Good Monday everyone and welcome to the start of winter! We have been yapping about this change for a few weeks now and we are settling into a pattern that will get winter off to a rocking start for the month of December. This kicks off with later this week with the chance at our first accumulating light snows.
We have some stuff to go through before we get to the flakes so let’s get to all that first.
Today will dawn with widespread rains across the region. Some of these will be locally heavy at times as a cold front moves through. Winds will be rather gusty and temps will be dropping into the low 40s and holding there for the afternoon. The rains will be moving out pretty quickly today and you can track them right here…
Your forecast looks like this…
Tuesday should be the nicest day of the week with temps in the upper 40s to low 50s under partly sunny skies. Not to shabby at all. Clouds will quickly increase Tuesday night ahead of a powerful low pressure that will be riding our way from the south. This low will be strengthening along the way and should take a track from near New Orleans to Pikeville to near Buffalo from Wednesday into Thursday. The GFS has a pretty good handle on this track…
Wednesday Morning
Wednesday Evening
Thursday Morning
What does that track mean for us?
– Heavy rains for Wednesday. Rain amounts of one inch will be possible in many areas. Highs will be in the 40s with gusty winds.
– Colder air quickly moves in from west to east Wednesday Night. This will mean a change to a period of snow by Thursday morning with temps in the low 30s.
– Snow showers will be likely Thursday into Thursday night with flurries carrying us into Friday. Temps will hold in the low 30s Thursday with wind chills making it feel MUCH colder than that. Friday’s highs will stay in the 20s.
You can see that the GFS is trying to put some snow on the ground around here Thursday into early Friday…
I have been reading the comments lately and I am trying to figure out where many of you are getting that this was supposed to be a big snow maker for us. That certainly has never been the thinking from this blog! 
This can easily bring the first accumulations to the region, though. It is only the first few days of December!!!!! 
Looking farther down the road… look out! The pattern continues to take on an extreme look across the country as TRUE arctic air is going to enter the picture over the next few weeks. This happens as our active southern storm track continues. These two getting together can create something special for much of the country before all is said and done.
If you are a regular reader… you know that I have been all over the Arctic Oscillation Index and what it has meant to our weather since the summer. Every time it went negative… we got really cold around here. In fact.. record cold was observed on more than one occasion. Check out for the forecast for the AO…
That is called going into the tank my friends! The “new” GFS is really picking up on what that could mean for much of the country…
December 10th
December 11th
Hello Arctic Express!!!
I will try to update things a little later this afternoon or evening so check back. Have a great Monday and take care.
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I can’t wait to see our first 1-2 inches of snow… 1 inch… ill be happy. A white christmas… it would be happier! I hope we see some white stuff this week!
I was looking back, and some winters we didn’t even have our first big snows until Feb and March. We ended up getting 30+ inches for seasonal totals but not until Feb and after. Not saying that’s what’s going to happen this season, but it’s interesting to say the least.
WKYT’s radar is so disappointing
I agree. I hoped it would be so much better than WLEX’s…but nope. They both blow compared to the 20-year-old NWS radar images.
Based purely on 06Z GFS, the coldest air we see in the next 15 days is 12°F at 850mb. Which works out to about 28°F at the surface. We’ve seen that multiple times already.
I agree.. 0z & 6z was much warmer then previous runs. but there is alot of potential on something to hookup, I’m sure once the snow is on the ground around our “OLD KY DOME” the temps on the models will be over achieved. Louisville NWS has a good discussion this morning.
Madison County – Berea
Light Rain
44.2° Falling
yeah, i feel that way as well
this is a nice forecast, but for the deserts of south west Tx. around El paso !!!!…how crazy is that…
…………
RAIN SHOWERS WILL CONTINUE TODAY AND BECOME MIXED WITH SOME SNOW
BY THE AFTERNOON. THE SHOWERS ARE EXPECTED TO BECOME HEAVIER BY
THIS EVENING AND TURN TO MOSTLY SNOW. SNOWFALL OF 3 TO 8 INCHES IS
EXPECTED…LIKELY HEAVIEST OVER HUDSPETH COUNTY…BEFORE THE SNOW
TAPERS OFF TUESDAY MORNING
…………………..
something about desert sands and 8″ of snow, just dont go together, I guess stranger things have happened…LOL..
If those images are all they will ever get from Defender, then they better just go ahead and list that puppy on eBay. Because it’s doing the citizens of KY no good whatsoever. Can’t tell a **** thing from looking at that radar.
Your Gonna love this!!!
(stranger things from above)
(1)..January 17, 1981: Reports indicate snowfalls in Fort Lauderdale and Miami.
(2) White Christmas in Jacksonville Fl. in 1989!!! first ever..
(3) Jan. 17,1977 first snowfall ever in west palm beach florida..
and the list goes on and on of snowfall in the state of Florida. with a couple of Pics as well..
These are the 2 mos interesting ones though…
1774: A snowstorm extends across much of the state. The affected residents speak of it as an “extraordinary white rain.”[1]
1797: Land surveyor Andrew Ellicott reports 8-inch (203mm) snowdrifts near the source of the St. Marys River in Baker County…
Go check it out on wikipedia..
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_snow_events_in_Florida
I’d say it will be warmer than that. The last two runs of the Euro…including the ensembles show a massive ridge building across AK towards the end of the week. This will likely carve out a large trough over the Pacific NW with zonal flow across the rest of the country into much of next week. There is a possibility that if that AK ridge rolls over to the east that we could get some much colder air in here by the third week of Dec…but next week will be rather seasonal it appears.
Highs Fri/Sat look too cold to me…more like highs in the lower-mid 30s.
It won’t be that cold…the Euro and its ensembles are forecast more zonal flow with each run…so I’d say seasonal temps are more likely for next week.
i just read another site talking about the feedback problems with the euro and handling of the western trough early next week which leads to a flase eastern ridge-zonal flow signal. this a biasthat the euro model has in my view, although it does concern me the operational euro has had zonal flow for three straight runs.
it should be of intrest that the new gfs is quite a bit colder than the current gfs in the long range.
(false eastern ridge)
teleconnection forecasts both have a strongly negative epo, the gfs has a negative nao and positive pna while the euro has a nao which trends negative by next Tuesday and a pna that trends positive by next Tuesday as well. these and the 00z Canadian model would also indicate a zonal flow pattern is not as likely.
I’m not aware of this bias as the ECMWF doesn’t say too much public about their model biases. I will say that there is a trend in all the ensemble guidance of that AK ridge popping up. Something to watch. Actually…its very similar to last December where the Pac NW got tons of snow in early Dec.
I read that as well this morning…gonna be an interesting month to say the least…
Chris…You forget that considering the recent winter snow a dusting is a big snow event for all us! LOL!
…THE 00Z/GFS
WITH THE SFC LOW POSITION AND STRENGTH ACROSS THE UPPER Ohio
VALLEY AND SIDED MORE SO WITH THE 00Z/Canadian-ECMWF AND 21Z SREF
FOR THE SNOWFALL DETAILS ACROSS ARKANSAS AND EASTERN OKLAHOMA.
THIS SCENARIO TAKES THE UPPER-LEVEL LOW OUT OF EAST CENTRAL TEXAS
QUICKLY NORTHEASTWARD INTO THE OHIO VALLEY BY THE END OF DAY 3.
NORTHERN STREAM ENERGY DIGGING ACROSS THE NORTHERN PLAINS AND
MIDWEST ATTEMPTS TO PHASE WITH THE SOUTHERN STREAM…ALLOWING FOR
A BRIEF WINDOW OF MODERATE SNOWFALL AND PATCHES OF 2-4 INCH
SNOWFALLS ACROSS THE BOOT HEEL OF MISSOURI…THE LOWER OHIO VALLEY
TO THE WESTERN END OF LAKE ERIE…
this is the hpc forecast as they bring this region of 2-4 into northern and western Kentucky. Unfortunately i think this forecast is far from reality for us.
areas from central Ill or ind to Michigan may have a shot at something over an inch as I’m disagreement with hpc on this.
it looks to me the snow dome in kentucky aint gonna be broke anytime soon. The big snow of 98 is probably the last big snow we will ever see in kentucky
I agree…best moisture is lifting out as the cold air comes in…combined with warm ground temps. May get some accumulation in the grass if there is some decent snow showers.
We’ll get another big snow…it may not be in my life time…but we’ll get one.
The models, to me, provide some foundation as to what is going to happen…but, mother nature has a way of making the models look bad when it comes right down to it.
We, for the most part, ALL want snow and lots of it, but the setup has to be just right for that to happen and it hasn’t been.
1989 was the year that Wilmington, NC saw a White Christmas. We had over 15 inches of snow at our house. Very rare for an area that’s average annual snowfall rate is 1.6 inches.
Here is my amateur thinking atm. For entertainment purposes only. Chris, MJ, Mitch..Don’t laugh too hard! lol 😉
http://freaksters.com/weather/kysnowb.jpg
At this point based on the model trends we are going to be lucky to see our first widespread snowflakes. Obviously it is too early to rule out no accumulation for anywhere in KY. However based on what I see the low will track right through Kentucky and on the Thursday we will have some light snow showers/ flurries no accumulation at 12z GFS is tryin to show something devoloping at 5 days out hopefully the GFS has an eastern bias with this too and the low tracks further west. http://www.nco.ncep.noaa.gov/pmb/nwprod/analysis/namer/gfs/12/images/gfs_ten_120l.gif
The temp. profiles on the 12Z GFS are nothing compared to that run Chris posted above. -20C at 850 is where it really starts to get what you would call COLD. -10 to -15 is average around here at best.
Any forecaster who knows what they are doing would call for people to wake up to a dusting of snow in central KY Thursday morning. Nothing more, nothing less. So I agree with you.
for what’s in worth i hope that comes true with bwg in the 2-4 area.
accumlating snow saturday now showing up on the 12z gfs
http://www.nco.ncep.noaa.gov/pmb/nwpara/analysis/namer/gfs/12/images/gfs_pcp_120s.gif
cant argue with that by no means..that’s about what usually happens…the ” GOOD OLE DUSTING ” phrase..ahhh ky. winter weather..You never know whats gonna happen..
12z has went colder.. go figure! lol The headaches of our famous weather dude continues! 🙂
Chris, I hope I didn’t give you the impression that I thought it was going to be a big snowmaker for us, I will just be tickled to SEE some snow down this way….ground is too warm for it to be much of a problem yet! But looking forward to seeing some, all the same! 😀
Also looking forward to the next update! Have a good day, all, and stay warm!
Geez, Bernie….if its for entertainment purposes, couldn’t you have at least “entertained” us southeastern and south centrals with some measurable precip, too? 😉 JK
Guys, guys…this is the last day of November….we are not really into the time of good snows around here…yet!
I guess we are all so snow starved that any carrot is enough to send us into a hopeful feeding frenzy! 😉
I agree with both of you…a dusting on grassy surfaces at best…based on what I’ve seen as of now. On the other hand, if we had been in the 20s/30s over the last week, we may have been looking at something different.
Boyle County- .43″ of rain since midnight. Temp is at 45 after having dropped to 41. Broken clouds.
For you Hurricane Trackers here is something that may be of interest to you:
On Wednesday night December 2nd Jim Williams will be live at 8:00PM ET for the annual end of hurricane season broadcast. Jim will have some interesting graphics to pass along on this show comparing this season vrs 2008. Jim will also discuss why the season was slow comparing this elnino to others. Derek Sibley will call in with stats comparing this seasons list of names with the last time it was used.http://www.hurricanecity.tv
That is the best shot we have at snow this week actually, but only for eastern KY and Chris’ neck of the woods. The I 65 corridor won’t see any of that.
I want MJ and Chris to give their opinion on this: 11 years ago we had the notorious “dusting” that shut down the state. With the advances in technology and forecast modeling in the last 11 years, do you think it is still possible to miss a forecast so bad that a “dusting” could turn into 24″ today? Or are those days of surprises a thing of the past? I’ll share my thoughts later.
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