CHRISTMAS DAY STORM... OR LACK THEREOF

Written by: Bob Metcalfe

Don't worry, I wouldn't forget about you folks! I was just waiting for some fresh data to come out the give you our new insight.

First, to address the questions from the previous post:

The HPC is the Hydrometeorological Prediction Center. Another division of the NOAA. These are the guys that design, test, and maintain the models, and do a lot of research. Their daily products include model diagnostic discussions, as well as national forecasts of big storm placement. Doing a quick google search will bring you right to their homepage.

While I can understand the discussion from Cleveland, I don't necessarily agree with it. There is now almost overwhelming support for pure rain here, with minimal to no snowfall as of the freshest data set. Here's the data for 12Z (7am) Friday from the GFS:


Completely in line now with the last several runs, with a low center just east of St. Louis. This cannot yield major snow for our area. In fact, this most recent run suggests that we'd be hard pressed to see ANY snow. The breeze would be decent, and the rain steady at times, but if this verifies, you'll need umbrellas instead of shovels.






Here's the Euro data for the same time:



The Euro is another great medium-range forecast tool, run by our friends in Europe (obviously.) This is the 500mb chart, with the center of the storm indicated to be even further west, along the western edge of Iowa.

If I saw one model great favoring say a more eastern track and one west, there'd be something to this. But each run shifts a little further west. I've seen it happen where one run will go west, and the next east, and then back again, but this isn't the case. Consistency is key looking out this far.

What I can say is that Christmas Eve is looking pretty good. High pressure will provide a decent amount of sun the day before Christmas for us.

Now remember to not give up hope yet. This storm STILL has not even formed yet, and in the past, we've seen HUGE changes in location and timing of storms once the models can grab some real data. The next two days will be critical in how the forecast shapes up for the end of the week. More to come!