Friday, November 30, 2012

When's the cold/snow coming?

It had looked a couple weeks ago that the cold in the west would be migrating here next week and beyond.  However, western/northern Canadian seems to be loving this cold and refusing to let go.  As a side note, Hudson Bay is freezing up the fastest in over 5 years.   So the pattern looks to be continuing a transistory nature over the next 10-15 days, alternating cold and mild periods.   However, the longer term is trending toward colder (more normal) in the east in a stormy pattern in the second half of the month.  So hopefully we all can do some tobogganing with the kids in the Christmas break.

Thursday, November 29, 2012

And now for something completely different...

If you like Christmas music and you like Celtic music then this is for you.   More details here.  Proceeds goes to a great cause.

I know of Ross McKitrick from the climate change debate.

Wednesday, November 28, 2012

And the winner is...

Ed Jager, the only other participant of the first measurable snow prediction "contest".  He predicted Nov. 5th, which is closer to the actual date of Nov. 25th than my prediction of October 28th.

As this (and the first frost contest) was a failed experiment to get reader blog interaction, there will be no further such contests.

Tuesday, November 27, 2012

No change from yesterday

Env. Can. is predicting a chance or rain (!) on Thursday and Saturday.  But I don't think we'll get any precipitation in the form of rain until Sunday.

Monday, November 26, 2012

Snow's here for a while...

A little while.

So here's what I'm seeing.

Scattered flurries over the next day or so.
A weak clipper comes through on Wednesday afternoon/evening which may give another layer like last night's.
An even weaker clipper, more like a frontal boundary, comes through on Thursday bringing another dusting.
Friday will be cold.
But on Saturday, things start to warm-up for a few day, getting well into the upper single digits, early next week.  So say bubbye to the snow on the ground then.
A return to colder temps next week Wednesday/Thursday time-frame but how exactly remains to be determined.

Quelle surprise!

Waking up this morning and finding a few centimeters of snow had fallen overnight.  Given my cursory perusal of the weather maps yesterday, I really didn't see this.   I saw flurries at most but this is a little more than flurries.   Mind you, the snow to liquid equivalent ratio is pretty high so this isn't much precip.  But a nice surprise, kind off.  Except when trying to get kids to school and get to work.   It was a scramble to find the winter boots, snowpants, hats and gloves.   Then the madness of the first snowfall on the roads.   Get your snowtires on people!

More on upcoming weather later...

Friday, November 23, 2012

Aaaand....

It's gone... Most models I have viewed today have move the storm south and east.   It'll likely give the NE US a whitening but Ottawa not much of anything.

BUT there will be significant cold on the back side of this.  While there will be a moderate lake-effect-snow event after the current cold front coming through, next week will likely see a signficant whitening of the snow belt areas of southern Ontario.

Thursday, November 22, 2012

Euro and JMA against the rest

With respect to the storm next week, the European and the Japanese models have squared themselves against the GFS, GEM (Canadian), UKMET, NoGAPs and DGEX.  The European has a stronger, broader trough of air coming, forcing and spreading the energy farther south, thus pushing it out to sea before winding it up.  The other models have a sharper trough allowing the system to come north quicker.  The GFS is usually the one jumping systems out (eg Sandy) but this time it's the Euro.   Not surprisingly, the Canadian is the most vigourous of the models.  It tends to blow things up quicker/more.

So making a predicition on this is a tough one.  I am going to wait until tomorrow to see if the models converge.

Tuesday, November 20, 2012

Fair warning...

Whether it's because the models are catching up with Canadian Arctic ice conditions or what, I'm not sure.  But there has been a shift in the modeling with a significant cold press coming down from the Arctic starting next week and going well into December and assumably for the winter.   In terms of relation to averages, the next week and the following will be definitely much colder than normal.  As such, there will be better opportunities for snow rather than rain.  The system on the 28th that I mentioned yesterday is still there but farther south.  It is currently projected to give a pretty good snowstorm to the US NE, with the Ottawa area catching a bit of the northern edge of the storm.

Pine beetle? What Pine Beetle?


2m temperatures valid Dec. 6th
 *Early winter cold temperatures increase pine beetle larvae mortality.

Monday, November 19, 2012

Near term and longer term

Near term, not much of anything.   The next weather of significance will be a cold front that comes through on Friday which will bring showers and very likely some snow showers on the back side of it as well.  

Longer term, there looks to be a weak clipper type feature early next week that may bring some snow flurries.   After that a more signficant system will come through.  As of now it looks to be be a "start as snow, turn to rain, back to snow at the end" type event.  The timing is up for debate with surprisingly the Euro bringing it Wednesday and the GFS Thursday.

A broader perspective shows that Western Canada continues to be very cold.  The map below shows the mean temperature anomoly over the next 16 days.  (Courtesy of Weatherbell)  Note that for our area we are starting warmer than normal, turning cold.

Thursday, November 15, 2012

Next opportunities for snow

The opportunity that I posted about earlier this week dissappeared off the models.   But have no fear snow lovers.  The GFS model has a clipper type feature bringing the possibility of snow around the 24th and then a bigger storm around the 28th.   Fingers crossed!

US Tornado count...

Nearing modern era record low:

Is AGW/Climate Change making drought bigger/longer?

Nope.

Tuesday, November 13, 2012

Calm before the storm?

There is a pretty strong model consensus that the mostly sunny but cool weather will continue until early next week.  Beyond that, it gets a little hairy.  The Euro brings in a Nor'easter that gives us shovelable snow later next week but the GFS delays it to the following week...

Monday, November 12, 2012

This week

After the vigorous cold front tonight (which could see some snow on its tail end), the rest of the week looks cool but pretty unoffensive.

Fred

Friday, November 9, 2012

Hints coming in

Things like the North Atlantic Oscillation and Arctic Oscillation indices are projected to both go negative towards the end of the month.  If all these pieces fit together nicely, we may a signficant snow then.   But it's early.

The next few days

Whilst the prairies are getting blasted by a blizzard, we will have warm up this weekend.   I really don't see the ice rain that Env Can is calling for Saturday night given the warmer air coming in.  

Sunday and Monday should be mild but with no precip (EnvCan currently has a 60 and 40% chance of showers both days).  

Overnight into Tuesday will see a cold front coming through with a fair amount of rain and perhaps some snow on the back side of it. 

It'll stay cool for a few days with next weekend warming up again.

Tuesday, November 6, 2012

Transitory weather pattern

Cooler than normal for a few days.  Warmer than normal for a few days.  Cooler than normal for a few days.   Both GFS and Euro calling for a lot of rain early next week.

Monday, November 5, 2012

A dusting of snow

Walking home from the busstop, I noticed that there was a dusting of snow that stuck, but didn't cover the ground.  We'll see if Env. Can. can measure that.

Friday, November 2, 2012

Keep on banging away

At the BS button.

1954 to 1960:  8 Major Hurricanes impacting the US coast line.   Last Major Hurricane to impact US, Hurricane Wilma, 2005.