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Posted: **Thu Jan 24, 2019 10:44 am**

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.

Posted: **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...

Posted: **Thu Jan 24, 2019 11:47 am**

WE DO SEEM TO GET A GLANCING BLOW BUT THE BLOW IS LEGIT! OR SEEMS TO BE ANYWAY

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Posted: **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.

Posted: **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...

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

Posted: **Thu Jan 24, 2019 12:05 pm**

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.

Posted: **Thu Jan 24, 2019 12:06 pm**

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?

Posted: **Thu Jan 24, 2019 12:12 pm**

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...
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.

Posted: **Thu Jan 24, 2019 12:32 pm**

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.

Posted: **Thu Jan 24, 2019 12:37 pm**

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.

Posted: **Thu Jan 24, 2019 1:40 pm**

Non zero chance

Posted: **Thu Jan 24, 2019 1:55 pm**

I am starting to think, that winter weather isn't going to happen for us guys in se tx lol

Posted: **Thu Jan 24, 2019 2:00 pm**

Imo, the Pacific hasn’t been very kind to us Texans here this winter. The ridging out west has been too close to us and the troughing has been too far east.. which is why we’re just getting glancing blows. +PNA. As far as precipitation goes, it’s been limited ever since the second week of December for the most part, which also is when temps started to go from below normal to near normal or above. We can’t get any systems to dig down deep into Cali/Baja peninsula and eject across Texas when there’s ridging there. The MJO has been stuck in P5 for what seems like an eternity. We need it to get into P7 & 8 if we want our winter to be salvaged.

Posted: **Thu Jan 24, 2019 3:06 pm**

Hearing some of y’all talk about 1973 like it was yesterday puts a smile on my face. That’s the year I was born. So for the first time in a long time, I don’t feel old

Living in Tampa, I didn’t see snow until 1978, when they had a once-in-a-lifetime snow event. They had ‘bay effect snow’ too. Didn’t see snow again until the mid-80’s, in Savannah.

Another chilly night with a low of 36 for me, but that’s not too bad

Posted: **Thu Jan 24, 2019 3:37 pm**

CRASHWX wrote: ↑Thu Jan 24, 2019 12:06 pm 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?

There was nearly zero wind last night for most of the area, that allowed the cold air to settle in and make things very cold. We had a forecast of 33, yet got down to 29.

There should be a bit more wind, but still less than 10 MPH for most of the night. At least that's what I'm seeing in the forecast for our part of the world. I'm expecting at, or slightly below forecast lows for us in northern Brazoria county tonight. Luckily for us, the forecast low is upper-30's, so mid-30's may be on order. We'll keep stuff covered to protect against frost again.

Posted: **Thu Jan 24, 2019 3:58 pm**

Cpv17 wrote: ↑Thu Jan 24, 2019 2:00 pm Imo, the Pacific hasn’t been very kind to us Texans here this winter. The ridging out west has been too close to us and the troughing has been too far east.. which is why we’re just getting glancing blows. +PNA. As far as precipitation goes, it’s been limited ever since the second week of December for the most part, which also is when temps started to go from below normal to near normal or above. We can’t get any systems to dig down deep into Cali/Baja peninsula and eject across Texas when there’s ridging there. The MJO has been stuck in P5 for what seems like an eternity. We need it to get into P7 & 8 if we want our winter to be salvaged.

Actually December 2018 is when the MJO was stuck in P5. It's actually moving rather quickly back toward P6 on onward.

Here is last year about this time. The MJO was much more amplified heading to P6

Posted: **Thu Jan 24, 2019 4:57 pm**

srainhoutx wrote: ↑Thu Jan 24, 2019 3:58 pm
Cpv17 wrote: ↑Thu Jan 24, 2019 2:00 pm Imo, the Pacific hasn’t been very kind to us Texans here this winter. The ridging out west has been too close to us and the troughing has been too far east.. which is why we’re just getting glancing blows. +PNA. As far as precipitation goes, it’s been limited ever since the second week of December for the most part, which also is when temps started to go from below normal to near normal or above. We can’t get any systems to dig down deep into Cali/Baja peninsula and eject across Texas when there’s ridging there. The MJO has been stuck in P5 for what seems like an eternity. We need it to get into P7 & 8 if we want our winter to be salvaged.

Actually December 2018 is when the MJO was stuck in P5. It's actually moving rather quickly back toward P6 on onward.

01242019 MJO diagram_40days_forecast_GEFS_member.gif

Here is last year about this time. The MJO was much more amplified heading to P6

01262018 NCPE_phase_21m_small.gif

Nice! It just seemed stuck in phase 5 forever lol do you think it can go to 7 & 8 before winter ends?

Posted: **Fri Jan 25, 2019 5:41 am**

Another beautiful mild January weather day across SE TX with lots of sun, streaming cirrus clouds, and high temps in the upper 50s to low 60s. 35 days until March 1st.

Posted: **Fri Jan 25, 2019 6:02 am**

GFS keeps trending better and better for next week. Some places might actually see something. Who knows?

Posted: **Fri Jan 25, 2019 7:53 am**

It’s a chilly 34 here this morning. Looking forward to a few days of nicer weather. I need to get some things done outside this weekend.

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