Polar Squash & A Warm Mosh

A good bit of talk has been focusing on the Thursday threat and while it's still on the "map" in the sense that computer guidance is still showing a storm develop, the odds of it coming north and hitting us on Thursday have diminished a fair bit from yesterday.   The biggest culprit is the polar low that's poised to move in later this week.   This polar low is a broad, deep, pushing a fast jet of the northern branch of the jet across the Great Lakes and the Northeast.   While this results in a cold blast for us for the middle and latter portions of the week, with highs struggling to get much above freezing Wednesday-Friday, the speed of the northern jet and the orientation of the trough in a broad fashion is not helpful for the storm to come north.

For one, the trough orientation is that dreaded U shape, broad and not deep in latitude.   This prevents from energy from digging down and helping energize the southern stream moisture that will travel east and then northeast through the South.   The fast-moving northern branch of the jet is also going to put the brakes on significant northern advance of the developing storm, helping to push it east and out to sea.

This doesn't mean that the odds of the storm are going out the window altogether.   Modeling may bring this storm back but the key in this storm coming back will be a sharper dig of the polar stream of energy, a less broad based trough, and a bit more muscle from the Southeast ridge in the Western Atlantic.   Not impossible to get everything to come together but we'll need the Monday night and Tuesday system to get going before we get definitive word on what comes down the pike.

Speaking of windows of opportunity and Southeast Ridges, longer range guidance from the Euro suggests a marked warmup starting up late next weekend and continuing into early next week.   Early indications suggest a run into the 50's on Monday and Tuesday, with the GFS not quite as aggressive but still above average on temperatures.   It will be a nice and milder break...one the snow crowd won't like but for those who are snow weary it will be welcome.