Good Evening, gang. The pattern continues to take on the look of an extreme one in the coming week and change. The European Model continues to take things to another level and is as wild as anything I’ve seen since January, 1994. That doesn’t mean it’s right… but… wow.
The model shows several inches of snow from our Thursday storm system that wraps up much more than what the American models are showing…
The GFS and NAM aren’t as wrapped up with the system, but would still give us accumulating snows. We still have lots of model runs to go through, but I like the snow chances followed by a very cold shot of air.
The European shows the motherlode of arctic cold surging into the area late Sunday into Monday and develops a monster storm ahead of it…
That… is… wild. Here’s a better breakdown of the precipitation associated with the storm…
That’s about an extreme solution as you can get around here. While possible, extreme events from several days away should be taken with a grain of salt. Let’s see what that looks like in a few days. If it’s showing something similar… then we can get excited.
Regardless… there is a ton of winter to come.
Take care.
Wow that’s impressive. Chris have you ever thought of doing video blogs.
I really appreciate all the devotion and time you put into your blogs.
He has done video blogs before
I like the snow chances.
But not digging the extremely cold air.
If that model run came true would that be 1 or 2 feet of snow followed by 20 degrees below zero in eastern ky? Just wondering If I was looking at it correctly. If so I’ve just seen that a couple of times in my life time around here winters of 1994 & 1985. We had a lot of snow and cold in 1978 but I don’t think it got that cold below zero.
1978 in Louisville we had snows on three consecutive Mondays. One being a 15 inch snow and the last being a Blizzard. I believe we had 18 days of below freezing high temps. The Ohio River froze over. Out of schools for two to three weeks if not longer.
It could happen again!
Even the underplaying weather channel just showed most of KY with a 3 to 5 inch snow Thursday??
I saw that Todd.
Now now don’t go getting excited over possibilities of mega snow. People will think you’re rooting for power outages, car wrecks and animals starving or freezing to death. 😉
This
That does look like January of 1994–still the worst state-wide winter weather event I can remember.
The January 16/17th storm in 1994 was the most awesome snow storm I have seen in my 50 years in KY, in Frankfort it started as freezing rain for a few hours only to switch to heavy snow at rates of 3 inches per hour, in a 6 hour period my yard in frankfort got 18 inches of snow with some thunder and lightning mixed in 🙂
I was living in Louisville, well LaGrange at the time. Like Frankfort, it started with a period of freezing rain that lasted a couple of hours. Even before going to bed, that guys at WAVE 3 weren’t sure of the dominant precip type that night. Needless to say, i was awakened by snow thunder at about 4-5 Am and witnessed a very intense whiteout outside our home. We ended up with nearly 14 inches of snow and the cold was WICKED for nearly a week afterwards.
You are correct, I was watching John Belski from wave3 at 11:00 pm that night and the freezing rain was still falling, they were not sure if any significant snow would fall, but by 11:30 the heavy snow started moving in from southern Indiana, the rest is history!
27 below 2 days later in Frankfort!
Pretty sure it was Craig Edwards who was on the job for Wave 3 that Sunday night.
Craig might have been their too, but remember John Belski standing in his weather garden showing huge flakes starting to fall in Louisville that night!
I think they all were pretty conservative on amounts. If my memory is correct, they were thinking 4-6″ with possible lower or high depending on the ice.
FWIW (not much IMO):
Euro panning out = 1%
Blend of models (real light on the Euro) resulting in ankle biter followed by temps trending to single digits to -4 for lows = 60%
The Euro needs a big snow to pan out for the crazy temps. Seems too many IFS to happen. That said, we would not want that to happen, since would absolutely result in bad things. No, I am not being part of the gloom police, but stating fact. Why would anyone want such cold temps to pan out as far as a good thing?
You do realize, don’t you, that what somebody hopes is going to happen, has no basis in reality, don’t you?
I’d like about 75′ of snow and -100 temperatures, so there, go into a frenzy about that one.
BigPoppaSnow (I’ve changed my mind, I now hope for 400′ of snow and -1000 below zero)
Now that would be the storm to end all storms, since we would all die 😉
Yes, that’s beyond absolute zero, I think, the temperature at which all molecular motion ceases. That would be cold!
I simply did an outlook based on the model trend and the fact that so far this year, the Euro has been a drama king/queen for outlooks for every winter event.
Simply blend of the models is all. Nothing implied or anything else. To follow the ever wise words of the Eagles, “Take it easy, take it easy” 🙂
Again, based on the trend so far… Who the hey really knows?
Love the snow chances, especially the one on Sunday, perfect timing.
Snowy Bengals game would be fun, that is if they win!
Dalton in snow… Not too sure about that one 😉
When do we go into alert mode?
Thanks, Mr. Bailey! Appreciate the time you’re taking to show the updates!
Well, I had a long post about a favorite winter storm (1996) but it never posted. I won’t try it again quite yet, but I thought it would be interesting to see what you guys and gals can recollect as far as your favorite winter storms. Mine are: January 1996, January 1994 and one we had from December 1989
1998 20 inches in February, temps never got below 31 degrees during 2 days of heavy snow, of course being February it was 60 a few days after that!
That was a good one, seemed like it snowed for 3-4 days straight. But, you’re right, the temps never got below 30 and it was quickly followed by the torch. Sorry, I had to throw that in there LOL
That was a torch year besides that one storm!
Yeah that was the blowtorch. I’d like to see the blog if we had those type of storms roll in this Winter.
The blog might get a workout the next few weeks, potential is still the word of the week so far though!
The “Great Blizzard of 93″….23″ of snow just east of Knoxville, where I was living at the time. There was snow as far south as Northern Florida and around 5″-12” in Metro Atlanta. 3′ of snow near Asheville, NC. It is known today as the storm of the century and I remember it like it was yesterday. Unfortunately, many people lost there lives during that storm, so I’m definitely not hoping for something of that magnitude again.
My lest favorite was in 1994. Power was out at my place for 2 weeks. My parents worked out of state and a family friend was supposed to be “babysitting” me. He left and went home after coming over to check and see if I needed anything since I had no license yet. Next morning I woke up to a loud sound. Looked out side and noticed a huge tree had fallen on my basketball goal and flattened it. That’s when I noticed no power. I got ready and went outside and trees were down everywhere. And more were falling. After a while I decided I would need to walk out. I made my way over about 40 or so trees on my way up the road (did not go very far) and noticed a couple people walking in to get me. It was a mess the whole way and I heard later that more than 100 trees where across my road. Had to stay out for almost 3 weeks before there was power back at my place.
I really love to see the snow, and now I have a generator, but I just hope we have nothing like that again here.
Looks like the euro has let up a bit on Sundays storm. Last night it was looking like a monster. Now it looks heavy but not as big.
As is the way of drama kings & queens. If you have ever been to Europe, there are a bunch of them there and are real people. Especially France! You want to get them rowdy in France, rush through dinner, rest your elbows on the table and talk with food in your mouth. The talking with food in your mouth is rude anywhere, but a new level of angst over there- especially when they find out you are from the US 🙂 😉
If even a quarter of the Euro maps above panned out it would make many people on this site very happy campers.
I believe the Euro has called for a arctic blast for the past three weeks.
Looks like the ensembles parlayed the maps into one big BET.
Rolo…..which horse should we be betting?
So basically, we’re looking for the models to continue to be dramatic until Friday, then even as they simmer down to reality, we should still get enough snow on Sunday to extend Christmas Break. This is then followed by a couple of days we’re out because it’s too cold for the buses. After that it warms up just enough for a good southern snow system, to be followed by the frigid cold thing again. Is that about right?
Well, I guess I’m one of those people who would enjoy the extreme temps. This region typically gets in the 20 below zero or so range about every 20 years or so. We are about overdue, and such cold temperatures have some very good ecological functions.
For those of you in Eastern Kentucky you probably watched a lot of your pine forests die over the last decade or so. This was because of the Southern Pine beetle moving north as a result of a lack of subzero winters. This pest is very detrimental to Yellow pine species such as short leaf pine, Pitch pine, and Virginia pine, all of which predominate the forest of SE Kentucky.
Invasive southern plants like Mimosa have been moving north and becoming more aggressive. Temperatures below about 15 below zero will damage these plants killing them to the roots and may outright kill them. The same can be said for kudzu which is eating up southeastern Kentucky.
If you live near or around Lexington you may have noticed that mistletoe is getting way out of hand on walnut trees, some maples, and in cherries. Temperatures around 20 below zero will do a number on the mistletoe infestations and help save our trees. There is no real effective of chemical or cultural control for mistletoe for any tree once a trees infested.
So I’m hoping for a good 20 to 30 below zero winter which would solve a lot of plant problems. If you have big Southern Magnolia’s they may not be around though oh well they don’t belong this far north anyway.
I work at an Arboretum so I have a plant science background and this is why I know all this stuff.
Great info – good to know of some of the benefits of the really cold temps, but I think I would settle for about 4 or 5 nights in a row between zero and five below. 20 below is extreme for these parts and many water and heating systems would fail.
I had a large garter snake sunning itself in my driveway on Friday. If I’m still seeing snakes out in the open, then it still isn’t yet cold enough to be called “winter”.
come on Chris don’t post these stuff, some here are stupid and will give u hell when we get 1-2 inches because they don’t have no sense. but there a SMELL IN THE AIR ill give u that Bailey.
I knew you would flip flop like always.
Rolo is right, if you throw lots of blood in the water the snow sharks expect to be feed at some point 😉
Fed 🙂
Looks more hopeful for some real winter than any time in my 9 years in KY. But, alas, the trend, the tend, the trend… Has. It been our friend…….
…has NOT been …
Statement From Brian Goode 30 Minutes ago
Latest NAM: strongest so far of all it’s runs, but still not a phased system. Indicates advisory level amounts (light). GFS is next. Then Euro.
Nothing like starting the semester with a chance of a snow day!
At this point in Berea, the next time we have snow covering the ground, it will be unfamiliar enough to our local kids that they’ll likely start screaming “stranger danger!” when it happens.
I think I almost wet myself from laughing so hard .
00Z GFS now running
CB was just on Fox and mentioned colder air and snow chances, but that is understandably it for now. I still think the Euro is being the usual drama king/queen and should be taken lightly in relation to the other models. As noted, even a fraction of the Euro would add some spice to next week.
to my untrained eye, according the the 00z GFS..it looks as if the Thursday storm may be attempting to phase into a stronger system..the mountains of eastern KY may meet advisory criteria..3-6 inches???..both the NAM and GFS are trending now for stronger storm…now..lets see what card the EURO deals..
GFS is trying it’s best to make some happy in the hills of EKY..A little to fast of a flow as i see it right now..Tomorrow we shall know..
If CKY is not part of it, that would not surprise many here 😉
My desire for snow seems to provide the energy required by the Louisville snow dome….but, maybe not this time!
Let it snow in Pine Knot, PLEASE!
Sounds like the latest trend is for a east ky snow thursday, and a dome look in the west and central, we shall see as the players are not fully on the field yet??
If we can get this baby to phase, then the central and east could be in for higher end of advisory or lower end of WSW type of event. Say, widespread 3-5″ amounts?
Most models show 1-3″ of snow for most of us. The Euro is the one going crazy. It has been wrong every single time so far this winter.