On the Radar with Jess
It is the first day of meteorological winter. Meteorological seasons differ from astronomical seasons as they always start on the first of a month. This allows for easier and more accurate comparison of records from year to year. Meteorological winter runs from December 1 - February 28 (or 29th if its a leap year), spring runs from March 1 to May 31, summer runs from June 1 to August 31 and fall from September 1 to November 30th.
Last Winter featured a mostly above average temperature for much of the country, despite a few extreme cold snaps:
As far as precipitation goes, only parts of the Southern Plains, Ohio Valley and interior Northwest saw above average precipitation while the rest of the country was quite dry:
If you missed it, even before meteorological winter got started today, we had a major winter storm over Thanksgiving weekend that brought significant snow across the Midwest with totals over a foot for several places:
Check out this time lapse from our station in Hills, IA where 8-10" of snow was reported:
The weekend storm also brought snow to our Oshkosh, WI station where around 8" of snow was also reported:
Now that winter is officially here, what can we expect for this season? While we don't love seasonal outlooks, they are at least worth discussing. The official outlook from the Climate Prediction Center (CPC) is below and calls for a high chance of below average temperatures across much of the Northwest into the Midwest with above average temperatures likely across the Southwest, Southeast and into the Mid-Atlantic:
As far as precipitation goes, high chances of above average precipitation across the Northern Rockies, Northern Plains, and Midwest with a high chance of below average precipitation across the Southeast.
The main driving factor behind this forecast was likely based on the odds of La Nina lasting through much of the winter months. Below is the general weather typically associated with a La Nina winter:
That said, much more than La Nina or El Nino goes into determining the weather and the long-range models have consistently been indicating a cold start to the season across much of the eastern two-thirds of the country. Below is the 30-day temperature anomaly from the long range Euro model which covers just about all of the month of December and would account for one third of the Winter Season:
Enough of the long range outlooks, we actually have another winter storm to track this week. The system has already spread snow and some wintry mix which you can see using our dashboard:
Winter Weather Advisories stretch from the Southern Plains to the Northeast and New England with a Winter Storm Warning up for parts of southern New England:
Forecast totals will generally be 3-5" from Missouri into the interior Northeast but increase to that 5-8" range for parts of New England with isolated higher amounts possible:
Unfortunately for the I-95 corridor, most of the precip will fall as a cold rain. The general timing is below from 7 pm ET Mon Night to 1 am ET Wed Morning:
If your location isn't receiving snow with this system, check out some of our locations that will! You can see snow from the warm comfort of your own home:
One important additional aspect of this system is the widepread beneficial rain expected aross the Southeast:
That will come with a slight chance of severe storms across the Florida panhandle, with the main threat damaging winds and an isolated tornado risk:
