Good Saturday morning! It looks like a fantastic weekend to melt snow and slowly warm up. Here’s what heading up your “forecast discussion” this morning…. 1) Time to thaw out and melt away the snow from Wednesday and Thursday’s winter storm system. No snow on the ground where you live? You will really be warming up this weekend! 2) The snow should be gone by Tuesday and high temperatures all across the area will rise into the 60s and possibly near 70 on Wednesday! 3) The computer models are agreeing that a storm system is heading our way for Friday & NEXT Saturday, but they aren’t agreeing on how much rain we could see. More for the GFS (American) and less for the Canadian and European models. 4) ALL the models agree that the precipitation type with this approaching storm will be RAIN vs. SNOW, so just a good ol’ rain is expected (for now!) I’ve attached a picture of where the snow was still on the ground, as of 3pm Friday afternoon. You can easily see the Caprock Escarpment in this picture and how the heaviest snow fell on top of the higher elevations of our area. You can also see where no snow remains (Eastern Panhandles) There will be a BIG temperature difference today where snow remains and highs only rise into the 30s and lower 40s…to where no snow remains and highs reach the 50s! Be sure and check out the wide difference in forecast high temperatures with the attached NAM (North American Computer Model) forecast highs for today and tomorrow. Otherwise, there will be some cloud cover today that we didn’t see yesterday as an upper-level disturbance (pocket of cold air aloft) makes its way to our north in Kansas. In fact, the attached NAM and HRRR (High Resolution Rapid Refresh Computer Model) show some very light precip (snow or rain) falling in Kansas at 5pm today. We will just see some high cloud cover from this and no precip here. As mentioned before, high temperatures will vary greatly depending on whether or not snow remains on the ground. Here in Amarillo, we have snow and we can expect a high temperature around 41 degrees by late day. Winds will blow from the west and southwest at 10-20 mph. If you live in/around Childress where no snow remains, your high temperature will be in the lower 50s! Tonight, skies will return to being mostly clear to clear as the upper-level disturbance in Kansas moves away. That disturbance will push a “wind shift line” through the region and change our west and southwest winds this evening around to the northwest by sunrise on Sunday. Our overnight low temperatures will drop back into the 20s and when you add the northwest wind at 10-20 mph, wind chill values in the single digits and teens are likely! Sunday looks to be pretty nice day and high temperatures no matter where you live will be a few degrees warmer than today. Even areas that still have snow on the ground will start to warm up a little more with more of the ground showing and less of snow remaining. High temperatures will rise into the 40s over snow covered areas to the mid 50s where no snow remains. Winds will blow from the northwest at 10-20 mph in the morning, then shift more to the west at 10-20 mph in the afternoon hours. Skies will be mostly sunny to party cloudy. As we head back to work and school on Monday, it will be just another beautiful day with plenty of sunshine and another day to melt the remaining snow. Yes, I think there will still be some snow around to melt (especially in cities like Amarillo and Canyon where a foot or more of snow fell!) High temperatures will rise into the 50s over areas where snow remains to the 60s and possibly, closer to 70 degrees where the snow has already melted away! Winds will shift again back to the northwest at 10-20 mph in the morning hours as another “wind shift line” pushes through, but the winds will decrease back to the 5-15 mph range by the afternoon hours. Mostly sunny to partly cloudy skies are expected. I think that by Tuesday, nearly all…or all…of the snow will be melted away and all of us will get to experience some nice, unseasonably warm temperatures for a few days! High temperatures just about everywhere will rise into the 60s and the eastern and southeastern TX Panhandle (Wheeler, Shamrock, Wellington, Childress, Memphis, Paducah and Quanah) could easily see highs in the 70-75 degree range by late day! Skies will be mostly sunny to partly cloudy and the winds will blow from the west in the morning at 5-15 mph, then the southwest at 5-15 mph around Noon, then the south at 5-15 mph in the afternoon hours. Not bad at all…enjoy the beautiful day! Wednesday will also be another unseasonably warm day before a cold front shows up late Wednesday or Wednesday night and cools us back down closer to where we should be for this time of the year. High temperatures look to rise easily into the 60s and 70s throughout the area as southwest and west winds at 10-20 mph in the morning hours shift around to the north at 10-20 mph in the late afternoon or evening hours as the cold front blows through. Skies will be mostly sunny to partly cloudy and all things considered, what a beautiful day awaits us! It’s not a STRONG cold front, but just strong enough to drop Thursday’s high temperatures back into the 50s to around 60 degrees for high temperatures by late day. Yes, that’s “cooler” and yes, those high temperatures are very “typical” for late January. Skies may be a little cloudier than they were on Wednesday and partly cloudy skies should prevail. Breezy northerly winds at 15-25 mph in the morning will decrease and shift to the northeast in the afternoon hours at 5-15 mph. Now, let’s get to the “busier” part of this forecast discussion…Friday and NEXT Saturday. As is often the case this far out, the computer models are somewhat in disagreement on when the next storm system will show up. The attached European Computer Model wants the storm to arrive Friday afternoon. The attached GFS (American) computer model is a little slower….and stronger…and has it raining by Saturday at Noon. The attached Canadian computer model is right in the middle and has it raining Midnight Saturday. So, the prudent thing to do at this point in time is to “go with the average” and say that cloud cover will increase during the day Friday and high temperatures will be kept down into the 40s to around 50 degrees primarily thanks to the mostly cloudy to cloudy skies. Winds will swing around from the east in the morning at 5-15 mph to the south by Friday afternoon at 15-25 mph as the storm system nears our area from the west and southwest. This storm system is “warmer” than the previous one, so it does look like a “rainmaker” vs. a “snowmaker” this time around. The rain looks to begin early Saturday morning or late Friday night and continue for most of the day Saturday. How much rain can we expect? Unfortunately, if you live in the OK Panhandle…not much. I’ve attached the GFS (American) model’s “rain forecast map” and it shows only .10” for cities in the OK Panhandle like Guymon….while it shows around an inch of rain for Childress. It has around a ½ inch of rain for Amarillo. The European is not as wet as the GFS and shows .2” for Amarillo and nearly NOTHING for Guymon with around a ½” for Childress. The Canadian computer model agrees with the European. So, at this time, expect a “little” rain, but nothing spectacular. Of course, there’s still a LOT of time between now and next Saturday, so stay tuned! High temperatures will be kept down NEXT Saturday because of the rain chances, cloud cover and another cold front that will blow through Saturday morning switching winds to the north and northeast at 15-25 mph with some higher gusts possible. That will make the forecast highs in the 40s feel colder when you factor in the wind chill value, which should drop to the 20s (remember that the wind chill value does NOT cause rain to change to ice! It’s a “human apparent temperature”) . Okay, that’s a look at this week’s “Forecast Discussion”. I hope that you have a fantastic day today and think of all that fantastic snowmelt that is slowly dripping into the ground today….and will give us beautiful green grass and those really pretty yellow wildflowers in the spring! Take care and I’ll see you back here first thing Sunday morning with another update!
Posted on: Sat, 24 Jan 2015 12:15:26 +0000
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