Good Saturday, everyone. We have very pleasant weather to open up the first weekend in December. This nice air will stick around into early Monday, then it’s hammer time. Old Man Winter is getting ready to take control of the pattern, perhaps in a big way.
Before I get to the discussion, I’m on the road today, so your midday update may or may not happen. If it doesn’t I will have the typical evening update for you guys. I’ll also be throwing out some thoughts via Twitter. 🙂
This weekend in weather is pretty good, so enjoy it. Seasonally cold mornings with afternoon temps approaching 60 degrees in several areas.
Things take a little walk on the wide side after the weekend. Here’s how the big change may take place:
- Gusty southwesterly winds will really crank later Monday into Tuesday. Gusts may reach 40mph or greater at times.
- Temps ahead of our cold front will likely surge into the 60s for many areas.
- Showers and thunderstorms work from west to east Monday night through Tuesday evening.
- Some areas may pick up 1″ or so of rain during this time.
- Temps plummet behind the front from Tuesday afternoon into Wednesday morning. That’s when the cold tries to catch up to the back edge of the rain shield, switching it over to a few flakes.
- The best chance for flakes appears to be across the eastern half of the state.
Here’s how all this looks on the models…
The Tuesday Front…
You can see how far eastern Kentucky has the best chance for some flakes by Tuesday night…
Cold northwesterly winds continue to crank on Wednesday and can spit out some flurries.
That same northwesterly flow will have several systems embedded within it, each of them diving into our region. The first arrives by late Thursday or Friday, with the GFS continuing to show a healthy clipper digging into the Ohio Valley…
The European Model has a smaller system arriving before that clipper. This produces some light snow on Thursday…
Here’s the Friday-Saturday potent clipper on the European…
The best snows with a clipper fall along and just north of the track. The above scenario would also unleash some snow showers and squalls behind it with very gusty winds from the northwest. That’s pulling in some arctic air, too. Check out the wind chill numbers at times behind that…
GFS
Canadian
That’s frigid, folks.
Another system is then forecast to dive in here to end the weekend and begin the following week…
That’s another arctic air mass showing up behind that, and it’s likely to be even colder than the one to start the weekend.
Arctic shots keep diving in here through the end of the forecast model runs, with the potential for some extreme cold shots showing up across the country. Watch how stable and similar the GFS and GFS Ensembles are with all this…
GFS
GFS Ensembles
I will update things at some point later today, so keep checking back. Have a great Saturday and take care.
I’ve been following kyweathercenter for 3 years now and love it but i was wondering when do you get any sleep?
So far, no phasing or lows coming out from the Gulf so no big snows to track, yet. Waiting to see when this phasing could start occurring because that would then start all the snowy chaos that could be happening in times like this when arctic air is in constant supply with an active southern jet. Boy oh boy, if it does start, it will be crazy! Timing is key though, will the southern jet then become active once the cold leaves? Only time can tell but for sure these clippers can cause decent disruptions, especially in our latitude since we’re not used to these pure snow, well below freezing events. Lets hope the Gulf can provide lots of moisture to work with for us snow lovers!
I wondered about you. If you were still here being a lurker or you left. LOL
Thanks Chris for all your updates. I don’t know what to make out of all the models being presented. I just don’t think the weather computers are fast enough to really pick up what is about to change. For instance, models are currently showing the trough shifting farther to the east, which would put us on the western edge, which would mean not as cold for us, which is fine by me. As far as snowfall, I think you are spot on with forecasting the clipper systems coming every few days. However, I think in my county the clippers will be to the north and east. Good news is that this would keep the ice away. I hope we get the forecast rain because it is really getting dry. If I had landscape plants I would be watering them today. Have a great weekend.
Yeah, SE KY had less 2 inches for the month of November in rainfall but still a lot better than the drought during last fall. Hopefully, the southern branch will become active again.
Just think: We only need a direct hit from a strong clipper to give most areas in the state more snow than the entire 2016-2017 season! And by a strong clipper, I am referring to a one with strong upper-level dynamics that produces a widespread 3 to 6 inch snow; we don’t get those type of clippers every year. Sad to think that getting more than 3 inches would beat last year, but we had a deep south type of winter last year for both temps and snowfall!
More than two inches of snow would beat last year totals for most.
We had an inch or so here last winter. That’s the lowest I ever remember for an entire winter.
It certainly would for my location
If a strong upper level clipper collides ( negative phase ) with the positive subtropical jet in the state of Louisiana and was force to move slowly north northeastward by a blocking high over New England, we would have what people had back in December eight, 1917. A real BLIZZARD !!!
Models are backing off the cold and snow this morning.
That’s why we don’t forecast run to run of the operational models…. especially the 6z/18z runs
Pay him no attention models are not backing off, models are going to fluctuate from run to run but the the consistency with the models of the cold and snow are all there.
This is what Accuweather had for my area. And their extended showed a very quite winter.
Take this with a LARGE GRAIN OF SALT.