Update about the "storm"

Please review the previous post I did on Monday to give you a sense what we're dealing with on this upcoming winter storm.  You can read that post by clicking here.

Unfortunately there are STILL many possibilities with the outcome of this weekend/early week storm.  The main reason is that the storm isn't even a storm yet.  Look at this afternoons satellite image.




The evolution of this potential major winter storm will be VERY complicated!  As of Wednesday afternoon it was only small upper level system over the Gulf of Alaska.  On the satellite image it is denoted by the X1.  The key will be upstream!  There was a deep upper system (denoted by the X2) that was forcing "warm" air north across the Aleutians.  We call this upper level ridging.   This ridging was also phased with ridging along the dashed line extending southeast.  Both the X2 system and this subsequent ridging is directly tied to the MJO that I talked about in the previous post!

X1 will undergo significant development as it dives southeast and again the influences from X2 and it's ridging will determine this eventual development.  If X1 was over the CONUS it would be sampled by weather balloons and I would have a better idea of the this development.

So, as of now (Wednesday afternoon), there are still many, many questions and uncertainties.  It is unclear just how far south this storm will "dig" and then just how far it will get east before eventually  turning north.  Computer forecast models during the past 24 hours have been trending for a track  from northern Mexico to southeast Oklahoma (which is shifting south).  Because of the numerous questions and uncertainties, there really is just no way to get specific about the outcome of the sensible weather.  The range of possibilities is still very large!  But it is looking more likely that much of the precipitation from the eastern Texas Panhandle to central Kansas may fall as sleet or a mixture of sleet and freezing rain which will limit snow amounts.  It's impossible to say where the transition line from rain to sleet/freezing rain to snow will set up.  For NW KS there may be a nothing at all to some snow.  If this system does indeed move farther south, then the heaviest winter precipitation will be limited to the panhandle into central Kansas.  It could even end up being a huge sleet storm too!

The only advice I have at this point is just be prepared and pay close attention to the forecasts and statements that will be issued by the National Weather Service.  The TV stations and Facebook posts will continue to show the output from various forecast models and the output from them will change, perhaps dramatically every six hours.

I do feel confident that travel will become very treacherous from west Texas into central Kansas by Sunday/Monday and perhaps as early as Saturday night.  I'll try and update again sometime Thursday.