Hello everyone! 

Today will feature more in the way if warmth as our little break from winter continues. Look for slowly fading sun to bring temps up to the 40 degree mark for most with mid to upper 30’s north. A few light sleet/freezing rain showers are possible late tonight into early tomorrow morning so use caution if heading out early tomorrow. 

-Jack

Hello everyone! 

Today will feature temps that are much more reasonable for February however still on the warm side. Look for highs in the low to mid 30’s north and upper 30’s to low 40’s south. Skies will feature a mix of sun and clouds and no precip is expected. 

Our boring pattern rolls on.

-Jack

Hello everyone!

Today will feature ridiculously mild weather as a cold front approaches from the north. Look for highs in the mid 40’s north and mid 50’s south under partly to mostly sunny skies.

Winter returns in a week’s time.

-Jack

Hello everyone!

Clouds this morning will give way to sunnier skies this afternoon as a weak disturbance drifts by overhead. Look for milder temps to continue as highs rise to freezing in the north and up to around 40 in the south. Winds will be noticeably lighter than yesterday. Watch for black ice this morning as any of yesterday’s melting refroze in last night’s cooler temps. This trend of melting/refreezing will continue through the week as daytime highs rise above freezing and nighttime lows sink below the 32 degree mark.

No major storms are in sight.

-Jack

Hello everyone! 

Today will feature the beginning of the 7th inning stretch of our winter. We’ve had lots of fun and there’s more to come, but we’re taking a break before the final push. We have about a week of mild and calm weather ahead before winter’s final push in early March. Today will feature partly to mostly sunny skies along with a NW breeze and dry conditions. Look for highs in the mid 20’s north and low to mid 30’s at the coast. 

Dry and warm weather will continue through the weekend.

-Jack 

Hello everyone!

Our next storm is already here across the mountains this morning as low pressure approaches from the west. Look for snow to continue through the day in the mountains while a mix of snow and rain develops towards the coast. Temps will range from the 20’s up north to the 30’s along the coast. Temps fall this evening and change everyone over to snow which is likely to be heavy at times as a Norlun trough combines with a storm offshore to bring intense bands of snow to the area.

Check out my post from last evening for details on snowfall accumulation.

We’ll have a week of boring warmth to melt and recover before another active period moves in to close out February and kick off March

-Jack

Hello everyone!

More snow is on the way! A clipper system will approach the region tonight before capturing and pulling a storm from the SE US up the coast in our direction. Precip will start tomorrow morning in the form of snow across the mountains. As the cold front associated with the clipper approaches, some of that snow may be squally in nature. Then, the real fun begins tomorrow mid day as a norlun trough sets up in SW Maine. Moisture will be funneled west along this trough and it will produce a band of very heavy snow. As the coastal low pressure system develops offshore, more bands of heavy snow could rotate into the region before the storm moves offshore Thursday morning.

Here’s a look at one model’s depiction of the weather map tomorrow afternoon at 1 PM. Note the Norlun trough developing along the New England coastline as moisture from the offshore storm is funneled back into the region. This process is a sure bet, where exactly it sets up and what the temperature is along the coast while it’s going on isn’t. Right now it looks like locations near Portland will start with a light rain/snow mix before going over to snow in the early evening. Exactly when this transition happens will be crucial in determining how much snow falls.

The Norlun trough will then become just another band on the west side of a coastal low due to upper level dynamics favorable for cyclogenesis offshore. A trough is diving SE out of the Great Lakes this evening and will ingest a disturbance currently moving through Oklahoma. The OK disturbance will tilt the trough negative tomorrow evening allowing for moisture to stream into the region. The upper level low will then close off to our south helping to keep precip going by wrapping in moisture and precip from the NE.

As precip gets going tomorrow afternoon, the biggest limiting factor will be surface temps. In the mountains, things will be plenty cold enough for a fluffy snow. More pow for the ski areas! Along the immediate coast, precip will start as rain. In between, a wet snow will fall. Exactly where the rain/snow line sets up and how fast it collapses SE will determine if the coast gets 6 or 16″ of snow. Any coastal rain will quickly turn to snow as cold air moves in later in the evening tomorrow.

Here’s what I’m thinking with regards to snowfall amounts. There will be a sharp gradient in NH as it’s a little uncertain how far west the heavier bands get. I’ll update this tomorrow when I know more. The snow in the mountains will be of the fluffy variety and of the wet/heavy along the coast. With all the recent snow, be mindful that loads on roofs will be getting very heavy so be sure to clear off as much as you can!

If you’re getting annoyed at this pattern, do know that a thaw is coming next week. If that thought makes you sad, winter will likely return to kick off March.

Wondering what a Norlun trough is? Check out my explainer in UpPortland from last winter.

-Jack

Hello everyone!

Today will feature quiet weather as high pressure builds overhead. Look for a mix of sun and clouds, light winds, and dry conditions. Temps will rise into the mid 20’s north and the low 30’s south. We have one more storm in the pipeline tomorrow into Thursday before we’re back to January’s mild and boring pattern.

-Jack

Hello everyone!

Our blizzard is here and ongoing across Maine this morning. Precip has moved out of western NH but is still going strong over ME as bands rotate in around our ocean storm. Winds are only beginning to wind up as our storm intensifies so expect continuing deterioration of visibility even as snow begins to lighten up. From the looks of it, an additional 4-8″ can be expected from Portland to Augusta and points NE. 2-4″ more is likely from Kittery-Fryeburg and NE while NH is likely only to see another coating-2″ on top of what’s already fallen. Winds will gust in the 40-50mph+ range along the coast and in the 20-40mph range inland which will blow around all the light/fluffy snow resulting in very low visibility. Winds could also be enough to bring down some trees which could result in power outages.

Snow will wind down from W to E during the day with snow already nearly done in the CT river valley and snow continuing into the early evening along the midcoast. The HRRR Model shown above gives a good visualization of this trend. Temps will linger in the 20’s for most today as daytime heating is balanced out by colder air being drawn into the storm from the north.

More snow is possible Wednesday into Thursday with some folks likely seeing another foot and possibly more. More details forthcoming!

-Jack

Hello everyone!

We are all systems go for a major blizzard tonight and into tomorrow morning. Low pressure now forming S of Washington DC will move NE over Cape Cod and into the Gulf of Maine by early tomorrow morning. As it does this, a powerful upper level disturbance will drive explosive development of the storm, pulling it west and stalling it out for a brief time tomorrow morning over the Gulf of Maine. The storm will then slide SE offshore tomorrow during the day. Now that snow is beginning to fall over NH and SW ME, we can rely less on model guidance and more on observations to determine if we need to change the forecast at all.

Model guidance has pretty much locked in the amount of liquid equivalent that will fall (around an inch in the mountains and between 1.5 and 2″ along the coast) so now the snow forecast goes over to ratios. Will the snow pile up quickly with very high snow:liquid ratios or will it be sludge that hardly accumulates at all with low snow to liquid ratios? Given strong snow growth dynamics (see last night’s post), this will largely come down to surface temps. As the above image shows, temps are currently well below model forecasts across the coasts (by around 5 degrees) meaning that a drier, fluffier snow is looking likely.

In the upper levels, the water vapor satellite tells the story. Powerful energy is racing SE across the Great Lakes with abundant lift and moisture ahead of it. As soon as that upper level energy hits the coast, the storm will explode and snow will intensify as moisture is dawn in from the Atlantic. The upper level trough is already weakly negative and well on its way to becoming very negative as the energy works east. This is the mechanism behind the explosive strengthening of our storm.

Radar this afternoon is showing bands of moderate snow working into the area from SW to NE. These will eventually overspread the entire area this evening and will continue through the overnight hours. During that time, the storm offshore will really get going and bands of snow will begin moving in off the ocean. As the storm stalls and slides out to sea, those bands will stall and then collapse SE with it. Where exactly these bands stall out tomorrow morning will determine who gets the jackpot totals. Under the heaviest bands, 30″ totals are a distinct possibility though only a few towns will see those so the general 18-24″ forecast stands.

Here’s the surface analysis from 2 PM this afternoon showing our storm beginning as a benign 1004mb low pressure system embedded within 80F temps in Virginia. From its humble origins, it will turn into an all out blizzard as it loops off the MA coast tomorrow morning. This loop/stall will be a result of the upper level low capturing the storm and pulling it west underneath the upper level low. Once the storm is “stacked” its intensification will halt as its source of energy is removed and the entire system will slide SE into the North Atlantic. This will occur midday tomorrow.

The explosively developing storm will result in very strong winds which, combined with the dry/fluffy snow will result in blizzard conditions along the coast tomorrow morning. Winds could gust to 50mph along the coast resulting in near zero visibility. For more details on the wind threat, check out last night’s post.

Here’s my latest snowfall forecast. I expanded the 18-24″ zone farther NW into the mountains as a very high fluff factor is forecast there and models have been hinting at a strong band setting up there. I took the coast down to a blanket 18-24″ as latest guidance has trimmed QPF back slightly though I left the potential in for up to 30/32″ in any of the heaviest bands that set up. For more on how mesoscale bands set up and why they have such an impact on snowfall, check out my post from our last major snowstorm just a few days ago!

Don’t look yet but another snowstorm is becoming more likely for Thursday. At the moment it looks like a Norlun trough type event which are notoriously hard to predict. Stay tuned for more info tomorrow and through the week!

-Jack