Tuesday January 18 2021 Forecast (7:34AM)

114 Comments

DAYS 1-5 (JANUARY 18-22)

We’ll have a cold and blustery day today as high pressure builds into the Great Lakes and yesterday’s storm spins in the Canadian Maritimes. Tonight, high pressure slides overhead, then offshore on Wednesday. A warm front will pass by during the morning with some clouds, and the day will be the mildest of this week. Low pressure that parents this warm front will be moving eastward down the St. Lawrence Valley and its cold front will swing through the region during Thursday morning and midday with some rain to snow showers. A little wave of low pressure on the front may result in a period of snow especially across southeastern MA and RI where there may be a small accumulation before it moves away during the afternoon. This will set us up with the next shot of cold air late in the week. Friday will be mostly dry but the position of high pressure means that a northerly wind can cause some snow showers across Cape Cod. The question for Saturday’s weather is whether or not we’ll be impacted by low pressure passing to the south of the region. Some guidance says it will come close enough to give our region accumulating snow. Other guidance indicates a miss. The pattern says we’ll likely be right on the edge one way or another, and with the uncertainty in the guidance as far as a day 5 forecast goes, I’ll just lean toward a graze and can adjust either way later.

TODAY: Sun/cloud mix. Highs 28-35. Wind NW 10-20 MPH and gusty.

TONIGHT: Partly cloudy. Lows 12-19. Wind NW diminishing to under 10 MPH.

WEDNESDAY: Partly sunny. Highs 37-44. Wind variable under 10 MPH early, then SW 5-15 MPH.

WEDNESDAY NIGHT: Mostly cloudy. Chance of rain showers then snow showers overnight. Lows 25-32. Wind SW 5-15 MPH, shifting to NW.

THURSDAY: Cloudy through midday with a period of snow possible mainly southeastern MA, RI, and eastern CT that may leave a coating to 1 inch of accumulation. Increasing sun thereafter. Highs 33-40. Wind NE 5-15 MPH early then NW.

THURSDAY NIGHT: Partly cloudy. Lows 12-17. Wind NW to N 5-15 MPH, higher gusts.

FRIDAY: Sunshine except clouds and snow showers possible over Cape Cod. Highs 18-25. Wind N 10-20 MPH.

FRIDAY NIGHT: Increasing clouds. Lows 10-17. Wind N diminishing to under 10 MPH.

SATURDAY: Cloudy. Chance of snow, favoring southeastern areas. Highs 23-30. Wind NE 5-15 MPH.

DAYS 6-10 (JANUARY 23-27)

Temperatures are expected to run mostly below normal during this period. We may have to watch for a passing low pressure area to the south January 24 indicated by some guidance (but not all guidance), and another system is possible around January 26 with a chance of some snowfall. Too early to try detailing anything.

DAYS 11-15 (JANUARY 28 – FEBRUARY 1)

Temperatures near to below normal and a couple additional opportunities for wintry weather.

114 thoughts on “Tuesday January 18 2021 Forecast (7:34AM)”

    1. Well we’ll see what happens when any kind of trend emerges. I haven’t seen one yet other than 1 model says yes and the others say no. 😉 Although the one that said yes said it a little less loudly lat run. 😉

  6. Euro is drifting away slowly. I think it ends up up hitting the Mid-Atlantic. Just the way the winter has been going.

      1. Definitely too early to call last snowstorm on January 18.

        We still have a window that goes into April.

  9. Thanks TK.

    I think the Euro caves to the GFS today. This looks like a classic case of the Euro over-amplifying the southern stream.

    1. Spectacular is right. Too bad we never see those around here. It seems we barely can get eclipses to be visible. Our skies overall are generally boring.

  15. Too soon to write off the weekend. CMC moved more towards the Euro last night.

    I know the experts say it’s over amplifying, but I am going to hold out hope.

  16. 6z euro already showing less amplification. Put a fork in this one and probably the rest of winter at this rate. All this great cold and totally wasted.

    2. The rest of winter? On January 18th?

      I think this blog is now 12 years old and we have all had the exact same conversation in January every single year. Haha!

  17. That’s 2 today for the last snowstorm of the winter.

    Looking for a 3rd blogger ….

    Can I get 3 ?

    Going once ……. going twice ……..

    And here, in my mid winter blahs, I’m lamenting that we have 3 months of winter to go 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 followed by a raw cold along the coast frequently pass Memorial Day.

  21. Most of the 12z hi res guidance is quite bullish on Wednesday night-Thursday morning. I would not be surprised to see this turn into a sneaky widespread 2-5″ snow event. However, it may also be what costs us any shot at a Saturday storm, though I think those odds are limited either way.

  22. I would be happy with a few 2-4, 3-6 type events. Just hate to lose all this cold over the next weeks and get nothing.

  25. I will say this, at least January is feeling like January. Boy, do I hate an unseasonably mild January. It would be one thing if on the flipside we had an unseasonably cool July and August. But that rarely happens.

    1. To find a July with below normal temperatures in Boston, you have to go all the way back to….2021, when the month averaged 1.7 degrees below normal.

    1. The idea is, as the mets have indicated, is we remain in a vulnerable pattern.. That is good until at least February 1st. Vulnerable does not guarantee anything but you need to be vulnerable to get something.

      1. Believe me, I do get all of this and understand it well, even if I seem very negative. I just get very frustrated when we
        get an OTS storm, followed by and inside runner followed by another OTS storm. Pretty crappy sequence of events!
        Sooner or later, you’d think one will take dead aim on us.

        Time will tell.

  29. From Bernie Rayno for Saturday storm threat

    ECMWF not as strong with southern trough…looks more like the CMC…stronger than GFS but not as strong as previous runs. this would spare much of the NE. Not sure its 100% correct at this point

  30. While most of the model watching world is focused on something that the models are unreliable for, I’ll be keeping a close eye on Thursday. I agree with WxW. We gotta watch this for a “sneaky” light to moderate event. The weekend threat can be brought into focus a little more starting when Saturday is day 3, or 2 days from now. 🙂 No output for that day can really be taken seriously at this point.

    I’m sticking with this day 3 rule for a LONG TIME TO COME. 🙂

        1. Yes Saturday would be only 3 days away, but On Wednesday, Wed. is day 1, Thurs say 2, Fri day3 and
          Sat. Day 4.
          Funny thing about that.

          So the issue is what do you mean when you say
          you won’t trust the models until 3 days?

          technically Ace is correct, however, by your definition
          Wed is still 4 days. So you really mean you only
          trust the models 2 days out and not 3.

      2. You always start with day 1 as the day of your forecast (unless it’s a late-day forecast, though mine are early morning). So that day is day 1. Tomorrow day 1 will be Wed, day 2 will be Thu, day 3 will be Fri, day 4 will be Sat. 🙂

        1. Of course Ace is correct. I mentioned this days ago. It makes no sense. Friday is the third day from first thing this morning. It is like using 30 years or whatever the silly number was for an average when we have many more years information.

          And I’m not faulting you. If it has always been done that way (I cringe any time that is said), then fix it 😉

          1. Ace is only correct if you ignore the day that you’re on or the day that you’re going to. As TK mentioned, there are 4 days in there. Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. So, which day are you ignoring, the day that you’re on, or the day you’re counting down to?

            1. Simply Wednesday morning to Friday morning. Is 48 hours. There are 24 hours in a day. 48 divided by 24 is 2 and yet when a report is given on Wednesday, Friday is day three. Sorry. Cannot argue with that

            2. It’s just the difference between adding the word inclusive. 7am today (Tuesday) to 7am Saturday is 4 days, but if ur simply counting the days inclusive of Tuesday and Saturday it’s 5

              1. Makes good sense. But it worries me some that the models are not accurate what is technically 48 hours away.

      1. I haven’t changed my #’s yet there, but I agree that it has the potential to do a little more something than what I have written above.

  32. JpDave I was thinking the same thing when posting that 18z NAM run. Looks to be bad timing for the Thursday morning commute.

      1. Hmmm, I am experiencing a weird problem with my computer.
        I have been forced to use Firefox just to survive.
        With Pivotal, I am not allowed to open the page in a new pane and thus have to make a Gif and upload to imgBB so people
        can see it. Tropical Tid bits works as normal.

        I don’t see any reason why the links won’t open.

        Anyone else not able to open the links?

    2. I’m taking a 2 week break from my daily toil in February. Looking very forward to that….

      2. Is that you way of saying you will be on vacation for 2 weeks in FEB? OR taking a break from the blog for 2 weeks?
        Have we driven you that crazy?

  37. I have noticed that most of Southern Canada is getting hit by decent-sized clippers (?) every 3rd day or so. Thursday is an example of this, as you’ll see on the models. And, I’ve seen this happen periodically for quite some time. Must be a nice snow-pack up there.

  38. I think the 12z GFS had a nice coastal snowstorm at day 11.

    The 18z GFS has it as a 959mb re-do of Sunday´s storm.

    🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂

  39. Thanks TK.

    So after sifting through a bunch of model output and NWS forecast discussions, I ended up making the decision to drive up to Stratton VT yesterday to take advantage of the fresh snow. My initial concern was hazardous driving up there, high winds causing lift closures, and a changeover to mixed precip.

    The drive up 91 was all rain to Greenfield at which point the mixing began and the roads got slushy. Hit Brattleboro and it was all heavy wet snow. Driving from Brattleboro to Stratton was a full fledged snowstorm with snow packed roads. Not much traffic though so didnt have a problem with my 4WD SUV.

    Arrived at Stratton and it absolutely nuked snow all morning with no changeover….looked like 1-2″ per hour stuff. They ended up with 15″. With the low center passing nearby, the wind was dead calm from base to summit and much to my surprise remained that way most of the day. Snow cut off after lunch and we even had a break of sun. Needless to say, conditions were epic with lots of powder on the trails and it wasnt overly crowded.

    At home in Coventry, we received 2″ of snow before the changeover to rain, The only surprise was last evening….we had a burst of heavy snow that dropped another 1.2″ It was happening as we were getting back and the road conditions were TERRIBLE. Snow on wet roads with crashing temps is never good….lots of black ice underneath. Cars spinning out everywhere, stuck getting up hills, etc. Ironic that after 6 hours of driving to/from VT in a storm, the worst of it would be the last 2 miles home.

  40. As far as the upcoming pattern, I like the chances for a quick hitting couple inches Thursday and wouldnt be surprised if Saturday comes a bit closer. GFS and GGEM ensembles are pretty far off shore but there are a few NW members that would get some accumulating snow in here.

    Regardless what happens with Saturday, the pattern still looks good for several more chances the rest of the month and perhaps into early Feb. Count me as much more optimistic than our friends Dave and Hadi.

  42. John Homenuk
    @jhomenuk
    5h

    Todays 12z ECMWF is once again more progressive and less amplified with the potential storm system this weekend. At the moment, most guidance suggests this system will remain offshore – but the setup remains highly sensitive to potential changes.

  43. Afternoon update from WPC regarding the weekend threat:

    Regardless
    of recent deterministic guidance trending more progressive with the system and limiting QPF over
    the northern Mid-Atlantic, there remains numerous ensemble members and synoptic support hinting at
    a farther north solution. Given the ridging downstream over the western Atlantic, it won’t take
    much to steer a system closer to the coast and extend heavy snow as far north as an area from
    southern Pennsylvania to southern New England. Given the large uncertainty, the heavy snow area on
    the hazards chart today depicts where most guidance overlaps the highest chances for receiving
    greater than 4″ of snow. However, it is important to note that changes to this forecast over the
    next few days are still likely.

  44. NBC CT going 1-3″ and Eric Fisher going an inch or two for Thursday generally south of a line from Boston to Springfield.

    1. The Hurricanes are the best team in the NHL. They are probably going to skate the cup at season’s end. The Bruins aren’t even playing that poorly right now and they are just being outmatched, outskated, out-everything.

          1. Rask is awesome. He does not deserve the hate he gets from Bruins “fans”. This is NOT on him. The entire team is being manhandled.

            Rask hate drives me insane. It’s so unfair and uncalled for. In fact, it’s disgusting. The man left the team to care for his CHILD. And people give him shit for it? That’s LOW.

            1. Don´t listen to Felger and Mazz or sidekick Jim Murray.

              To create hot takes that lead to caller response, they trash on everyone.

            2. Nothing to do with him being out at all I just think in my opinion & a lot of Fans agree he’s past his time , retire . We can agree to disagree as it’s nothing personal . I’m also not a fan of how Sweeney is handling things . But again just one opinion from a fan of the game

  46. The only question I have about the Thursday snow is ……

    how much cold really sneaks in behind the front while it snows?

    I don´t think the teens and 20s immediately come in. Maybe mid 30s falling to low 30s in the boundary layer, so will we maximize .2 to .3 melted into accumulations ?

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