Nice day for the last day...of Winter. Spring kicks off at 7:02 AM EDT. But....yeah. You know.
FLURRIES?
There will be a weak amount of lift tomorrow afternoon leading some cold air into the region. That may be just enough to squeeze out some snowflakes. Maybe drizzle if rise too much in lower levels. Either way, we will be above freezing during the day--no issues.
WEEKEND MESS
The picture remains quite muddy on this setup. But ...less mud than yesterday.
First wave will be on Friday. That will stay to our south/west...bringing a southern snow for AR/MS/AL/GA and maybe far west KY? It will miss our counties...but it will be a close call. Hmmmm.
NAM SNOW MAP FRIDAY NIGHT
Then as we head into SATURDAY NIGHT...we start to feel the influence of the main system. Timing is crucial here as we may see light rain in the afternoon...then changing to snow/sleet or even a risk for some brief freezing rain (impacting elevated objects). That part remains too unclear to get more specific. So we plan to just stick with rain or snow for now.
Here is the model output of the EURO
The light blue box is the surface temp in Celsius. .5 which is 32.9° F. The second darker blue box is the temps aloft. Usually you get into a snow situation once it drops below zero...but for March, -3 or lower is certainly much more preferred. It is showing up at .7C. So that indicates rain. And the pink box is amount of precip.. .08".
So yes, there is that chance for sleet/freezing rain if you go by the EURO late Saturday night, but you can see how the surface temp does rise that morning---so only a brief issue.
GFS is much warmer with Saturday night by the way---pure rain.
Just giving you a little fun model breakdown of how we look at the layers on different models.
SUNDAY--- the GFS/EURO vary quite a bit on which low will be the more dominate feature. GFS is stronger with the upper low... the EURO is stronger with a surface low across the SE corner of the country.
The GFS idea would result in quite a warming for Sunday. It suggests 50s to near 60 across southern counties. Snow well to our north/west.
EURO is similar on a rain idea, but not as warm. A colder rain.
Then by late Sunday into Monday, they both agree that the upper low will send temps crashing enough for light snow.
But as I stated, the GFS is stronger with the upper low so the GFS idea would indicate cold/windy with some decent snow showers. Some that may last a few days in fact.
EURO moves the upper low along pretty fast. So maybe one day of snow showers then just chilly weather.
It is interesting to check the GFS ensembles however...which are a blend of model idea from the GFS. It has the upper low MUCH closer to us Sunday into Monday...similar to EURO. So we are not jumping on the highs near 60 idea for now on Sunday.
NO model indicates a big snow event for our area at this time.
Indicies still show how the pattern has pushed the AO to very very low levels. This supports a cold period next week with snow showers.
NAO remains negative as well to further support a very slow moving weather pattern in the days ahead.
CURRENT THOUGHTS:
We have to watch Friday night carefully to our west/southwest. It looks like light rain Saturday afternoon. Maybe a mix Saturday night. Warming back to rain Sunday. Chilling back to snow Sunday night into Monday. Snow showers likely until about Wednesday of next week with some light accumulations certainly possible. Especially at night.
Another system is showing up Easter Weekend. But ummm yeah. We'll wait to dicuss that one.
There are signs a pattern change will kick in by early April. Finally----signs of a warm-up to what could be a "normal" spring pattern.
NOTE: if we clear out and calm the winds down tomorrow night...we may get awful close to record lows. Record in Louisville is 17°. Forecast is about 20 or 21 right now. Regardless, not exactly the best first night of spring?!!?!
First off Smarty pants! and I got sea sick just reading this.lol
HAHA :) Sorry. It was jumbly for sure. - BG
Posted by: Rainbowwheels | March 19, 2013 at 05:36 PM