High Plains Drifter


disclaimer:  "The meteorological views/forecast thinking expressed are those solely of the author of this blog
and do not necessarily represent those of official National Weather Service forecast products,
therefore read and enjoy at your own risk and edification!"

December 22, 2009

Great Plains Christmas Eve 2009 Blizzard [post 3]

Filed under: Dec 23-24, 2009 — Mike U @ 8:15 pm

My driveway is already slick! I didn’t expect the light freezing drizzle to develop this soon, but it has.  That low level warm advection atop the shallow cold layer is already underway, and it’s just going to get worse.  Temperature in Dodge is now 28°F.  It appears the 3-6″ is still on track as the latest numerical model prediction continues to keep the 500mb vorticity stream south of southwest Kansas as it undergoes a hard-to-predict re-orientation from an east to west configuration to more of a meridional north-south configuration.  See the cartoon below:

20091222-3

As it is doing this, the storm undergoes cyclogenesis in the low levels.  How fast will this occur?  How much will the whole storm itself translate east is it re-orients itself.  How is the northern PV anomaly up in Montana going to affect this??  This is an unusual time when the global spectral models are still very volatile even at 36-60 hours!  Below is the numerical prediction of 500mb Height/Vorticity from the GFS and ECMWF global models valid for 6am CST Christmas Eve morning Dec 24:

20091222-2

2 Comments »

  1. Mike- Looks like a fun system! Hope you get a lot of snow. We have a system affecting our northeastern zones right now.

    Comment by Stacie — December 22, 2009 @ 10:34 pm

  2. In your experience Mike what does this type of evolution mean in a operational sense? And why is it so important to see these features, what do they mean?

    Comment by Chad Alwick — December 24, 2009 @ 9:59 pm

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