Nice Vets Day

To All Our Veterans: Thank You! 

Today will be a nice day for most of us. Some sunshine early through the high clouds, and milder temps with highs into the low to mid 50’s. Not bad at all. Fairly seasonal with a touch of mild tossed in. But it won’t last. Big changes come tonight.

The frontal system coming, which looked like it had potential to give us our first widespread snowfall of the year, will give the northern Ohio Valley, NW PA and the NW half of NY and northern New England a good dumping of heavy snow. But for us, a sweeping line of light rain, changing to light snow is about it.

Like last Thu, how much precipitation is behind the front will be key to how much snow there really is to fall and maybe whiten the ground. Right now, most of the moisture is behind the front. But will it last?  I think so. But there are some inhibiting factors in getting a nice snowfall (>2):

• The trough is leaning forward. We call this positively tilted. It typically does not bring much in the way of snow, because there is no mechanism to maintain moisture behind the front and produce heavy snow.  There are exceptions, but they are rather unusual.
• Our warm start. Climatology tells us that changing rain to snow when it starts in the 40’s is very difficult to do. It can happen, but it is very rare.

Because of this, I suspect, that at best this could be a ‘white rain’ situation Tue morning. The moisture behind the front is supportive of seeing snow, but the warm initial temps, and mild ground temps argue for any snow that falls will melt on contact. Thus “white rain.”

The ridge tops have the best chance of seeing any snow stick to the colder surfaces. At the most a slushy ½” – 1” might occur in the highest elevations. I really am not too excited about snowfall with this set up

What could change this? A stronger than expected impulse energizes the front east of the mtns, almost producing convective snow. This would provide a burst of heavy snow for 2-3 hours from 7 am – 10 am Tue. This is highly unlikely. But it is possible. Maybe 5% chance or less!

After this its cold. Snow flurries, and a snow shower or two is possible Tue into Wed morning. There could be some heavier show showers around too. They could whiten the ground also. But you cannot predict where they will fall.
Cold Wed and into Thu. A weak system, acting more like a warm front, will move in Thu and bring a chance for a snow shower or two as warmer air returns, relatively speaking that is. Instead of highs around freezing, we will warm into the 40’s. Still cool, but much nicer to the middle of Nov.
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That is about all. If you want snow, drive to Rochester NY. They’ll get 6” or more. If not, enjoy the milder day today.
 

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