November 16th Mo Mo

Good Morning,

Welcome to the first "Mo Mo" blog of the season. The intention of these "Monday Morning" blogs is to briefly update you on near term weather and long term pattern changes. Sometimes I struggle to find time during the work week to put out detailed posts. These updates every Monday Morning should help.

The Week Ahead

The first few days of the week will be dry with temps around average. There is a powerful storm taking aim at the Midwest that will bring snow to the Denver area and severe weather to the Plains. The strong upper low will force positive heights over the eastern seaboard.

Despite the impressive height anomalies, temperatures around the Tri-State area will remain on the cooler side. There is a nice area of High Pressure to our north preventing winds from blowing out of the south-southwest. Instead, they'll be blowing from the north-northeast which will keep our temps comfortable.

Once the surface low pressure system cuts into Central Canada, a cold front will approach the area Thursday and bring us rain. Not a whole lot of rain is expected, possibly .25-.75." Start time looks to be mid morning into early Friday morning. 

Behind the cold front, cooler temperatures can be expected again. Looking to be in the upper 40's to low 50's with low's in the 30's (above freezing). The weekend also looks dry. 

Thanksgiving Week

Our first cold blast of the season will occur during this week. A potent upper level trough is expected to track over the eastern U.S. This is in response to the ridging forming over the Northeast Pac. and western U.S. Temps Sunday the 22nd through Wednesday the 25th will only be in the 30's and 40's. Low's will get down into the 20's, possibly teens for those N&W of NYC. There is upper level energy wrapped around the trough that may lead to scattered snow showers at the surface. The day to watch for our first snow flakes of the season will be Sunday into Monday. I'll keep everyone updated on the forum. 

You'll notice the 500mb height anomaly map below actually shows a bunch of ridges and troughs scattered across the Northern Hemisphere next week. You can see the trough I talked about over the Great Lakes / Northeast regions. It is pretty typical during strong El Nino events to see a progressive pattern early on. This means, not one particular trough or ridge is likely to "lock" into place over a specific area. The "line keeps moving" with these features until wavelengths finish undergoing seasonal change. In other words, the overall pattern continues being progressive. 

Thanksgiving Day forecast is tough to call right now. There is significant differences between the GFS (left) and EURO (right). The GFS keeps the trough over the east longer, while the EURO takes the next trough from the Pacific and barrels it into the west U.S. This forces the ridge to move over the east and likely bring some rain to our area. Since the Pacific Jet has been very strong and the pattern remains progressive, I am inclined to believe the GFS at this time. That said, my confidence is low and the Thanksgiving forecast will be much clearer by next week's Mo Mo blog. 

At a later day this week, I want to issue another blog to update everyone on the status of our El Nino and what it means for Winter. Have a great day! 

Have a nice day,

Frank Paparatto