Winter Storm Weekend

Well goodness golly gracious that escalated quickly. Seriously I keep waiting for the numbers to drop severely and they just haven't. I promised you all a write-up today so here we go although this might be a tad rushed (I have class in half an hour).

The short and the long of this is, as I explained in the other thread, that we're looking at a winter storm of epic proportions. I've been holding off on pulling the trigger on this, to wait for it to really zero in but things are starting to align and frankly...its bad news for you snow haters in Blacksburg and up the Shenandoah valley. The Euro is still being a little bold with its predictions, throwing some numbers out there around 20"-30" of snow, which is usually shot down by the GFS but the GFS has jumped right on board as well; running predictions for our area around 20". If these numbers hold up, snowfall accumulation could easily hit this range, even if it tapers off a good bit, its still going to cause some serious issues. While it hasn't completely zeroed in quite yet (more on that in a second) its looking like the low is going to push most of the snowfall up our beloved Shenandoah valley making everyone from Blacksburg to DC ride the struggle bus for travel arrangements.

all aboard

There is a silver lining however, as the low has not made landfall yet

Here's an image of the storm we're keeping tabs on

look at that a pretty little track and everything! thanks NWS

As you can see he's (or she) is still chillin out in the Pacific ocean. Once this bad boy makes landfall is when we're really going to start seeing all of the data zero in and the models to really make some realistic and logical predictions. However don't expect the storm to suddenly disappear, the potential is all there for this to be a very bad system, from the track of the storm, the deep layer of saturation, the temperature...its all ready to be quite the doozy so I wouldn't bank on it falling through. The next run of model data (9 utcish) should have the system making landfall and giving me much more reliable numbers to really make a good forecast.

What this means for travelling... BAD ...very very very BAD. seriously anybody who thinks they can drive through 30" of snow is kidding themselves. even for areas that aren't falling on the bullseye (lookin at you virginia beach) you're still probably looking at a couple of inches of snow and a couple of inches of rain...yeah you read that correctly A FEW INCHES OF RAIN. (this is of course if you obey the overlord that is the European model)

hold on to your butts

The GFS paints a slightly different picture, its been see sawing on rain for most of the area (temperatures dont get low enough naturally) and painting the bullseye over Richmond (giving Richmond the largest snow event of recorded history). The Euro has been much more reliable for me in the past, and has now wavered much in its forecast this time around, I have a good deal of trust in it right now, and the GFS does seem to be trending towards snowfall just in a different region. By any means I completely and totally expect snow at this point next week, the number and just how out of hand and ridiculous this storm gets is another story. expect the big numbers to come out tonight and tomorrow that really paint a picture of what we're looking at but I'd definitely get that ramen and TP ready. Also PS if you dont have a damn snow shovel learn from my mistake and go get one, cleaning out your car in 30+" of snow is not fun with a freaking pizza dish

eshiben5 out!

one more quick blurb. Friend of mine just sent me this, the latest Euro ensemble run!

Quick edit, forgot to mention this puts us around the 20" of snow range!