January 2019 - Active Progressive WX Pattern Ahead

General Weather Discussions and Analysis
CrashTestDummy
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29 at 0700 in northern Brazoria County. Frost is everywhere.
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tireman4
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000
FXUS64 KHGX 241144
AFDHGX

Area Forecast Discussion
National Weather Service Houston/Galveston TX
544 AM CST Thu Jan 24 2019

.AVIATION [12Z TAF Issuance]...

Weak high pressure over the area has allowed for calm winds and
clear skies. VFR conditions with light winds are expected through
the next 24-30 hours.

Overpeck

&&

.PREV DISCUSSION /Issued 339 AM CST Thu Jan 24 2019/...

.DISCUSSION...
Surface temperatures as of 3 AM were in the upper 30s along the
coast to mid 20s in our northern counties, with dewpoints in the mid
20s to low 30s region wide. Model guidance has struggled to keep up
with observations, remaining a few degrees too warm. Trended colder
than guidance in the short term, with high temperatures today
expected to rise into the mid to upper 50s, with sunny skies
overhead.

Overnight temperatures will fall into the 30s once more, with
temperatures in the mid to upper 40s along the immediate coast. Some
of the short term guidance such as the TT WRF, ARW, and NMM show
light precipitation late tonight into Friday morning tracking
south, mainly north of I-10 and west of I-45. Forecast soundings
show some saturation in the 850-700mb layer, with a very dry
pocket of air aloft. This precipitation also looks in phase with
the right entrance region of the 250mb jet streak that is
overhead, helping to provide some extra lift. With such profiles,
the possibility of light rain or freezing drizzle could be
possible during this time frame. Confidence is low given the
trends in recent short term model runs and the lack of moisture.
Therefore, have left the mention of light rain or freezing drizzle
out of the forecast for now but this will be worth keeping an eye
on as we move into the afternoon.

High pressure shifts east of the area tomorrow. Winds tonight will
be mostly out of the SE before turning NE behind a dry weak frontal
boundary that slides through SE TX early Friday morning. This should
allow high temperatures Friday to be a touch colder than today by
only a few degrees. By the afternoon hours, partly cloudy skies
return to the forecast and moisture values will be on the rise as
winds turn back onshore by Friday evening.

A coastal trough will slide north over the lower to middle Texas
coast late Saturday into Sunday morning increasing our chance for
showers over our southwestern zones such as Wharton, Jackson, and
Matagorda counties. Additionally, another weak dry frontal
boundary will shift into the region early Sunday, acting to turn
winds once again out of the northeast. Following the coastal
trough, our next best chance for precipitation will be late Monday
into Tuesday morning, when another strong cold front swings
through SE TX. Precipitable water values increase to near 0.75
inches and with strong upper-level forcing behind the boundary,
anticipate another line of showers to slide through the region.
Most recent model runs show the Canadian solution to be the
fastest and wettest with this front, while the GFS and ECMWF trail
behind by about six hours, placing the front just offshore by
sunrise Tuesday morning. ECMWF remains the driest with this
feature. Temperatures behind this system will once again fall to
near freezing Tuesday night into Wednesday, but do look to remain
above hard freeze criteria at this time.

Hathaway

.MARINE...
Winds and seas should continue to decrease this morning so we will
drop any advisories for the upper Texas coastal waters. Light
northeast winds today and tonight should increase Friday as another
front slides off the coast. A coastal trough is expected to form
Saturday and Saturday night but largely remain off the coast and
farther out in the Gulf. The main impact will be enhanced easterly
winds that decrease on Sunday. Southerly winds increase again Monday
with the next strong cold front on Tuesday. It looks like there will
not be any marine hazards until the front on Tuesday at which we
might need advisories or gale watch/warnings.

Overpeck

&&

.PRELIMINARY POINT TEMPS/POPS...

College Station (CLL) 57 35 54 40 59 / 0 10 0 0 20
Houston (IAH) 57 37 57 42 59 / 0 0 0 0 10
Galveston (GLS) 53 47 54 51 57 / 0 0 0 0 10

&&

.HGX WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES...

TX...None.
GM...None.

&&

$$


AVIATION...Overpeck
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CRASHWX
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Looks pretty intimidating!
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redneckweather
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26 at my house this morning. Next weeks front will be about the same or a hair colder...just your good solid seasonal fronts for this time of year. I don't see any precip with it either. Someone mentioned the fv3 does but that model imo is garbage.
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CRASHWX
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FV3 did really good with this last event several days out all the others did not perform as well even did better than mesoscale
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Kingwood36
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CRASHWX wrote: Thu Jan 24, 2019 9:03 am FV3 did really good with this last event several days out all the others did not perform as well even did better than mesoscale
Agreed it was the only one showing wintery precip constantly
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Belmer
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CRASHWX wrote: Thu Jan 24, 2019 9:03 am FV3 did really good with this last event several days out all the others did not perform as well even did better than mesoscale
Agree, overall the GFSFV3 did a decent job many days out picking up a wintry mix for SE and E Texas. It remained consistent in nearly every run. Although it did well with the wintry precip, it did poorly in accumulation as FV3 (going back to 1/21 on the 12z) up to the actual event it had anywhere from 0.5-5 inches of sleet/snow across the area. Remember, it had the whole back end of the precip shield all snow/sleet extending about 50 miles west to east from the Tennessee Valley all the way down to SETX coast.
GFS (old) wasn't quite as bullish with the amounts and kept it further north in NE TX. Either way... none of the amounts materialized. Not even sure NE TX picked up any accumulation more than just a cold rain. That was fairly expected though as if the temps were a few degrees colder aloft, I'm sure that would have panned out. Just couldn't quite pick upon the extent of the warm nose.

Going back and looking at the mesoscale models:
NAM 12km showed hints at wintry mix in the 18z run on the 22nd and the 00z run on the 23rd. 06z and 12z lost the 'wintry mix' but kept the overrunning rain which ended up falling as sleet over the area yesterday morning.

NAM showed this as well in the 18z run on the 21st, 06z, 18z run on the 22nd and the 00z run on the 23rd (mainly in our northern counties).

HRRR showed hints of it in the 18z run on the 22nd (specifically at hour 20 in Montgomery and Grimes Co.). Several runs on the 23rd showed a quick change over to mix with the HRRR becoming more aggressive as the event got closer - 10z, 11z, 12z and 13z runs all supported winter precip here in SETX.

Always neat to go back and see how models actually performed once the event has passed. This becomes more frustrating though in the spring looking at severe weather and picking your "target". :roll:
Overall though, for as much model bashing has been going on, models didn't do too terrible for this event. Now lets see how they start handling midweek next week.
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I think the bigger story is what may happen with the polar vortex dropping into the midwest a week from today. The 00z Euro showing scary low temps -- coldest in years for Minnesota, Iowa and Wisconsin? This would be seriously dangerous stuff that just boggles my mind. #BarneyOnTheAttack
00z euro midwest temps.png
Regardless, not much here as most goes east.

Btw, whoever made the post about it being a lame winter a few pages back, I agree 100% but in doing some research, last year was as well despite the multiple winter weather events that masked the blowtorch November (+4.9) and February (+6.1) with a relatively normal December (-0.7). January 2018 was the only month that was truly cold with a negative departure of more than 4 degrees.

This year, we had a super cold November (-3.6) while December came in +1.2 degrees and January is running about the same thus far. With all the talk of TPV and negative oscillations this or positive oscillations that. Just goes to show that there's much more to the ingredients to get cold here than just having a substantial SSW event. I don't see anything in the models through the next 16 days that gets me overly excited. Some cold shots but nothing that gives a severe case of "analysis paralysis" where I have to see very single model run as it comes in.

It should be noted that we have yet to even hit the 20s in Houston -- something we accomplished 8 times last year through January 24th.

All that said, what constitutes a "good" winter anyway? Is it the amount of freezes? The severeity or longevity of freezes? The amount of winter weather events? Using that criteria, there are only a handful of benchmark winters we've observed here in the last 150 years.

1895: 20-30 inch snowfall
1899: Back to back nights in the single digits
1930: Lowest temp on record
1973: Multiple accumulating snowfalls
1983: Longest duration freeze, snow and severely cold
1989: Single digits, snow
2004: Christmas snow
2018: Multiple snows, first teens in 22 years.

Those are the ones that come to mind. Even if I missed two or three, the point here is that truly "great winters" in terms of severity are rare and occur only 2 or 3 times in a lifetime.
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jasons2k
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Excellent post Blake and thanks for putting things into perspective with somd excellent examples.
Last edited by jasons2k on Thu Jan 24, 2019 12:30 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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KHOU BLake wrote: Thu Jan 24, 2019 10:33 am I think the bigger story is what may happen with the polar vortex dropping into the midwest a week from today. The 00z Euro showing scary low temps -- coldest in years for Minnesota, Iowa and Wisconsin? This would be seriously dangerous stuff that just boggles my mind. #BarneyOnTheAttack

00z euro midwest temps.png

Regardless, not much here as most goes east.

Btw, whoever made the post about it being a lame winter a few pages back, I agree 100% but in doing some research, last year was as well despite the multiple winter weather events that masked the blowtorch November (+4.9) and February (+6.1) with a relatively normal December (-0.7). January 2018 was the only month that was truly cold with a negative departure of more than 4 degrees.

This year, we had a super cold November (-3.6) while December came in +1.2 degrees and January is running about the same thus far. With all the talk of TPV and negative oscillations this or positive oscillations that. Just goes to show that there's much more to the ingredients to get cold here than just having a substantial SSW event. I don't see anything in the models through the next 16 days that gets me overly excited. Some cold shots but nothing that gives a severe case of "analysis paralysis" where I have to see very single model run as it comes in.

It should be noted that we have yet to even hit the 20s in Houston -- something we accomplished 8 times last year through January 24th.

All that said, what constitutes a "good" winter anyway? Is it the amount of freezes? The severeity or longevity of freezes? The amount of winter weather events? Using that criteria, there are only a handful of benchmark winters we've observed here in the last 150 years.

1895: 20-30 inch snowfall
1899: Back to back nights in the single digits
1930: Lowest temp on record
1973: Multiple accumulating snowfalls
1983: Longest duration freeze, snow and severely cold
1989: Single digits, snow
2004: Christmas snow
2018: Multiple snows, first teens in 22 years.

Those are the ones that come to mind. Even if I missed two or three, the point here is that truly "great winters" in terms of severity are rare and occur only 2 or 3 times in a lifetime.
Welp. by this measure I've used up all of my "great" winters and I'm only 31. :D
redneckweather
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Back in October a cold front would roll thru and the moisture stuck around after the frontal passage up to 18 to 36 hours (or more) after a frontal passage. A lot of these systems were heavy at times causing a lot of flooding. This pattern carried over into November/December. By mid December, the systems coming across started coming through quicker, weaker and did not linger. This has carried over into this month. It seems like we will have a little moisture associated with a front and then clears up pretty quickly afterwards.

When the models backed off the southward plunge of Arctic air for this past weekend, it was a sign that this could continue for the rest of the winter season as the pattern keeps it from diving straight down the lee of the Rockies.

With that said, with the lack of deep cold air and the lack of any storms systems associated with the fronts, I think we missed our opportunity for this winter season.

Just read Blake's post after I typed this. Great post Blake.
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Thankfully as a SE Texas native I remember 1973 like it was yesterday. The late 50's and early 60's offered a couple of memorable "snow events' here in the Houston area as well. So proud of Blake! And to think he cut his 'weather teeth' right here on our Forum... :mrgreen:
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CRASHWX
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WE DO SEEM TO GET A GLANCING BLOW BUT THE BLOW IS LEGIT! OR SEEMS TO BE ANYWAY
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CRASHWX wrote: Thu Jan 24, 2019 11:47 am WE DO SEEM TO GET A GLANCING BLOW BUT THE BLOW IS LEGIT! OR SEEMS TO BE ANYWAYFF3933D4-02AD-4EE9-84A6-1DC4782C4730.pngi4E716A9E-E482-4D3B-92BD-0E4D2D7A67F7.png524AA421-0115-483A-80E0-EFBD982ED01C.png
Not really. The Euro only gets us to 32 degrees in that time frame. The GFS leaves our entire area above freezing.
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srainhoutx wrote: Thu Jan 24, 2019 11:22 am Thankfully as a SE Texas native I remember 1973 like it was yesterday. The late 50's and early 60's offered a couple of memorable "snow events' here in the Houston area as well. So proud of Blake! And to think he cut his 'weather teeth' right here on our Forum... :mrgreen:
Thanks, Steve! Yup, got my humble beginnings right here -- and of course waiting for :50 past the hour to see John Hope and the tropical update. Or the top and bottom of the hour to see 'Weather Scope' haha
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CRASHWX
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KHOU BLake wrote: Thu Jan 24, 2019 11:59 am
CRASHWX wrote: Thu Jan 24, 2019 11:47 am WE DO SEEM TO GET A GLANCING BLOW BUT THE BLOW IS LEGIT! OR SEEMS TO BE ANYWAYFF3933D4-02AD-4EE9-84A6-1DC4782C4730.pngi4E716A9E-E482-4D3B-92BD-0E4D2D7A67F7.png524AA421-0115-483A-80E0-EFBD982ED01C.png
Not really. The Euro only gets us to 32 degrees in that time frame. The GFS leaves our entire area above freezing.
[/quote

Do you think with as cold and heavy of an Artic event is what is being shown up north that we will miss having a shallow but intense cold layer slide south? I guess I just am a bit lost how that works out.
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CRASHWX
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Like my forecast low was 30 last night and we went all the way to 25...what is the reason for that? I am forecast at 31 tonight...should I expect upper 20’s?
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KHOU BLake wrote: Thu Jan 24, 2019 12:00 pm
srainhoutx wrote: Thu Jan 24, 2019 11:22 am Thankfully as a SE Texas native I remember 1973 like it was yesterday. The late 50's and early 60's offered a couple of memorable "snow events' here in the Houston area as well. So proud of Blake! And to think he cut his 'weather teeth' right here on our Forum... :mrgreen:
Thanks, Steve! Yup, got my humble beginnings right here -- and of course waiting for :50 past the hour to see John Hope and the tropical update. Or the top and bottom of the hour to see 'Weather Scope' haha
Yes you did Blake, sniff sniff. You are all grown up now. We raised ya..LOL...I agree with Blake and Steve's write up on this upcoming weather event. Also, I, too, remember the 1973 snowfalls..three of them..two in January and one in February. I, too, miss the tropical weather updates on the 50's and John Hope..boy he was a treasure on the Weather Channel. :)
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KHOU BLake wrote: Thu Jan 24, 2019 10:33 am I think the bigger story is what may happen with the polar vortex dropping into the midwest a week from today. The 00z Euro showing scary low temps -- coldest in years for Minnesota, Iowa and Wisconsin? This would be seriously dangerous stuff that just boggles my mind. #BarneyOnTheAttack

00z euro midwest temps.png

Regardless, not much here as most goes east.

Btw, whoever made the post about it being a lame winter a few pages back, I agree 100% but in doing some research, last year was as well despite the multiple winter weather events that masked the blowtorch November (+4.9) and February (+6.1) with a relatively normal December (-0.7). January 2018 was the only month that was truly cold with a negative departure of more than 4 degrees.

This year, we had a super cold November (-3.6) while December came in +1.2 degrees and January is running about the same thus far. With all the talk of TPV and negative oscillations this or positive oscillations that. Just goes to show that there's much more to the ingredients to get cold here than just having a substantial SSW event. I don't see anything in the models through the next 16 days that gets me overly excited. Some cold shots but nothing that gives a severe case of "analysis paralysis" where I have to see very single model run as it comes in.

It should be noted that we have yet to even hit the 20s in Houston -- something we accomplished 8 times last year through January 24th.

All that said, what constitutes a "good" winter anyway? Is it the amount of freezes? The severeity or longevity of freezes? The amount of winter weather events? Using that criteria, there are only a handful of benchmark winters we've observed here in the last 150 years.

1895: 20-30 inch snowfall
1899: Back to back nights in the single digits
1930: Lowest temp on record
1973: Multiple accumulating snowfalls
1983: Longest duration freeze, snow and severely cold
1989: Single digits, snow
2004: Christmas snow
2018: Multiple snows, first teens in 22 years.

Those are the ones that come to mind. Even if I missed two or three, the point here is that truly "great winters" in terms of severity are rare and occur only 2 or 3 times in a lifetime.
I do believe there is a misconception by some on what average temperatures for SE Texas truly are. Even for January highs in the low to mid-60s and lows in the low 40s are normal. It's hard to overestimate how mild this climate is during the winter and I think that does disappoint some when we don't see a straight month of lows near freezing. HGX has a really good climo graphic page for the last 19 years showing precipitation and temperatures compared with normals. I myself like to reference it every once in a while to take a more objective look at how close to normal we really are.

https://www.weather.gov/hgx/climate_graphs_iah


As for this year, it has been difficult to truly get those blasts of cold air to come straight south. A lot of troughs just haven't been able to dig deep enough south, and even if they do they have been quick to progress eastward. Even with the mentioned SSW and negative AO, location is key and this month has been a key example. The cold air is moving south, but unless you are in the right place it might not make a huge difference for local weather.


Either way, we are just moving into the end of January and we still have February and March which has provided plenty of surprises in the past. Enjoy the mild conditions while you can because it won't be long before highs in the 60s will seem like a distant memory.
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The 12Z Global models appear to be coming into agreement with the timing of the next strong front. The latest European model now has a faster arriving solution that pushes the strong front through late Monday night/early Tuesday morning. This looks to be a very dynamic front with very strong winds out of the North. Temperatures today do not look much different than yesterday mornings strong front at this time. I believe there is a non zero chance that some light wintry mischief could occur much like yesterday morning. Will continue to monitor throughout the weekend.
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