Wednesday, January 22, 2014

potentially wild wednesday... (am.22.jan.14)>

*Update @ 3:55pm... The rain has increased a bit in intensity during the past hour.  It's very dark and foggy here in my part of town.  Occasionally gusty winds and even some rumbles of thunder recently.

*Update @ 2:50pm... The off and on mainly light rain is back 'on' again at the moment.  My rain gauge shows 0.24" (6mm), which isn't a lot -- but it's nearly as much as the entire monthly total up until today.  Current temp: 42.1F (5.6C).  The snow line remains well above.

*Update @ 9:17am...  Been getting some steady light rain since about 8:45am, but still nothing very dramatic.  The temp has dropped to 42.6F (5.9C).

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We have totally overcast skies at sunrise this morning, with a couple of random sprinkles in the vicinity and some gusty winds which have just picked up.  Those few brief showers last evening ended up being no more than that -- few and brief -- and I have just 0.01" (less than 1mm) in the rain gauge to show for it.  The temperature at my location in the upper part of town has been more or less steady since around midnight, and I'm recording a low of 45.1F (7.3C).  Humidity is currently 45%.

Without exception, the various sets of computer model data this morning are showing a very healthy period of rainfall for our area during the coming 24 hours.  But as you know, technology has let us down a few times recently, so though I want to believe what I am seeing on the computer screen, I'd rather see it and feel it in tangible/material form.

At any rate... the 'engine' of this latest storm system in the upper-levels is centered just west of the Rajasthan border in central Pakistan.  It is expected to move slowly east-northeastward, arriving in Punjab between midnight and sunrise tomorrow morning.  This upper-level system itself is not very dynamic, and will weaken further as it approaches, but what all the computer model data and algorithms are picking up on is the copious amounts of sub-tropical moisture which have been drawn northward in the counter-clockwise circulation ahead of it.  With mid-level winds from the south-southeast, and upper-level winds from the southwest, there will be some impressive lifting of that moisture here along the leading edge of the mountains, bringing us fairly widespread precipitation.  Projected amounts range from around 1.5cm to (gulp) nearly 8cm (0.7-3.2"), which is an insanely wide range within the data, obviously.

My gut instinct is that we'll remain too warm for snow here in McLeod, despite the projection of a freezing level hovering very near our elevation by tonight.  However, if there is development of significant precipitation around here, some heavy snowfall amounts are quite likely just up-mountain.  We'll have to watch it carefully as the day unfolds.

So there you have the meteorological mumbo-jumbo -- now we'll see if we're in for something interesting, or if it's going to be another flop.

Check the CURRENT FORECAST specifics on the tab above.