Saturday, October 03, 2009
Staying cool... snow possible by end of week
Cool weather will be with us for the week ahead with generally cloudy skies and temperatures remaining below normal. Tuesday looks like the nicest day of the week with partial sunshine and temperatures near normal. A cold front will then move across southern MB Wednesday bringing gusty northwest winds and below normal temperatures. Even colder air will be moving in by Friday as a second cold front crosses the area, bringing a chance of snow over much of southern MB Friday into Saturday. Welcome to October!
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Rob!
ReplyDeleteThe GFS is showing high's of only
-1 C next Saturday!
If that is to happen that would be quite amazing for this time of year!!
We'd have to have snow on the ground to have a high of -1C this time of year.. but it can happen. Check out Oct 8-9 1985.. (click on my name)
ReplyDeleteIn Saskatoon, this looks like it's turning out like October 2006. Very cold Oct and Nov, but the weak El Nino made its presence felt in a warmer than normal December and January. February was harsh again, but after that every month was more or less normal.
ReplyDeleteYWG seems to have a more normal pattern in fall 2006.
Looks like I might have to break out the winter parka next weekend along with the mitts and scarf......OK so I'm getting a little carried away!!!!
ReplyDeleteMost models are leaning towards a below normal month in its entirety. Some are leaning towards a MUCH below normal month. Hope this isn't the start of another 9 month stretch.
ReplyDeleteDid anyone see the Oct 1 Nov-Dec-Jan revised outlook from EC it completely reversed from the prev one. It now has much of Canada in below normal temps in that period with wetter than average Srn Sask into Srn Manitoba.
ReplyDeleteWe can chat locally with Fargo TV mets and they even got calls about this last storm and what it means for the flood next spring. A bit too early....
Glad to see the EC forecast is calling for below normal temperatures again. As we all know, these forecasts are almost always wrong, which means that winter will actually be above-normal.
ReplyDeleteDan..
ReplyDeleteThe flip in the 3 month outlook is likely influenced by the major pattern flip we had in September. EC's seasonal outlooks are automated climate model products that are initialized by the previous 10 days of climate data, and simply extrapolated out to 30 days or 90 days up to a year in the future. It doesn't even take climatic influences such as El Nino into account that have a predictive signal in certain seasons in certain regions. Hence, the seasonal outlooks will be heavily influenced by the most recent climate pattern (i.e. persistence), which limits predictive skill. This explains the rather puzzling below normal outlook for the West Coast in an expected El Nino winter, while central Canada was showing above normal for the 30 day and 90 day outlooks.
I can't believe how quickly the pattern has changed the past few weeks!
ReplyDeleteWe went from 10 degrees above normal on some days in September to now in October we could see temperatures 8 degrees below normal on some days and snow flurries!!!
Any chance of that Colorado Low on Monday/Tuesday sneaking into Southern Manitoba or should it stay south of the border?????
ReplyDeleteLooks like it should stay south of the border. Winter weather advisories posted for SW North Dakota for the first snowfall of the season through there.. 2-5 inches possible in some areas Monday afternoon into Monday night.
ReplyDeleteWHOA!
ReplyDeleteThe temperature took a real nosedive this morning at the Winnipeg airport!
+4 and cloudy skies.... I think not!!
It was close but no frost overnight at my place. MLBYWS recorded 0.5 °C as the low. So still no frost event in my neighborhood. It doesn't make much difference... the plants don't look too well in any case because of the cold.
ReplyDeleteWe hit -0.4C in Silver Heights (3km SW of CYWG) this morning (05 Oct). Plenty of frost. This was our second frost of the season.
ReplyDeleteThe models are showing the potential for a major lake-effect snow event towards the end of this week, or on the weekend. 850mb temps are forecast to dip down to -10C...with lake temperatures still around 10C, we could see intense convection off the lakes.
ReplyDeleteWith most of the trees still covered in leaves after our above normal September, it wouldn't take much in the way of snowfall to weigh down the branches and result in widespread power outages.
ReplyDeleteIf the Hydro workers are still on strike, it could make for a very interesting event!!
A heavy lake effect snowfall event would be very localized.. but possible given the strong instability expected by the weekend. But it takes more than instability to give you heavy lake effect.. you need well aligned winds in the lowest 5-10 thsd feet with little or no directional shear in order to develop more intense single bands (vs weaker multiband streamers). You also need a lack of a low level inversion that would suppress convection, and finally, having general lift in the atmosphere would help sustain the convection. I'm often surprised how little lake effect we get given the potential. But the potential is certainly there this weekend for locally heavy lake effect snowstreamers off the southern lakes. Click on my name to see a similar situation on Oct 11 2006 with -10 to -12C air at 850 mb moving over +10-11C lake waters.
ReplyDeleteNote that the most critical factor for lake effect is wind direction, and how much open water the wind is going over (fetch). The ideal wind direction for lake effect over the southern lakes is about 330 degrees.. which maximizes the fetch over water. If the winds have a more westerly component (270-300) then the fetch is reduced, and lake effect is minimized.
ReplyDeleteFor Thursday through Saturday, models are indicating a more westerly wind component for the southern lakes with little or no lake effect shown. Heavy lake effect is indicated on the eastern shore of northern Lake Winnipeg, through the Berens River and Poplar River areas, where winds have a greater fetch over open water. In these areas, models are indicating a good 50 mm of pcpn between Thursday and Saturday, which could easily equate to 50 cm of snow inland. Much of it however will likely fall in unpopulated areas so we'll never hear about it..
It would seem that Environment Canada's daytime highs for the next week is a little on the high side!
ReplyDeleteI could easily see these daytime highs being notched down a few degrees and the very least!
Sharp edge of low cloud deck cutting right through Winnipeg with overcast skies in Charleswood, but sunshine downtown. Looks like the edge is right over Kenaston Blvd. That would roughly correlate to the "X" in CXWN on the College Du Page satellite image for reference..
ReplyDeleteRob!
ReplyDeleteI see the flurries have been taken out of the forecast for Winnipeg as of Tuesday's forecast!
Still any chance of snow for Winnipeg????
BNN may be the newest source of long term weather info. It may not have the cachet of the Farmers Almanac but the NYMEX Natural Gas Price movements they report this year are a true Mirror of the local weather. For the last 9 months the longer and lower temperatures were mirrored by 9 months of lower and lower LNG prices, both setting records along the way. Suddenly at the beginning of Sept a total reversal took place with the price quickly doubling until.... Near the end of Sept. prices abruptly and once more falling.
ReplyDeleteBNNs prediction or at least that of their expert guests is continuing lower Prices until at least next Fall..
BNN Business News Network
I'm hoping they and EC are wrong
Will there be any clear sky early tomorrow morning?
ReplyDeleteVenus, Mercury and Saturn are supposed to be visible this week early in the morning in the eastern sky. On Wednesday morning, look first for brilliant Venus. Your fist at arm's length is about 10 degrees wide. Tomorrow, Mercury and Saturn are only about 7 degrees to the lower left of Venus. Mercury and Saturn themselves are only about 1 degree apart - that is less than the width of your little finger held out at arm's length.
With periods of rain tonight and low of 3 C I wonder if a few flakes of snow could mix in????
ReplyDeleteBrilliant sunrise over St Vital but didn't see the any rain, snow or planets at 6am .
ReplyDeleteHere is Dauphin's forecast for Thursday!
ReplyDeleteCloudy with sunny periods. 30 percent chance of rain showers or flurries changing to 30 percent chance of flurries and then to 30 percent chance of rain showers or flurries in the morning. Clearing in the evening. Wind becoming northwest 30 km/h early in the afternoon then light late in the evening. High plus 3.
In other words a 30% of flurries!!!
Don't get so excited, I have to go to Dauphin this weekend :(
ReplyDeleteUghhh.. that's automated text generation for you. Implying a level of precision that is neither realistic or necessary. No human forecaster would ever write a forecast like that, and no one would ever describe the weather like that. Just awful.. In the old days, that forecast would have read.. "Mainly cloudy with a 30% chance of showers or flurries." Nice and simple and to the point. (..and don't get me started with sunny with cloudy periods becoming cloudy with sunny periods!)
ReplyDeleteToday's forecast issued for Winnipeg at 5:00 AM was for periods of rain!
ReplyDeleteAt 8:32 Am they re-issued a forecast saying they added cloudy and THEN periods of rain!
When there is an update to the forecast is that also automated???
The only difference between the 5:00 AM and 8:32 AM forecast was the word "CLOUDY" added to the text!
Rob
ReplyDeleteThose weren't only the old days they were the good days
Adam
ReplyDeleteAccu Weather 15 Day Hour by hour Dauphin "forecast' is calling for 45- 50Km wind gusts WNW friday Aft til Sat noon then 30-45 til 6pm then 20 to 35 til midnight .
Yesterday they were predicting 75-85km gusts for Wpg friday. Now they are saying Max 35 Km Friday pm
I'm sure others on this blog will have comments on the accuracy of long term detailed forecasts I have cursed them more often than not generally, especially hour by hour Wind and Precip Rates weeks in advance
According to Environment Canada Winter Storm Watch will most likely be issued for parts of the Southern Manitoba for possible heavy lake effect snow!!
ReplyDeleteHi
ReplyDeleteLooks like some snow accums for southeast Manitoba Friday night into Saturday morning per GFS and NAM. GFS had been the drier of the models but 12z and 18z runs came in more moist. Our HPC snowfall internal guidance has 4 inch area roughtly Steinbach to Grand Forks then to Lake of the Woods area through Saturday morning. We will see as this system still out in the Gulf of Alaska but snow potential is there.
Speaking of automated forecast wording. We in the U.S. NWS do our forecast in what we call GFE (Graphical Forecast Editor). We can populate with certain models...blend several together..or create from scratch. We have hourly T, Td, max/min, RH, wind, wind gust, sky cover, Pop, Pcpn, and QPF. A text product of our forecast (zone forecast) is created using automation to "read" what the weather elements say. Sometimes it sounds awful but we as forecasters can hand edit out awkward wordings before we send it out. Also through our website we have a way to get the point and click forecast which is way better as it takes the lat/lon you choose and produces a text of your elements exactly. The ZFP can contain multiple counties and thus can cover a variety of elements making for some awkward wording.
ReplyDeleteI do wish EC would allow some type of point and click on their website which could product a forecast for a lat/lon based on what exactly the folks at PAASPC have in their system. Better than the regional forecasts.
Quite the chilly night out there.. windy, raw, with that "cold enough to snow" feeling. And it's only going to get colder over the next few days.. I'm sure we're going to see a few flakes of snow in Winnipeg over the next few days, in between snow streamers off the lakes and that system moving to our south late Friday that Dan was referring to.
ReplyDeleteWinter storm watch issued east of northern Lake Winnipeg through Berens River and Poplar River areas for lake effect snowsqualls. Models show 3 days of continous lake effect in the area from Thursday into Saturday!
Don't look now, but latest NAM and GEM has pushed that area of snow from Friday's impulse further north over southwest MB Friday into Friday night, moving into the RRV by Saturday morning. First general snow of the season for southern MB coming up?? (Models hinting at possible significant accumulations over Riding Mtn area)
ReplyDeleteOne thing's for sure.. Mother Nature sure isn't content with being just average this year!
Thanks for the heads up Rob and Dan. Driving to Brandon on Friday pm or Saturday am now looks less hohum. Will continue watching updates on the snow .
ReplyDeleteThe winds won't be any help if they're still in the 40km range .
Am I really watching for BZ weather in early October
Special weather statement issued for southwest Manitoba for first snowfall of the season Friday into Friday night. 10-15 cm possible for Riding Mtn/Dauphin regions with 2-5 cm for Brandon area. System will track slowly east on Saturday with accumulating snow possible over Interlake region and RRV including Winnipeg.
ReplyDeleteSnow just started in Antler on the MB Sask border. just west of Souris. on Hwy 2 ( Mb)
ReplyDeleteTWN on TV and on their website graph a 14 day weather TREND for Manitoba with a flat Historical average temperature.Line.. For example Winnipeg Trend Average (hi temp) is shown as 13C til Oct 22nd
ReplyDeleteThis constant 2 week Avg Temperature might be normal in moderate southern climes think TO or Mississauga ON. it is pure fiction in Manitoba or the prairies in Mid October. if todays average Hi temp is 13C...By October 22nd it is 6 to 7C
EC Winnipeg has a chart of daily Hi and Lo averages Click on my name.
TWN s 14 day trend chart is at
http://www.theweathernetwork.com/fourteenday/camb0244
Winter Storm Watch re-issued for Southern Manitoba!
ReplyDeleteThis time for Western Manitoba!!
Nice fill someone in on and this mail helped me alot in my college assignement. Gratefulness you on your information.
ReplyDeleteSorry for my bad english. Thank you so much for your good post. Your post helped me in my college assignment, If you can provide me more details please email me.
ReplyDelete