The cold as of late hasn’t been anywhere close to extreme, but it has been persistent. The last real semblance of a thaw for ilsnow land ended on January 15th.
We have a few opportunities for snow over the upcoming week, then we’ve got some trouble on the horizon. Let’s take a look at them:
Thursday 2/13:
There should be a pretty strong storm developing over coastal North Carolina Thursday morning. At this point, I’m pretty skeptical as to whether ilsnow.com will score a significant snowfall with this one because of the fast Pacific jet stream plowing into the United States and the utter lack of high-latitude blocking over Greenland or the Canadian Maritimes. With NO amplified ridge over the western United States, the eastern trough probably won’t get deep enough capture that storm close enough to the coast to really take it to the house here. But, this could be a really good snow event for interior New England though:
Saturday 2/15:
Even if we get completely skunked with Thursday’s storm, a minor storm from the Great Lakes area should deliver a half-way decent shot of snow by Saturday morning. There will be a decent charge of cold air over the weekend in the wake of the storm. Just what we need to keep the snow nice and fresh!
Tuesday 2/18:
Yet another storm will be heading toward us after Presidents’ Day. This one will have warmer air trying to wedge its way into ilsnow land, but the entrenched cold dome should ensure a snow event or snow to mixed precipitation at worst:
After that?
Our good times come to an end later Presidents’ Week. After the 19th, the Polar Vortex will have retreated to the Arctic Circle and a large vortex will have set up over Alaska:
This locks up the Arctic cold over Alaska and northern Canada and leaves us highly vulnerable to a significant warm-up. It’s tough to say how bad any thaw would be 10 days or more away from its occurring. But it’s pretty safe to say that it’s not going to help our cause.
Is winter over then?
Probably not as long as we have this tremendous blob of warm water over the northeast Pacific Ocean:
As I have noted many times before, warm water over the northeast Pacific leads to strong cold outbreaks in the winter. After we get over the hump with any late February thaw, I think winter has plenty left in the tank and it could continue well into early “spring.”
Bottom line:
Get up here and ride all you want for the next week to 10 days, while conditions are good. Then we’ll see what the back 9 of winter gives us.
Darrin @ ilsnow.com
