Wednesday Forecast

87 Comments

7:39AM

DAYS 1-5 (FEBRUARY 6-10)
Note to self: Next time you are confident of your low temp range, don’t let someone else convince you to lower it. You would have been right then and chances are it may happen again. But be wrong on your own, not with someone else’s help. Yup, all us forecasters struggle with this one. This morning’s temperatures are in my original range, not the one I ended up putting down in the final product yesterday. Blah! On we go. No big changes for this update. A more “realistic” winter feeling today after 2 days of spring preview. This sets up a dicey situation for tonight as cold air at the surface will combine with an area of rain moving in from the west. This means a period of freezing rain for a good portion of southern New England, exceptions being just liquid rain near the South Coast where it’s not cold enough for icing, and potential sleet along and north of the Route 2 corridor to start as the layer of cold air may be thick enough to freeze the raindrops before they reach the ground for a while. Eventually, the slightly milder surface air should work far enough north and west to change everything to straight rain in the pre-dawn hours of Thursday, lastly of course over interior valleys, but by then much of the precipitation will probably be gone anyway, other than some lingering drizzle. The frontal boundary in the area will have some difficulty pushing to the north, and the short range computer guidance almost always tries to take these fronts more quickly northward than they actually get, as the models are not that great at figuring out the cold air trapped at the surface, so I’m going to lean toward a slower movement of this front and therefore cooler temperatures right through Thursday night, but by the time the next period of rain arrives by then, surface temperatures, I suspect, should be above freezing, thwarting a second episode of icing. Will keep an eye on it for any tricks. A brief surge of milder air should get in here early Friday but a quickly-moving cold front will bring rain showers then a quick drop in temperature as it dries out Friday evening. Wind will pick up and start to dry things out but any lingering puddles and wet areas on the ground may freeze quickly, so we’ll have to watch for areas of ground ice forming during Friday night. Then the weekend will feature dry but cold weather, windy on Saturday between departing low pressure and approaching high pressure, and more tranquil Sunday as high pressure moves overhead.
Forecast details…
TODAY: Sunshine dominant into afternoon then clouding over later in the day. Highs 33-40. Wind light N.
TONIGHT: Cloudy. Precipitation arrives west to east evening as sleet and freezing rain southern NH and northern MA, freezing rain much of MA and northern RI, and rain South Shore and South Coast, changes to rain most areas overnight before tapering off to drizzle from west to east pre-dawn. Patchy fog. Lows 28-35 evening, rising slowly overnight. Wind light N shifting to E.
THURSDAY: Overcast. Chance of drizzle. Areas of fog. Highs 35-40 north, 40-45 south. Wind light varying from E to N.
THURSDAY NIGHT: Overcast. Periods of rain. Areas of fog. Steady temperatures 35-45 evening may rise slightly overnight. Wind light varying from N to E evening, E to S overnight.
FRIDAY: Mostly cloudy with rain showers likely through mid afternoon then becoming partly cloudy from west to east by late in the day. Highs 45-52. Wind S to SW 10-20 MPH shifting to W 15-25 MPH with higher gusts by late-day.
SATURDAY: Mostly sunny. Windy. Lows in the 10s. Highs from the middle 20s to lower 30s.
SUNDAY: Mostly sunny. Lows in the 10s. Highs from the upper 20s to middle 30s.

DAYS 6-10 (FEBRUARY 11-15)
Will continue to watch the February 11-13 period for potential unsettled weather that can feature any or all types of precipitation from rain to ice to sleet to snow. Don’t read this automatically as “big winter storm”, just a period of unsettled weather in which the details are yet to be known. Dry and seasonably cold weather expected to follow this.

DAYS 11-15 (FEBRUARY 16-20)
A bit milder overall but changeable temperatures with a somewhat drier trend to the overall outlook.

87 thoughts on “Wednesday Forecast”

    1. Hello, North. It is always a pleasure to see you here. Nice way to begin the day!! Please tell Ivy I said hello.

    1. Yes I’m wondering now if it’s not going to be an issue at all Boston / south . I saw yesterday a WWA was up for Suffolk county. I think plain rain in store ending first thing tomorrow morning

      1. Although we could always be surprised, I agree. Looks like plain
        rain in the city. We’ll keep watching to be safe.

  6. Late tomorrow night, early tomorrow morning is an interesting forecast for how far southeast the freezing rain line gets.

    Going against: the airmass arriving today and tonight is not as cold as the event a week or 2 ago. the strength of the high to the north is not as strong as it was a week or 2 ago.

    Going for: the cold air damming signal is on the models. Some even show a weak low pressure sliding south of us on the warm front. Also, while not cold, dps in the teens have made it into Portland and Portsmouth, NH with low 20 dewpoints in Boston. So, the initial arrival of precip is going to wet-bulb the temp, in essence creating a dense, low level, cold airmass in southern ME, NH and northern MA and I think some of that has a chance at seeping into Boston and southwestward into the interior south shore.

    2. If the air mass were colder, I would agree 100%. Just don’t think we have
      ice in the city. Will know more later. We shall see.

  7. Thanks TK.

    The HRRR is warm for tonight. Too warm for ice in most of MA. It’s typically among the coldest guidance in these type events, which is usually the way to go. But I think here it’s a sign that the “cold” air, while it will be stubborn, just isn’t that cold. Thank the longwave pattern for that. This will go down as one of the more persistent Southeast ridges (and western troughs) that I have seen. At least another week, if not two or more, where that longwave configuration won’t really change.

  8. It has been snowing just North of Flagstaff, AZ for 3 days now.|The ski resort
    14 miles to the North of Flagstaff has received snow as follows:

    Snow Totals
    19”
    24 hrs
    27”
    48 hrs
    29”
    72 hrs
    41”
    7 Days
    169”
    Season Total

    Yet, we can’t catch a break

  10. GFS is back to a cutter for the middle of next week. CMC shows some coastal redevelopment with a follow up system at the end of the week, both would be primarily snow as shown…..will see what Euro has to say

  11. Thanks TK.

    It was great seeing you and your wife at the game last night. Good game but not the result that I had hoped for. The Islanders did not have their best game and that third period goal getting called back due to the offsides was killer. Bruins and Islanders are two good, evenly matched teams though and I think it’s going to be a good playoff run for both down the stretch.

    It was a pleasant surprise when the Pats came out on the ice before the game! I snapped this picture….

    https://imgur.com/a/Ue4f8Dz

    Funny looking back at the picture that nearly every one of the players had their cell phones out snapping selfies. LOL.

  12. Go For Snow…I was just about to post the same thing.

    Here is the 0z GFS run for next Wednesday night showing a nor’easter snowstorm:

    https://www.tropicaltidbits.com/analysis/models/?model=gfs&region=us&pkg=mslp_pcpn_frzn&runtime=2019020600&fh=192

    Here is the 12z GFS run from this AM for next Wednesday night showing a cutter over Wisconsin and heading up into Hudson’s Bay…

    https://www.tropicaltidbits.com/analysis/models/?model=gfs&region=us&pkg=mslp_pcpn_frzn&runtime=2019020612&fh=174

    You think the models are confused?

  13. The CMC, FV3 and 00z Euro are more interesting with mid and late week coastal storm threats next week.

    00z Euro sends the primary low next Tuesday far west but manages coastal redevelopment over the Mid Atlantic. CMC has a similar solution. This type of setup would probably involve a changeover for some, at least for a period of time. Verbatim the 00z Euro still delivers 6″+ for many. We’ll see what the 12z has to say.

    It’s all conjecture at this point, but something potentially interesting on the horizon to track.

  14. I worked the long term forecast the past couple days, and couldn’t help but notice the striking similarities between what we’ll be seeing today through Friday and what we may see next week. Aloft definitely, but even at the surface. Again, it’s all driven by this familiar big picture pattern. I wouldn’t be surprised at all if we deal with another weak leading wave or two followed by a stronger cutter early to mid next week. A potential difference next week is a colder preceding air mass with high pressure further south, so the odds of winter weather may be higher, as TK has mentioned in his forecast. However, what that may mean for SNE is that the leading wave(s) gets suppressed while the cutter potentially brings some front end snow/mix before a changeover. Still plenty of time for change and as TK has said, models aren’t much good outside three days right now. But we have confidence in the large scale pattern so it stands to reason it’s at least possible we get a similar result next week.

  16. Yep, the 12z Euro now has the primary going over Wisconsin like the GFS. Coastal redevelopment is now too far north, basically right over us. Still good for the ski areas.

    Snowmap:
    https://imgur.com/m8VnyNX

    Just cant stop cuttin’……….

    1. Of course. Why the bleep would it be anything else.
      Our Winter of Discontent continues!!!! (who coined that? Great term!)

  19. Thank you, TK!

    Today is the 41st anniversary of the Blizzard of 1978. I still marvel that we had school (and most everyone had work) that morning. We got dismissed at 11 am. A lot of elementary school kids were “stuck” in school for days.

    TK, I am remembering your diary entries as you witnessed the storm as a boy that you posted a year ago!!! I am still in awe of your writing style and still hope that you consider getting your work published somewhere some day!!!

    Bumper sticker I saw this morning: “I took the road less traveled. Now, where the hell am I?” 🙂

    This is me taking attendance in my classes yesterday:
    “Bueller…Bueller…Bueller…”

    1. I hated creative writing in school. When I got an assignment I usually did “average” work. There was one exception. I wrote a short horror story in 10th grade that my English teacher loved so much she wanted a copy for herself. 😉

    2. We were let go at 2:00 from work in Watertown. Mac and I made it easily back to his apartment in Medford where I was stuck (oh darn) for the duration. Department heads had a meeting earlier in the day for the first time in company history to decide how to address notifying employees if work were to be cancelled the following day. We each went home with a list of numbers to call.

      The senior VP held the door for us as we filed out to our cars at 2 wishing us a safe trip and assuring us he’d see us all the next morning.

      He stayed at work —- and then spent the night on 128. He sheltered a mom and her children parked near himi in his car because he had a full tank of gas. Fellow employees retrieved him using a snowmobile the following day.

  20. Mark… Great to meet you too! Sorry the game didn’t turn out your way but as you know I liked the result. Although losing to the Islanders would not have been that painful had it gone the other way. My top 2 teams playing last night. 🙂 But I bleed black & gold so I had to root for my boys.

    I haven’t had much of a chance to look over the 12z data yet. Going to do that and then move on to the 18z short range stuff.

  21. WxW you are right on the button about the upcoming pattern I do believe. I do think while we have the cold air in place that next initial system may be suppressed to the south as mainly a miss, but the second push looks like a track well west and north of New England, like this upcoming one. Can’t say we didn’t outline these 2 tracks as being the main players this winter. 😉

          1. -3C = 26.6F at about 2500 feet.
            Yeah, I guess rain drops could freeze into sleet
            at those temperatures falling that far. 😀

    2. I’m still thinking O issues tomorrow early Boston/ south just cold rain but of course I could be wrong .

        1. Getting alerts down this way for Hanson which is a rock throw away but I’m just not feeling it .

  23. Many forget about little meso lows that don’t initially show up on short range guidance. HRRR picking up now. This is what I was referring to in my discussion. Almost ALWAYS, it either ends up a little colder than modeled, or it takes longer to scour it out, and almost always, the experience in forecasting little details pays off.

  25. I hope this link works…
    This is a long lost photo taken about 75% of the way through the Blizzard of ’78 showing my garage and my neighbor’s shed. We still had about another foot of snow left to fall at the time this photo was taken by my brother from inside the house about midday on February 7. The snow finally ended that night.

    https://scontent.fbed1-2.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/51373660_10156171530356395_7408398065352048640_n.jpg?_nc_cat=106&_nc_ht=scontent.fbed1-2.fna&oh=fd293f26e5e55fc4da9d8e68cd0169cd&oe=5CB4ECD1

      1. Good!!

        There was almost no snow left on any roofs after that storm because the wind was just simply so strong and the snow too dry. The coastline from Boston south had much wetter snow for the first part of the storm before the wind shifted and temp dropped.

            1. Sleet didn’t become involved because it was cold enough aloft there for snow the entire time. It was only warm at the surface for a while due to a coastal front. Cape Cod & the Island changed to rain after 6-12 inches of snow and then the dry air near the storm center caused the sun to start shining there for a while on Tuesday February 7. From JP west and north it stayed in the 20s the entire time.

              1. A dry powder snow where I lived just north of Bellevue Hill on the Roslindale/West Roxbury Line. We probably at roughly 250 ft above sea level.

  26. some of the short range looking like it want to changes things up a bit. Rain to freezing rain to sleet to a period of snow just at the end lol. Highly doubt any snow accumulation would happen but hey who knows.

  27. So far it appears the next Tuesday-Wednesday system will be the usual mix. According to Harvey the trend is warmer. So what else is new? 😉

    1. I think the trend is definitely away from snow and more toward rain/ice/sleet if anything.

      There is not a lot of support for snow events any time soon.

  28. 35 with 25 DP Sutton with a winter weather advisory until 10 am

    Severe weather for Sutton, MA — via Weather Underground.

    —————-

    Winter Weather Advisory

    4:52 PM EST, 2/06,expires 10:00 AM EST, 2/07

    … Winter Weather Advisory remains in effect until 10 am EST Thursday…

    * what… freezing rain expected. Total ice accumulations of up to two tenths of an inch expected, especially in higher elevations.

    * Where… much of western and central Massachusetts.

    * When… until 10 am EST Thursday.

    * Additional details… the hazardous conditions could impact the morning or evening commute

  29. Mix. That’s the theme this winter. Kitchen sink. Glop. You name it, we’ve had plenty of it and will continue to get plenty more. And these events don’t exactly add much to Logan’s total. Oh, increments of 0.2 or so. But that won’t get us near the 9 inch mark (record minimum). Imagine if Boston absolutely shatters the record with a grand total of 4 inches (at Logan, that is).

    1. Thing is we haven’t actually had too much glop. Most areas have really only seen 2 significant events that involved that. Most of the bigger events have been mainly rain events.

      I still think Boston makes it to double-digits. We have until at least early to mid April. And even though I think spring turns out warmer than average, that doesn’t mean you can’t get a renegade snow event. We have pretty much 12 weeks of opportunity left to get that Logan snow to double digits. I say it happens.

  30. The 18z GFS shows essentially the same pattern holding for the next 16 days (as far out as it goes). We can’t trust that as a guarantee, but I do think its evolution over the next week looks very reasonable. I agree with TK though, it’s much too early to say with any confidence that Boston sees a record low snowfall. There’s way too much time left, and even a moderate snowstorm gets us close. Even if it gets beat by an inch or two, it’ll be kind of a cheap record since the actual snowfall total for Logan should be a few inches higher than it is now.

    I’m very happy with how my sub-seasonal (2-4 week) predictions have been working out this winter. Seasonal, not as great. Early part of the season was wetter than I expected, and I never thought the Southeast ridge would feature so heavily in a non-La Nina year. I expected below average snow, but it’s not happening for the main reason I was expecting, which was frequent suppression. We have seen some of that, but it’s been more cutters.

    1. Logan needs 6.7 inches for a tie! A long haul imho.

      1. 9.0” = 1936-37
      2. 9.3” = 2011-12
      3. 10.3” = 1972-73

    1. We all know already. The usual messy mix to mostly rain. Set in stone, unfortunately, as most rain events are. 🙁

    2. Gotta agree with Philip and WxW on this one. Persistence. The pattern is simply LOCKED in right now. We cut.

      1. when we start thinking this way, in terms of lower snow years, this is the time in which a snow comes up and blind sides the area. 😛

        1. Not likely this time. It’s been a while since we’ve had one of these winter. I lived through a fair amount of them in the 1970s to mid 1990s. After having studied those patterns in the years after they occurred, having better knowledge as to what I was looking at, this is one of those patterns. It’s very very hard to break.

  34. Man, that’s the coldest rain I’ve felt in several years. Plain rain. No sleet pellets or anything. It’s 33 where I live and I had to do several errands by foot. Miserable outside. We go from a glorious spring day (yesterday) to the the coldest of rains. And this isn’t a passing shower. It’s a steady rain.

  37. Very marginal temps in a lot of eastern MA right now. Nobody could have said with confidence that the areas that are just above freezing were going to be that way. If you do, you’re not telling the truth. We still have to watch for sneaky cold in the next couple hours. It’s pretty chilly not far up the coast. At least this time it doesn’t look like it will come too far south and it also doesn’t have the same strength it did last time this happened. Anyway, even with the steady precip ending soon from west to east, low level moisture remains so if it does happen to drop below freezing a little closer in to Boston, untreated surfaces can still slick-up. This is why the NWS put the WWA right into Boston. It was 100% the right thing to do.

      1. That was what was expected down there. The icing possibility was just a bit further west and north of you.

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