Good Wednesday everyone and thanks for making us one of your online stops for weather. We are coming off the coldest air of the season, so far, and we’re staring at a pattern that looks much different than the one from November and December. That’s a good thing for fans of cold and snow.
Our short term weather will actually feature a mild up over the next few days. This will cause temps to rebound into the upper 30s east to mid 40s west today under partly cloudy skies. 40s will rule by Thursday and we hit the 50s on Friday. That doesn’t sound like a different pattern, does it? Well… it is because it won’t last very long as colder air moves in for the coming weekend.
I am confident of temps being seasonally cold this weekend. I am not as confident on the precipitation chances. The models are diverging a bit, but the safe route is to call for some Saturday showers and temps in the 40s with some possible flakes Sunday and Monday with temps in the 30s. I will touch more on the weekend forecast later today.
The outlook for the next few weeks continues to point toward an increasingly cold pattern that could unleash the arctic beast into much of the country.
The first really cold shot looks to arrive by the middle of next week. Check out the trough showing up on the GFS Ensembles…
Now… watch how the same ensembles keep the trough in the east, while taking on the classic arctic outbreak look with the polar vortex diving southward through Canada…
That’s certainly a cold look and it’s one showing up on all the model guidance over the next few weeks. Outside of saying there would be several snow opportunities with a pattern like that… I really can’t get very specific about the flakes.
I will have another update later today. Have a great Wednesday and take care.
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Ok going outside to do my precipitation dance now. You all can thank me later 😉
My temp here was 17 deg when i went to bed last night and when i got up this morn around 6:30 the temp had come up to 21 deg. I thought that was odd. Ready for some new posts on possible snow chances!!!!!!
Partly cloudy (which really means mostly sunny) and highs around 40 today. Can someone explain why I see all these mountain schools closed? Can they not get a couple of inches of snow cleared from the roads in a day or do they look for any excuse not to go to school?
WHAT!!!! Have you ever traveled some of the narrow mountain roads that receive very little direct sunlight during the winter months? Obviously NOT!!!!! They are covered with ice and snow and no amount of salt can melt that especially if the temp does not get above freezing. The administrations in the school systems missing the extra days are out all day checking the places the buses have to travel……I think it is safe to say you do not have a child traveling on one those buses or you would not make such an ignorant statement!
Are you familiar with the infrastructure of the mtn. counties? Hundreds of small, curvy, STEEP, “holler” roads that could be considered dangerous even in normal conditions, much less snow/ice covering them. Many of these roads the sun never hits during the winter. To answer your question, No, its pretty much impossible for the county to scrape/salt “every” road that the buses travel.. there’s simply too many of them.
Yes. Snow in the mountains is a completely different animal that snow in flat areas! I grew up in western NC and we almost slid off the side of a mountain once going up the to the blue ridge parkway from Brevard. I’m thinking it was the winter of 84/85. I was 13.
I wonder what kids do in mountainous areas way up north? I’m sure they deal with the same issues. Perhaps schools in those areas are closed more often
u are an idiot, plain and simple. I encourage you to get in your car and drive to jackson county and try to drive hwy 89 and see how far you get, then come back and ask your stupid question again. i bet you would pull over and cry your eyes out … it’s dangerous dry let alone put ice on it.
I’m not buying any “Cold” Stocks or bonds today – or this year as a matter of fact. PLEASE Chris, you have barked up and down this same tree of
“The outlook for the next few weeks continues to point toward an increasingly cold pattern that could unleash the arctic beast into much of the country” over and over and it hasnt come true as of the last two months..So yes, its Jan/Feb. and it should get codler, but that “tree” has fallen over and I’m not going to get excited about it.
This winter will be MILD, and not that much snow. Period!, well I shoud have said Period.
I’d say they probably have to make me days up in the summer.
I’ve seen some of those roads in pictures and know a friend that travels to eastern KY weekly.
I say a picture is worth a thousand words to someone who doesn’t know what you have to deal with. Show’em what you’re up against…and maybe they’ll think twice before making such a comment.
Just saw where Gatewood Galbraith died in his sleep last night. RIP.
Agree. Big blog follower who never posts. And a MASSIVE snow lover, as I plow and salt in the Winter months for great money. So, I am definitely on the ‘Gimme Snow’ team. But seriously…… In October, we heard about change in November. In November, we heard about massive change in December. In December, JANUARY was forecasted to be brutal. I guess now February will be the bad month, right? It’s as if there’s this self-fufilling prophecy that “It WILL be cold and snowy!” this Winter. Well?? Looks like more busted statements and hype (and yes, I know that word has been thrown around a lot and I’m not jumping on the band wagon.) But it is what it is. The daily forecasts and information are great!! And I will always visit this site. But for the longer-term predictions, I’m done putting any legitimacy into those “Get ready for a roller coaster and nose-dive temps, people” statements. From all the info I can gather, it looks like January will be slow/tame and average- and that’s fine.
CB has that fine-tuned wording down like a master! It lets you chew on some winter excitement, with juuuuust enough vague, middle-ground phrases to allow for a “HEY, I never said that it was going to be ________.” or a “We called it just right!” in the event of a huge forecasting success.
Well I’m looking at the weather cams that Chris puts up, there is no snow showing in Pike County, Whitley County, or any other web cam for that matter.
The NWS out of Louisville in there forecast discussion stated this morning that for later next week depending on timing and phasing that the area has a decent shot of wintry precipitation. At the very least the NWS at the Louisville office is recongnizing the possibility.
thats your mistake Ignorance meaning you don’t know what you are talking about. Not everybody lives on Paved roads and you can’t salt gravel roads as road salt causes the roads to erode much faster. Every road i have been on is clear but i’m not ignorant enough to say that all roads are clear. The camera for Whitley county is on I75 so i most certainly hope that its clear by now
I bet he would pull over and hear banjos and someone squealing in a trailer!
Is it because they don’t have shoes and their feet might freeze?
That usually means mix 😉
CB is only posting his thoughts and not an outlook, but true, none the less. Maybe it will pan out this time….
Go back to California with a comment like that.
yea right, they are going to put a weather cam on a remote country road … realllll smart
NEWS ALERT …. California Dreamin just got awarded the poster child for dumba$$es of america
great job !!
Well he stated theis : “The outlook for the next few weeks continues to point…”
So either an outlook or his thoughts..don’t really matter which,(I personally think that it wont be a bad winter at all!!!) but I totaly agree with TominLou on this, I too will still look at this site, but CB long term is always saying (thought or outlook) starting in Oct. has been like the gas station “SPEEDWAY” jingle..Cold is “Around the corner, around the country, at work or play we’re on your way”..
Mix for them means rain for us
Agree.
Boyle County: So far this season less than one inch of snow. January mid month to second half still looks good for accumulating snow chances.
That said the cold will not “set in” but should be a little longer lasting than thus far this winter. A potential storm coming out of the gulf
looks to be our best shot and this is what forecasters are noticing. The big question is what type of precip and how much. The potential is there for
a big storm but the chances are equal it could be left over snow, you know the wimpy kind.
For the season it still looks to me central Kentucky will have 10-15 inches of snow. This would be an average across the area not
one particular spot. (This is only my opinion based on what I read and how I interpret NAO and other modeling data)
One last comment or question. Where is the big NEW site?
Thanks again Chris for all you do and presenting all the possibilities. Thats a good sign of a meteorologist thinking for himself.
Seems like the storm on the 13th will be a case of whether or not the cold air with the northern stream catches the storm before precip exits…looking between the CMC, EURO, GFS and its ensembles there seems to be differing ideas on which stream will be dominant, whether or not there will be phasing involved,etc. If the cold air stays up north we could be looking at a great lakes cutter or a storm to the north and west of KY leaving us in the warm sector for you guessed it more rain
If you cant handle the fact that weather has so many variables that predicting it is the hardest profession there is. I mean geez its a free site and people are complaining about what computers models predict long range.
Whoaaaaa,Euro showing 850 temps at -20 around the 14th.Cheer up folks the pattern is fliping big time.Models are showing the pv is split with ridging over the North central Atlantic on into Greenland.Strong PV over Quebec.AO,NAO looking better.Things are setting up nicely for the Ohio Valley.A fun 6 to 8 weeks of winter to go.Looks like western ky may get the first big snowfall around the 13th.6 to 10 inches possible.
I dont know out of all the NWS office’s around Ky the one out of Louisville seems to be the best office and usually it’s fairly decent. The afternoon forecast discussion is really making a point about the forecast pattern changing to a cold and a wintery scenario. The support with the models and with the NAO/AO ensembles has lifted there eyebrows. Kuddo’s to them and CB at least for once the NWS office out of Louisville is on the same page with Chris.
uhhh yea, and monkeys are going to fly out of my butt too …. huh huh huh
One webcam overlooks Middlesboro and one overlooks Pikeville. There is no snow on the hills, WHICH IS WHERE THE COUNTRY ROADS ARE!
UKFAN, did you not know this? By the way, your post could use some attention on spelling, grammar and punctuation. Real smart.
From NWS in Louisville (they along with Chris seem to be on to something):
…A CHANGE COMING???…
The past several runs have been hinting at a phasing of the northern
and southern streams sometime after Wednesday. Depending on
If/When/Where this occurs, a significant storm system could develop
with a chance at wintery precipitation and bitterly cold
temperatures for the area. Both GFS/GFS Ensemble/ECMWF show a
significant cold air outbreak into the eastern CONUS late next week
into the weekend behind this system. The model solutions have
support from the NAO/AO ensemble forecasts that hint at a trend
toward negative over the next 7-10+ days. Stay Tuned.
Read the Models,the models are your friend.Like i said 3 days ago the potential was there for something big on FRIDAY the 13th.The peices are starting to line up.Chris won’t forecast longrange anymore because too many people CRY when it don’t happen.OH,when that monkey comes out of your butt its gonna hurt.
as far as the poster wondering why they couldnt had school today, first posters are ritght about dangerous roads in our parts,BUT there NO REASON and I mean NO REASON there shoulsnt been school in 97 percent of the counties TODAY, not counting the 2 oer 3 already called tomm. the snow that fewll wasnt deep enough or ebough to cause a bus to slide. u just drive. most snow if it was still on road yesterday morning just blew away. I agree AS far as school. they misse4d today i guiess for no reason. i guess MRS sambples her in clay county wanted to take her XMAS TREE down.
I completely agree with you. LMK is an excellent forecast office that works very hard and is usually quite accurate. Louisville and Paducah are two of the best NWS’s in the country given how they do with Kentucky weather, which is extremely difficult to predict. Chris also does extremely well with the Ohio valley in general.
Have you ever seen the movie Bruce Almighty? It is possible to have monkeys fly out your rear;)
The thing is my friend IF something was to happen then parents would be suing the school board so to avoid lawsuits the county decides to call off school. Thats just the way it is now days
I am ahuge van of this site and visit it several times throughout the day. I have to say this is one of the very few times I have truly been disappointed in the blogs.Come on, So Echo asked a legitimate question (and yes I’m from Eastern KY. and know the roads), So Chris is vague sometimes, he has to be, because turncoats like you guys have been would have him stoned to death if he actually predicted something this far out and it didn’t occur. Everyone knows predicting snow (amounts,type, etc) is extremely difficult to do given all the variables..Lighten up folks! Chris always does the best he can and I will always go with his forecast vs. 99% of the others! All I see today is a bunch of whining and bitching and beating up on a guy with a simple comment or observation.
I traded California for Kentucky over 10 years ago and don’t regret it one bit. So “California Dreamin'” needs to examine his/her words and learn some respect.
Mr. Rolo, I would suggest you drive over to Leslie County and take a look at some of our roads. One road is still completely ice and snow covered, and there are several more just like this one. As a matter of fact, just a few minutes ago I saw a tractor salting and scraping one of the schools driveways because buses and parents still cannot use that road at all to get up to the school, and that was at 4:00 p.m today! I’m sure there were several roads in the same shape in Clay County, our good neighbor to the west! Please don’t assume that just because your road is clear, or town roads are clear, that all other roads in the county are in good shape.
The ECMWF does not have a 6-10 snowfall. Maybe something like that could occur next week but the phasing would have to be just right, odds don’t favor that at this time.
Well said my friend!
What is it they say about California? “The land of fruits, nuts, and flakes”?
I guess i should of stated 6-10 possible if all the peices fall in place.POTENTIAL is the word.Future runs will be interesting.
Well, GFS has been consistently showing a bitter arctic airmass looming across the northern U.S. next week, just waiting to take a dive at the OH valley. It continues to show that today. NWS LMK is picking up on it too and is even mentioning the possibility of winter weather next week. And now, the Euro model does NOT show a wintry solution next week… so if you put all that together it would argue strongly for snow in KY in the next 7-10 days. As I’ve said since Thanksgiving, I believe these next 4 to 5 weeks will be our most wintry of the season.
Something not said enough! Chris I appreciate this blog, your dedication to it and us as readers. Looking forward to the new site! And following you and the hopes for the” BIG ONE” lol for yrs. To come!! 🙂
Yeah, you’re probably right. Again. Hahahahahaha