Good Tuesday and Merry Christmas! If you know anything about your friendly weatherdude, you know I am a sucker for Christmas. It is, without a doubt, my favorite time of year and I love just saying the words “Merry Christmas”.
While we won’t have a white Christmas, we will have some festive flakes and frigid temperatures to go around. The first round is moving across the state early this morning. It may leave behind a rooftop dusting for some areas. Temps this morning will drop into the teens across the central and west with low 20s east. Gusty winds may make it feel close to 0 at times.
Sunny skies return later in the day as highs stay in the 20s. I have you set to do some holiday tracking…
Current temperatures
Winds
Christmas morning will find temps in the upper teens and low 20s with an increase in clouds. Those clouds have a shot of producing a few snowflakes. The future radar from the HI-Res NAM continues to show a diminishing band of light snow working into the region early in the day…
Highs will be in the 30s with gusty winds for the big day.
Another system dives in from the northwest by Thursday morning and will bring another quick-hitting shot of cold air. It may also bring the chance for a few flakes…
Highs Thursday may not get above freezing for many.
Farther down the road… the pattern continues to show itself as one that wants to go toward extreme for January. We get an arctic front in here late this weekend and that’s the beginning of it all. Look at the 500mb setup from the GFS…
Folks… that is just a brutal run of the model as it brings the polar vortex south toward the states… relaxes it for a winter storm… the brings the vortex into the Great Lakes.
Based on that model run… check out where temps wind up as the PV drops into the Lakes…
I am ONLY showing that map to illustrate the capabilities this pattern has for January. As I have been talking about for weeks… the month ahead has the potential to turn brutal for much of the country.
Merry Christmas and take care.
Snow falling in Lawrenceburg! It won’t amount to much–but it is sticking to everything on contact with temps in the Mid 20’s.
why did my extensive post on the PV fail to register?
lol i had like two paragraphs typed out as to why I would love to know what the polar vortex means for us. Bummer it never made it. Definitely not going to repeat it all, but the main question was what defines an extreme polar vortex and what a polar vortex actually is.
any help from some of you weather gods is very much appreciated too. I had a huge post about the PV and what correlation it has to E KY, but it never made it. let me in on this….
Go to Wikipedia and search for “polar vortex.” Your answer is on that page.
Nice little deck duster in Frankfort, joy to the world!
Yep–a real surprise! I woke up to grab a drink of water and now I can’t stop watching it snow!
Merry Christmas, Chris. The cold is a’coming but what about some storms?!!!?
Christmas and snow bring out the kids in all of us (who haven’t lost our inner child) and it doesn’t take much of either to make us happy!
Merry Christmas!
Yikes!!! Its cold out.
Dusting ala’ Festive Flakes! Festiva!
I will take this over the profoundly bad ice storm that Michigan and other area got = anytime! Hundreds of thousands without power and the majority maybe still without until Saturday.
You got it. Toronto, Canada had one of its worst ice storms on record.
I woke up earlier and was pleasantly surprised at the small dusting of snow on everything but the pavement. However, something seemed off, like I could hear something outside. I opened the front door and I could immediately hear the cries of a billion snowflakes being quickly murdered by the sun in a 100% cloudless sky.
In my best Bernie Mac voice (R.I.P.), “now that’s some bull!@$1”
I duh pappy 🙂
No,I da pappy boss.
We’ve got festive flakes in eastern Mason Co. Beautiful! Merry Christmas to all and God bless us every one!
Nice coating of snow in east Frankfort, even a little snow on the roads, looks very festive out their 🙂
Merry Christmas, everyone!!!!!!!
Merry Christmas Eve to all. Bring on the cold and just maybe a system can ride up the Apps when it relaxes later next week. Have a great day everyone.
It is very cold out there with the wind though. Current temp in Lawrenceburg 16–wind chill 3 above.
Merry Christmas to your family Chris! Woke up to big fluffy flakes and a light dusting on roof and cars this morning! Add in the Christmas music and it just set the stage for Christmas Eve. At least Santa will have the cold temps and that suit won’t be too hot! Wouldn’t want him to have a melt down! 😉 Have a GREAT Christmas Eve, everyone. IF travelling, safe travels to everyone! Thanks Chris, for all you do. Merry Christmas to all my fellow weather weenies!!!!
Wonder where blowtorch boy is?
He was right. But they forgot to tell him it would be an ICE blowtorch.
He will be back–the first day we have above 57 in January (though I doubt we will have many–with the average high in the low 40s). An average of 57 for a high in January just isn’t sensible. That’s higher than the average high in March or November. Just can’t see that happening.
Now, in all fairness–if he had predicted January would average–say 47 for a high–I might have taken him seriously. That is possible, and has happened in recent years.
Merry Christmas, Chris Mercer
Bryant Merry Christmas to you!
And for the record–I don’t try to bash anyone–I really don’t! I just like to look at historical facts and try to point out when we have some amazing weather.. If your 57 pans out–that would be amazing–I just don’t see it happening given 150 years or so of weather data in Kentucky. Like I said 47 is warm–57 would be “bowtorch” LOL
Have a Merry Christmas, Eyewall
It is snowing!!!!!!!!!! Merry Christmas Chris and everyone.
I have a white Christmas Eve at my house and it’s still snow my but now it needs to quit so I can get to grandma’s house….
Deck duster here in Middlesboro. Does put one back in the Christmas spirit after it has almost been completely robbed of us by the incessant commercialization, monetization, and the almighty Wal-Mart. I do hope everyone here has a wonderful Christmas almost completely robbed of us by the incessant commercialization, monetization, and the almighty Wal-Mart. I do hope everyone here has a wonderful Christmas.
beautiful snow this a.m.
Christmas tunes on the stereo and a big family breakfast-perfect!
Merry Christmas everyone….
Winter of 1976 or any of the late 70’s will do for me! That was Winter with the capital W! We have the cold now we need the snow.
Nice little deck duster here in Laurel Co. Hope you guys and gals have a merry Christmas, and may we all get the elusive big snow this January.
Well said.
Chris was the only one last night saying we had a chance at putting a little snow on the ground, Great call Chris!
Merry Christmas to ya Chris and all bloggers, we may disagree sometimes on here but that’s part of what makes the blog fun 🙂
Amen! It is fun to “agree to disagree” I do think personal attacks have no place here though.
Agree
Every year I notice the record lows from 1989. That was one heck of a cold spell. I was in Austin and it got down to 2 degrees.
Was there snow on the ground here that year?
I’m pretty sure I remember Dec 89 here there was snow on the ground and very cold most of that month – at least what I’ve read on this blog from past comments! But, I think that following Jan and Feb ended up being warmer and no snow……
We had three extremely cold snaps in Austin that year – all in December. After that I don’t remember it being cold at all.
December of ’89 was very cold. Then the “blowtorch” came in January and February.
I posted a comment here, but I guess it failed. Perhaps it will show up later with some info on the 1989 event you mentioned. Cheers! -MJ
MJ – Good to see you 🙂
I don’t know what’s wrong with this blog comment section (at least for me) it seems if I type anything long, like over a paragraph, it never takes…….It’s frustrating to type out all that in a comment, only to submit and it goes to never never land, even if I’m careful with trigger words……..
MJ thanks for posting. You have always had some good insight regarding the AO, PNA, and NAO. What do you think the signals look like as we move into January?
Pretty cold with some snow chances. Snow depends on how the storm track sets up. Overall looks like a good set up. -MJ
Sounds like January will be fun! At least we are in the game for some snow.
Yes and carried through until late January. We had snow on the ground in some manner for over a month. Started warming up some mid January.
late December.
Started getting significant snow off & on in December until end and mid-ish January started to thaw out.
Merry Christmas Chris.
Wishing the very best Christmas for you and yours
I still follow you daily for my weather…
Charlie
from Huntington, WV
If I don’t get a chance to post tomorrow… Here’s wishing each of you a very Merry Christmas (even you Bryant ;)…)! Hope hard for a Christmas morning dusting!
MJ… It was nice to see your post… I have always loved your insight on the blog!
Remember all of my brothers and sisters in arms tonight and tomorrow… at home and abroad they have our backs so that we can have our day!
Semper Fi my friend! And for my grandfather (who served in the Nayy from 1941-1975) Anchors Aweigh!
I served in the Marines for four years: Infantry 🙂
Semper Fi!
Thank you for your service
i was wondering what happened to the snow chances this week…..we got the dusting this morning and then chris said to watch out for the day after christmas and then he said to watch around the end of the year into the first of the new year….according to the models and local mets…..our next chance for even a dusting will not be until monday of next week….is this winter going to be remembered for brutal cold but lack of snow……i since a trend developing here.
14 degrees in Versailles at 9 PM. I smell single digits tonight.