Wednesday, March 2, 2016

Last Hurrah?

7:30 PM 3/2/2016 Wednesday Update:
Well the GFS caved. It ticked south for the 12z and 18z runs. Nearly every other model ticked north. It looks like we will be just north of the heavier precip. 1-3 inches of snow is expected overnight into early Friday morning, with all of it melting by nightfall. A delay is possible. Closing unlikely unless we get more snow. There is still a bit of upside. The storm will be bombing off the coast so exact track is going to be unpredictable. A 25 mile shift north/expansion of the precip shield would put us in the game for 3-6 inches, not a bad way to close out the winter. I'll keep you updated.

Original Text 
Spring is approaching but we have one last chance at some snow Thursday night into Friday morning. A potent little shortwave will approach the area tomorrow. However, the storm that went by this morning will probably shred the shortwave, killing the primary low. A coastal low will form to the south-too far south to give us any precip of consequence . We are hoping for the front end moisture associated with the primary low, which probably will not amount to much. A trace to and inch of wet snow is expected. Most models are in agreement on taking the coastal too far south.  There is, however, a bit of upside to the situation.
Euro has the 850 low farther south, in line with most of the models
 
The GFS has the 850 low 100 miles NW
The GFS is different, keeping the shortwave more organized, and organizing up the to-be coastal over the SE US much earlier as a result. We get 3-6 inches in that situation. This is probably the most that we could expect to fall. As stated before, the GFS is an outlier and probably should be discounted. We will be looking at the 12z model suite too see if the other models hold and if the GFS stays with its solution. The snow should liquefy under the sunangle of early march by Friday afternoon. Currently, I anticipate a school delay at most. After this"storm", we have a chance at some snow showers. Yay Snow TV. After that, we go straight into spring weather as California gets some much-needed rain.