Potential Storm Next Week

Hello everyone,

It's been a very long time since I've posted anything this year. There are several reasons for this that I don't want to explain, but the biggest reason is there simply hasn't been any significant weather around the southern Great Lakes this year. There will be another warm storm Tuesday, with a chance the rain turns to some light or moderate snow as precipitation winds down. That seems to be the story of this winter so far.

However, this is about to change, thanks to a series of shortwaves crossing the South-Central United States. The models now show that the third shortwave to eject out of the plains will form a very strong storm that moves through the Great Lakes late next week. Where this storm tracks and where snow will fall is still yet to be determined, but I believe this storm could be a major winter storm for some areas of the great lakes.

Looking at the ECMWF Ensembles, a deep trough across the Western US sets up around 120hr. This trough eventually works through the plains and into the great lakes by 144hrs. This, combined with a strongly west based -NAO with a -PNA, would favor a track somewhere through the great lakes, especially combined with a +EPO which typically leads to higher heights over the North Central CONUS. Right now, I expect a track to the west of Ohio and Eastern Michigan, with the most significant winter conditions well to the west in Iowa and Wisconsin.

That scenario is what the ECMWF suggests, and what I believe is most likely due to how quickly this system is amplified. However, there definitely is snow potential for all of the area this blog covers due to two things:
1.) Redevelopment of a secondary low, throws back some light precipitation
2.) LES after the storm stalls to the Northeast of here.

There is still several days for details to be worked out, so I'll be updating every day or so leading up to the storm.