Good Monday to one and all. Old Man Winter is blowing into the bluegrass state over the next few days… Literally. Winds are going to crank tonight into Tuesday as a powerful cold front crosses the state. From there, it’s all about tracking arctic shots of air into the country, with the potential for some snow makers showing up.
Ahead of the front, temps will surge into the 60s today as clouds increase. Those clouds will start to spit out some showers and rumbles of thunder across the west before the afternoon is through…
Showers and storms will then increase quickly from west to east tonight and early Wednesday. Winds are going to be a big player during this time and may top 40-45mph…
It’s a good time to secure those Christmas decorations. No one wants to chase Frosty down the street. 🙂
Temps tumble behind the front Tuesday afternoon through early Wednesday. The cold is going to try to catch the back edge of the rain shield into far southeastern Kentucky. That MAY lead to a flake or two.
Wind chill temps by Wednesday morning will make it feel around 40 degrees colder than today in some areas…
Temps on Wednesday are well below normal, but only seasonally cold as the northwesterly flow gets established. This flow will try to throw some flakes in here on Thursday, with a more potent system diving in here Friday into Saturday.
The GFS continues to develop one heck of a clipper on top of us, as a big storm rides up the east coast…
A tightly wrapped system like that would produce some pretty awesome conditions for winter weather lovers. If we take that particular run verbatim, it would produce convective (thunder?) snows across our region to go along with gusty winds with arctic air moving in.
That would spread accumulating snows across much of the region.
While I am expecting this to produce our first light accumulations, at least, I am nowhere near being able to forecast anything specific. Please read that statement over and over. 🙂
The above system happens as we get all the upper level energy diving into the trough to bundle up right on top of us…
The Canadian is now similar with the look upstairs…
The European Model is slowly shedding some it the southwestern bias with upper level energy and is getting closer to the GFS and Canadian…
Give that model a few more runs and see how it looks then. It’s already trending deeper with the Friday-Saturday clipper than earlier runs.
Wind chill readings from the GFS continue to be way down there…
And the models continue to track then next DEEP system early next week. Here’s the GFS…
The GFS keeps these systems coming through the entire 16 day run.
The European Model brings the Polar Vortex into the country behind that system early next week…
The Ensembles have been singing the same tune for a while now and show our snow chances during the same time period…
Here are the individual runs of the GFS Ensembles that make up the above map…
Again, there is some nice potential in the overall setup in the coming weeks. Let’s just see if Old Man Winter can deliver the goods on occasion. 🙂
I will have your usual updates later today. Have a good one and take care.
So does this mean we’ll get out of school early for the Christmas break? Will temps be cold enough?
When do you get out of school? Dec. 15th is last day for my son before winter break starts.
Seems a given we should at least get some pretty “snow globe” snow. Beyond that, even CB will not suggest anything right now.
An awesome post of material for study! Thanks for going the extra mile.
Great! Now, let’s hope Dec and Jan and super wintery and then by Feb we will be sick of it and ready for early spring.
One shovel event makes me sick of it. Truth.
Sign me up!
Thanks Chris, All your weather information along with the timely updates is very much appreciated. It’s like taking an advance course in meteorology. It’s an obsession with me. Looks more like a cold, windy event rather than a rain or snow event. Not good with the on going drought we are having. However, the weather could get interesting along the east coast. Something to watch. Have a great day.
Clippers can surprise. Too early to tell. Might be some white stuff by this weekend. Or not. Either way – I’m gonna grease the shovel and have it ready.
I got stranded in Terre Haute, Indiana back in November 1964 by an Alberta Clipper which dump up to seven inches of snow. The next morning the temperature was a bone chilling minus five. To this date I have not seen a clipper event like that one. Climate change ?
Much of Alaska now basking in much above normal temperatures can only mean one thing: The ridge is on, and it will lead to our troughing pattern soon.
All we need now is a good source of moisture from the Gulf.
Thanks Chris! I`ll take e-12 please.
Is it too far out to measure out our chances for snow on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day? I’m not good at reading models.
Yes
I second that.