Joe Bastardi's Outlook

[Planetsnow]

Joe's Meteorological Outlook: February 2, 2005

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The thoughts expressed in this column represent Joe Bastardi's personal interpretation of the weather pattern formulated from his expert analysis of the conditions affecting the weather in the entire Northern Hemisphere.

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TRANSITION TO MID AND LATE MONTH COLDER PATTERN GETTING FIRST MATCH LIT IN W. PACIFIC

But these things take time. Remember, the idea is to get this trof to amplify around the 10th in the central and eastern part of the nation and lock it in for the rest of month. With an undercutting stream like we have, that is a pattern that can be a lot of fun in much of the nation, but sadly, our friends in the Pacific Northwest are left out.

Speaking of the West, look, I know you folks think you don't get enough attention here in this column, but I want you to think about some things. The major trof, though truly stronger than I thought, was caught two weeks in advance, and the worst of the storms that struck California had be doing an imitation of a rabid dog for several days in advance. The two surges of warmth into Los Angeles were talked about a week in advance, and again, that is just to use a forecast to drive home the point of the discussion. THIS IS NOT A FORECAST COLUMN. THAT IS WHAT WE DO FOR A LIVING HERE, AND WE HAVE 90 OF THE BEST DOING IT. It is a column to try to catch major pattern swings and really supply some answers where the common forecast may not even be asking the question. But back to the West. I see the number in LAX for Thursday is not 76. Getting awfully close to my 80, which was talked about a week ago. And I again ask, like I ask East folks to do when there are things talked about there, to look who said what first.

I am running a pattern example contest right now, and there is always a chance I take it on the chin. The point is that here we are, Wednesday, and if we go back to two weeks ago, there was all sorts of talk THAT LAST WEEK IN THE EAST WOULD GET WARMER. But yesterday, New York City got a little above normal, but almost everyone from New England to Texas was below normal again.

Where the warmth is not denied is from the Great Basin to the great province of Ontario, and before my next 15-day pulse comes along for cold, that will have to be taken care of. Interestingly enough, it almost looks like a December style turn to colder, but with February feedback and much more of a southern branch.

And I am going to keep score of the big three, and this is day two of the running 15-day mean, to see how warm warm was. Those big three have a contest going against the last warm snap, and they are IAH, ATL and NYC, chosen for their size and markets in energy consumption. The winter, by the way, where heating oil is king, in New England, is below normal now.

I have no real changes in how I think things evolve. This trof will NOT lock in the West. If we look at the three trofs for the next seven days in the Southwest, the current is kicking out. The next one goes in and kicks out, but arrives from the north and northeast, then takes off. The last one simply rolls through from the northwest and then it becomes the lead for the development of the trof over the nation's midsection and East. The theory here is as follows. The mayhem off the East Coast keeps working to pump the ridge in near 40, rather than 20 west in the Atlantic, so as soon as we start slowing things down, blocking can start and stay. When does that happen? Well, with the next pulse of eastern North America amplification. How does the eastern North American amplification happen? The monster rolling off Japan now gets to near the Aleutians in the means, and that really starts things going with ridge pumping in the West. A lot of this has to do with timing the cycles that we have had success with in the past, so let's see if I have it now.

For the record, the CPC dream scheme (that is what I will call the probability ideas now, because they are dreaming if they want to say it's a real forecast) takes issue with me. Last time that happened when the forecasted chill we used Chicago as the benchmark where they had an above and it wound up 7 below. So who can we pick on now? Let's see. They have Pittsburgh in an above, so I will take, heh, hold it, wait a minute. It's a 38% chance it's above there. That means 62% chance of normal or below. If it's against a standard deviation of one, which for all I know in Pittsburgh is plus or minus 3 degrees, they can have it 2 below and score it as normal, giving the 62% chance a verification score that is high. What the heck kind of challenge is this?

I will show guts and take the 3 below anyway in Pittsburgh the 9th-15th. Basically though, the dream scheme is very tough to lose points on. Keep pumping those scores, eh?

The January grades, by the way, are waiting in the wings. There is no score pumping in a plus or minus one regimen.

Source regions will be crucial, but it appears that with time, should this trof wind up locking over eastern North America, the trof will grow very cold again, so comparable deviations from normal, with respect to the season, develop. But here is the catch. That is more likely to occur in the Southeast than the Northeast or northern Plains. Why? The northern jet.

Now we covered all the hullabaloo with my Eastern and Gulf system. I see the Junction Boys are getting snowed on now, but one has to read what was written for midday to get my current take on what is going on the next few days farther east. I am really thinking that the heaviest of the snow with this storm and the worst of the coastal effects will be for North Carolina and Virginia - the mountains for the biggest snow of the year and the coast from Virginia Beach to Hatteras could be raked late Thursday night into Saturday. The models only have a "nitch" on them where my rogue item will be, but it will be interesting to see, right or wrong, how this turns out.

Ciao for now.