Tuesday 12/10 Winter Weather Event

The C NJ area has now changed over to rain, bringing to a close the frozen precipitation aspect of the early season surprise. Many areas exceeded snowfall amounts, and areas not expected to receive snow got a nice surprise (unless you dislike snow). So, what happened? Well, for starters, the cold high pressure that had cold air over the region prior to the precipitation start was much more stubborn than modeled. The High pressure to the north did not budge, and the over-running warm air caused some mesoscale banding to set up with an area of very significant snows. Anyone watching the Eagles game yesterday saw first hand the tenacity of the falling snow. This part of the storm was not picked up by the major global models. Instead, it was picked up by the very short term HRRR model which had this nailed from Sunday morning. So, once again, models are not gospel and there is always room for now-casting events. Luckily, with warning systems, social media and other means, warnings can get out much faster for alerting citizens. In any case, many areas received 6"+ in the greater Philly area. 

As this storm winds down, we turn our attention to Tuesday. Once again, a storm will move in bringing the area another chance at some snow. This storm will move in around noon and will be out of the area by late evening. It will be a quick hitter, but areas can generally look to pick up 2-4"  with some areas getting a little more with any areas that get hit with a heavier snow band. This will have some impacts on the evening rush hour. Once this storm moves out, we will be entrenched into a cold pattern for the foreseeable future. 

Our next shot at a storm will come this weekend, towards the end. The Euro model is showing a low pressure which will head to the east coast. Its movement from there is still unknown, but will be watched over the next couple of days. 

Thanks for the many observations that were tweeted or facebooked. Feel free to send photos / tweets etc and I will retweet them or share them out to everyone!