Spring Has Sprung, But Significant Pattern Change Coming
Western New York continues with a somewhat lengthy spring like stretch going into the new week. Mild to warm, dry weather will persist through Tuesday as a disturbance approaching from the western Great Lakes washes out. Temps stay above average through the majority of the week...highs in the 50s/60s. The next chance of rain arrives Wednesday with a few scattered rain showers. A stronger cold front moves in Friday with periods of rain and sharply colder air diving in Saturday and Sunday. Temps next weekend will drop through the 40s along with the chance of a rain/snow mix. Do not be discouraged though, this next chilly pattern will be relatively short-lived, only lasting a few days before spring weather returns from a short hiatus.
posted by Mary Beth Wrobel at
10:38 PM
28 Comments:
Out of that whole post, the only thing I really wanted to hear is "dont worrie though, spring will be back after a few days of cooler weather." And I got that! So looks to be a minor cool-down, then spring really digs in... or at least it should... Im sick of gray cold winter day's! Time for warmer spring weather... the buds are getting bigger on the trees... the flowers are starting to poke up...
Jim: ..and lots o' birds are chirping, too! Many folks share your sentiments...
Hope the spring will be a good "normal" one. For two years, I have planted peas a tad too late and it has warmed up too fast for them. Sunday,I got a head start in the garden, turned over an area by hand (still too wet to till) and got my pea seeds planted. I know the ground is probably a little too cold right now, but I am hoping for a good crop finally.
Another thing I wanted to mention is the amazing energy the sun gives us. We have a one acre pond behind our house and as of 3/30 it had about 8" of ice on it. By this past Saturday, it was still ~80% covered (of varying thicknesses) and by Sunday evening it was totally ice free (even after skim ice had reformed Sat. night covering back up all the open spots). With 33 - 35 degree water flowing into it, most of the melting came from above. I know the above may sound silly, but with my background, I know how hard (in terms of energy input) it is to get water to change states.
As Mary Beth posted, Spring will return after a few days of chilly and fairly unpleasant conditions.
However, just so folks don't get their hopes up too, TOO high about the permanence of a warm pattern, we are heading into the season where "cutoff" blocking patterns become climatologically favored. That is, in these blocking patterns, the warm ridges and cold lows in the mid levels of the atmosphere have a tendency in the spring to become cut off from the prevailing westerlies aloft which keep things moving along from west to east. If you happen to get stuck under a blocking ridge, the weather will be tranquil and mild. But if you get stuck under the influence of a cold upper level cutoff low, conditions can be wet and cold.
It's common for those cold cutoff lows to impact the eastern Great Lakes in the spring, so don't be surprised when they do. This weekend's low will take on the characteristics of a cutoff, but the operational GFS 12z run does show enough of a progressive west to east flow reestablishing itself by the middle of next week to nudge this particular cutoff out of our hair.
Good evening Don
Is the scenario you describe similiar to a cold low, which I have heard used before by Environment Canada? Is that a fall scenario?
Learning curve needs answering.
tx
Well, a cold low need not be a cutoff low. It can be progressive and keep moving along. Or, it can get stacked up in a holding pattern. But a cold low in general induces instability showers, particularly when the angle of the sun is high enough to heat the surface and boundary layer of the atmosphere. Instability showers often are convective in nature, and coverage can be popcorn-like.
Had a nice blast of the cool lake today in a odd wind shift, took the temperature and sent down quickly Look at the history for 4/07/08 this is my weather station. http://www.wunderground.com/weatherstation/WXDailyHistory.asp?ID=KNYDERBY3
It's not really an "odd wind shift." It's an onshore breeze. When the landmass heated so strongly today north of the srn tier, the rising currents of the heated air near the surface allowed the cooler, denser air from the cold lake surface to move inland to some extent. Newfane HS, at our Neighborhood WeatherNet site went from 70 to 58 in short order when a NE breeze off Lk Ontario kicked in during the latter part of the afternoon.
I have lots of free time on my hands all of a sudden, >:o( so I spend time wondering about this stuff:
correct me if I'm wrong, Don, but is it the Lake temperatures that will determine how these cut off lows will affect us? Right now, the lake will bring us clouds and rain with these systems but I know that when later in the season the lake actually re-stabilizes air as it passes over us giving us that lake shadow effect, busting apart convection over the metro area and other areas within the shadow.
When does this changeover occur in our lake-effective conditions, in your observations, (in regards to the season)? How do you think the next system will fare as it passes over the lake?
Thanks again!
Mr. Don,
Looks like the high sun angle and warm temps are really eating away at the ice on lake erie according to todays national ice center chart, it shouldn't be long now.
sabresfan,
The lake temperatures have an impact on how slow moving or even cutoff lows effect us. However, we would still get some popcorn showers at the least--some with small hail--even without the lake's effect. When there is a cold upper level low, the heated landmass will combine with the cold air aloft to produce at least conditional instability.
The lake's shadow effect is also somewhat conditional. You can still get elevated convection (not surface-based) passing over colder lake waters and not weakening, given other conditions. There's no magical date when lake effect switches from destabilizing to stabilizing. It depends on the temperature of the airmass residing over the lake. In general, the lake more often stabilizes with a SW flow at this time of the year, and begins to destabilize late in the summer and early in the autumn.
will the temps raise after next tuesday?
Temperatures will begin to moderate on Wednesday and become fairly mild again for a few days.
This weekend's precipitation looks spotty at worst, with some extensive rainfree time. Friday will be the wettest of the Fri-Sun time period, and even that shower activity will be heavier in MI and southern ONT than here. A few tstorms are possible Friday with some modest jet dynamics in place. The spotty activity which lingers into Mon-Tue will include some wet snowflakes, especially at higher altitudes, and the core of the coldest air and a NNW flow sets up--but moisture looks quite limited.
It got into the low 70's in Amherst today! Too bad it wont last...
How is the long-range forecast looking? Cooler, warmer? Wet, dry?
On Friday, there'll be a likelihood of a severe weather outbreak as close as Ohio. As of now, it appears the dynamics for svr storms will stay SW of us, but we'll have to keep an eye on the projected placement of the plains storm and the better dynamics in upcoming runs.
Thanks for your reply Don.
I hope we get some thunder boomers on Fri. (as Mike likes to call them)
Do you think it will get too cold out this wknd for my more tender plants? I just trimmed my roses back. I would hate for them to freeze.
Thanks again!!!
Hi Mike, looks like a dirty cold low will be messing up our weekend?!
The weekend won't be a nice one, but it not be a washout, either. There should even be some limited sun on Saturday, with a few showers more likely in the afternoon as chillier air aloft creates conditional instability. Sunday will be somewhat on the raw side, with a chillier breeze and daytime highs struggling to reach the mid 40s, though there could still be a few peaks at the sun. Any spotty shwrs could be mixed with wet snow over the hills. Monday's spotty showers are likely to be of the snow variety, with the 850 temps at their coldest. Nightime lows, however, should stay above freezing at lower elevations due to extensive cloud cover.
Typos: "it won't be a washout," and a few "peeks" at the sun....sorry, typing too fast.
I heard a crack of thunder earlier today that came with a nice downpour. It only lasted a few minutes.
Good afternoon Don
How much rain from this system on Friday in your neck of the woods? Hoping we might get a few t-storms around here out of this system. Had a rumble of thunder in the neck of the woods this morning from a very fast moving front of light to moderate showers.
Nice to see those puffy white clouds building in the afternoon sky with the sun mixed in. That is always a sign to be we're rounding the corner toward summertime---eventually!
Tx
barrie1; we may get a few localized downpours in passing tshwrs, but the average rainfall looks to be moderate across the region.
Thanks for responding.
I'd just like to note how much different this April has been than last year. We had a white easter on April 16th and had lake snow in the southern tier last year. This year so far has been extremely warm and nice so far. We've been quite lucky with easterly not southwesterly winds blowing away from lake erie.
Mr, Don
I was wondering how come squall lines make it over lake huron and michigan and not lake erie?
This looks amazing (currently at 1025 am)
http://radar.weather.gov/Conus/full_loop.php
The early SPC Outlook for tomorrow now has the Slight Risk for Svr coming up into SW New York. This outlook will be further updated during the early afternoon on the SPC website.
Post a Comment
Links to this post:
Create a Link
<< Home