the front itself may produce 1 inch alone. So would this add to the totals here and something I need to maybe update and if so it would be in the 2-4 inch total but at the moment leaving 1-3 inches for most folks. I believe from what I have seen is that eastern Kentucky and southeast Ohio may be a big winner with how things played out today and could easily see a winter storm watch issued for them on Thursday. I could see 4-6 inches and a few areas getting higher totals.

Still 48 hours away so we know the forecast can change but from what I see is an advisory will be issued for us late on Thursday and folks to the east will probably be issued a winter storm watch. How close will that watch get to us is still up in the air.

tpweather wrote: ↑Wed Mar 09, 2022 4:19 pm Still 48 hours away so we know the forecast can change but from what I see is an advisory will be issued for us late on Thursday and folks to the east will probably be issued a winter storm watch. How close will that watch get to us is still up in the air.

I totally agree, great post!

18Z RGEM still showing 3-6" for everyone. Wow... that model refuses to back down.

Les my biggest take today I believe is the models are not quite understanding how cold this air mass is and how it may affect snow totals. I had a 9-1 or 10-1 at the start of the system and that may be true but the changeover to a 15-1 or maybe 20-1 may come in quicker and that is why I may need to raise totals somewhat. Seeing some areas in the great lakes over the next couple of nights to see overnight lows at least -10 and no we will not get that cold but we area getting a quick cold shot and with no warm layer during the storm temps can fall quickly.

You can see a subtle hint on most of the models that a band of heavier snow is showing up Northwest of Cincinnati and Dayton and, of course, the heavier snows to the east of the area. Dayton and Cincinnati seem to be kind of in the middle of these two areas. Even on the RGEM you can see it to a lesser degree. I hope it doesn't happen as depicted.

Doug,

That is an interesting (and nervous) observation. Looks like the models are picking up on two distant mesoscale, or heavier bands of snow with this system. Most folks get an inch or two. But 2-3" isolated 4"??? may occur in a few isolated areas. Hopefully we are not in those screw zones. We will need to monitor frontogenic forcing in the deformation band on the eastern band and on the NW band it is as the arctic front is diving in and the southern wave begins to phase with it.

Guys it is a strange look an the only thing I can guess is that the models are having a hard time seeing where the lowest pressures may be located. Lots of moving parts in a short period so that could be the reason.

tpweather wrote: ↑Wed Mar 09, 2022 4:52 pm Les my biggest take today I believe is the models are not quite understanding how cold this air mass is and how it may affect snow totals. I had a 9-1 or 10-1 at the start of the system and that may be true but the changeover to a 15-1 or maybe 20-1 may come in quicker and that is why I may need to raise totals somewhat. Seeing some areas in the great lakes over the next couple of nights to see overnight lows at least -10 and no we will not get that cold but we area getting a quick cold shot and with no warm layer during the storm temps can fall quickly.

Temps and atmospheric profiles Tim are fine. I'm not worried about a slow changeover from rain to snow. 850s will be crashing hard as will surface temps. No frz rain or sleet concerns imho. The changeover should be pretty quick. We'll see Fri evening together lol

My biggest concern is amount of precip. Cold is no issue, agree with you there. The speed of the system is against us. I'd say max 4-8 hours total of accumulating snow. It is a short window. Flurries and lighter snows the rest of the time so we've got to make hay. No -NAO so no slow moving bomb. Just isn't going to happen. Our system eventually gives way to an EC Low too so we have that going against massive QPF. Quarter inch is avg (not counting CMC / RGEM higher solutions) so it's really hard to argue against most people's 1-4" NW to SE type of thinking. An earlier phase is the only way to achieve high totals, other wise this will be a light (but fun since it is March) like system.

tpweather wrote: ↑Wed Mar 09, 2022 6:51 pm Guys it is a strange look an the only thing I can guess is that the models are having a hard time seeing where the lowest pressures may be located. Lots of moving parts in a short period so that could be the reason.

If you are referring to the low looking like it's jumping around on some model runs it is because there is a transfer of an energy to our low in WV that another low further east that tracks inland and intensifies to bury Interior New England. If the low remained the domain one and strengthened over WV and PA instead, we'd get clobbered.