Potential December 27th storm looking better and better

The winter of 2012-2013 has gotten off to an inauspicious start to say the least and this is on the heels of one of the worst winters in the history of MRG. Can we finally get an extended period of winter now after another undeserved period of rain Friday ? Yes !!

The next 10-14 days will be as winter-like as anything the mountain has seen since February of 2011. Snow showers and a few snow squalls Saturday from the slowly departing occluded swirl should yield between 2-8 inches depending on the elevation. Anything that falls on the mountain, will do so on top of the few inches of the very dense concrete or conglomeration of half melted but now frozen snow. This is effective stuff actually when it is actually at the bottom and not on top. Sunday looks like a drier day than it did a few days ago which has been the exception in a weather pattern that has produced lots of precipitation of all varieties. And yes, there is plenty more to talk about and it all stems from an active southern branch and a pattern that will ultimately evolve into a more classic split-flow scenario (at least for a time). There are lots of goodies under the Christmas tree in such a regime. The first is a storm that is likely to bring its goodies further south on Christmas Eve/Christmas Day unless there is a late 100 mile shift to the north. It is a weaker weather disturbance and it precedes a much more potent weather system later in the week.

The storm that deserves all the attention and most of the discussion should strike the region in some fashion around the time of December 27th. It is a low pressure center that will efficiently suck moisture out of the Gulf of Mexico and proceed northeast, eventually evolving into a ferocious noreaster. There is a fresh supply of cold air with this storm and since its formation is farther south and east, it will not prematurely amplify before interacting with the Atlantic Coast. The one critical question that remains is the track. There has been a loose consensus amongst the models to allow this system to travel just inland and this would bring above freezing air well into southern New Hampshire and perhaps threaten parts of Vermont. The storm is still 5 days out so a shift 50-100 miles southeast or northwest could make all the difference. Either way, the result appears to be a net very positive and potentially a significant amount of snow, our biggest in a while.

There also could be more where that came from as there are some indications of a follow-up snowfall around the time of the 30th and below freezing temperatures through the early days of 2013. For now, the blog will stay focused on our potential December 27th event. Hopefully it is worthy of such focus.