Update @ 1:15 pm (Lunch!) 

The egg is about what the snow forecast amounted too: all cracked up and nothing to do but toss it! So I did as you can see below Tue is gone :) 

Amazing how State College and Altoona was at 4" by 10 am and still snowing ... but east of them?  A dusting for most. Truly remarkable. Broken forecasts all over the place: For us forecast waaaay too much. To our west, waaay too little. A humbling business it really is. I guess you could say, we gave our 2" to Altoona and State College :) 

A little sarcasm ... Yes we will be getting some snow! 

Discussion:
The winter forecast spoke of 3 storm tracks that would dominate this winter: Cutting NE through the Great Lakes (the dominate one by far), Clipper systems (like tomorrows system) and from the southern plains to the mid-atlantic coast. Obviously, the Great Lakes cutters, which bring snow,ice and rain, have been dominate. The others will be appearing this week and at least early next week. And these two tracks are the ones that bring us the most snow … so, it should not be a surprise to see snow on Tuesday and then again on Sun night into early Monday.

If all goes as planned, we will have the most snow of the winter over the next 7 days than we’ve had all winter! Of course, that statement needs a huge * by it. I mean we’ve had very little all year. In fact at my house (in a very low valley) I’ve measured 4” total so this season (including this afternoons squall through 4 pm). I think it would be very likely to get 4” of snow from the squalls of this afternoon, the snow tomorrow and the snow of Sunday night.

This pattern flip is a very good pattern to produce snow for us. It was one that I thought would have appeared a few other times, temporarily during this winter, producing a couple of decent snow storms. Well, that has not happened. Most of the action has been out west. But, I must admit that the west has been dry. California is the epicenter of the heavy snow and rain, and their “perma-drought” as coined by some, is all but officially over!  Now that is great news! So, I guess less snow for us is ok since someone is getting a very badly needed winter barrage.

Will this pattern last?  Well, it appears to want to stay longer than I first thought. It looks to last through the middle of February, but after that … spring may arrive?  Or is it back to cool, warm, cool, warm as storms journey NE through the Great Lakes?  Time will tell.

For now, this is how it looks for the upcoming week: The Dailies …

• This Evening: Some heavy snow squalls are still roaming around. Any squally could accumulate up to 1” of snow quickly.
• Tuesday: Clipper system moves in from the west. Snow starts around sunrise and continues into the early afternoon. 2-3” look rather likely at this time. More to our north, and less to our south.
• Wednesday: Clouds and sun. Chance snow shower.
• Thursday-Saturday: Cold. Sun and clouds. Chance snow shower.
• Sunday-Monday: Snow likely Sunday night into very early Monday as storm intensifies from southern plains and moves off the Delaware coast producing several inches of snow.

 
Some intrigue for around Feb 8-9? The pattern would support a significant storm, but where?  Through the Great Lakes?  Or up along the East Coast?  Both are plausible. It all depends of which energy will be dominant: northern or southern. Northern means Great Lakes, and southern means East Coast.

​The irony behind all of this is that last week the highly respect EURO model showed Sunday’s system heading NE through the Great Lakes … but its not going there. So, could this be the same error?  Similar pattern, similar error?  It could fit since the EURO struggles with energy coming throught the SW US. So, we shall see.