Merry Christmas! Lots of rain, some ice possible by Wednesday
UPDATE 10:20 AM, Christmas Day: ICE STORM WARNING ROCKBRIDGE, BATH COUNTIES FOR 1/4 INCH OF ICE OR MORE; FREEZING RAIN ADVISORY FOR PATCHY ICE SOUTH TO ROANOKE/MONTGOMERY COUNTIES.
Merry Christmas! Every one of you who visits this page — not just commenters, but everyone who lurks or calls up a page — has made this blog a success in another interesting year to follow weather in Southwest Virginia.
It’s a holiday, and day off the blog for me, at least through mid-evening or so. I’ll check for new comments in the morning and approve them, and then won’t be back on the blog til at least 7 p.m. In the meantime, be sure to keep an eye on the National Weather Service-Blacskburg for any new advisories, watches or warnings.
The main thing you need to know about the weather ahead is it’s going to rain quite a bit on Wednesday, maybe starting before midnight on Christmas, as a low tracks west of us and pulls in lots of Gulf and Atlantic moisture. We’re talking 1-2 inches widespread, maybe heavier in spots — a nice gift to help start relieving the long-term drought and refilling some reservoirs, though a messy day to return gifts. There will be some ice, and perhaps a little sleet/snow at the outset, especially north of Roanoke, with winter storm watches having been issued for Bath and Rockbridge counties in Virginia and Greenbrier County in West Virginia, and points northward. Be aware of that if your travel goes north and west of Roanoke — or of course, if you live in those areas. There may be some spotty ice for a while even farther south — slight risk for quarter-inch of ice down the Blue Ridge, according to federal forecaters. I’ll check back in on that Christmas evening to see what the threat level is on Wednesday morning. There will be much heavier snow in states to our west, all the way from Arkansas to Ohio, which could really stymie travel in those areas. There are also likely to be severe storms on Christmas and the following day in states to our south.
The next thing you need to know is that there is a storm system arriving about Saturday that will need to be monitored closely for some wintry potential. That’s about all that can be said right now.
Merry Christmas to all!
December 24, 2012 - 11:11 PM
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Merry Christmas to Kevin and all the weather bloggers!!!
Merry,merry to all…hope your day brings you all the happiness of your childhood,and all the wisdom of adulthood…no matter what the weather,family and friends make the season what it is…I hope for snow,and the quiet rustling of the branches as the deer brush by. The wind- swept meadows and blustery ridges take me back to days of my youth. No matter what winter has in store for us all,lets be safe and continue to speak our minds about our desires and memories of winters past and future…y
Fired up early here @Dfw…
area of thunder moved through about 3am..
firing up rapidly..moving off NE btwn 25-40 kts.
Im thinking after tonight midnight local ROA
ought to be seeing this moisture..
Asheville has it on their doorstep by around 10pm..
The Feds dont have it in ROA by 7pm..at least not
in present fcst..but im thinking it may be moved up
a little with the next update.
Low moves from about Charleston Wva north of ROA to DC/MD area
and continues out to sea ENE..off Jersey coast by daybreak the 27th.
Looks like some good moisture for SWVA late tonight thru tomorrow.
Merry Christmas Kevin!
ice storm warning for Roanoke
Merry Christmas bloggers
Merry Christmas!…to you and yours!…Thank you for this Weather Journal!
Think I better leave this evening for Giles. Winter storm watch posted here in Greene and freezing rain advisory in Giles so I best be getting to where I’m going!
Dim prospects for significant snows in the area in the near term. Better chances farther north. See how well you can forecast snowfall amounts for select stations across the mid-Atlantic and southern New England.
14th Annual NEWx Snowfall Forecast Contest
Deadline for entries: 10:30 PM EST TUE…25-DEC-12
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Details @ http://newxsfc.blogspot.com/2012/12/winter-12-13-storm-1-call-for-forecasts.html
Enter your forecast @ http://www.newx-forecasts.com/
Merry Christmas Kevin! About this system coming Saturday.. I know it’s early, but are you thinking it’ll be arriving early in the day or late? That’s the day I’m planning on returning from Georgia, and am trying to decide whether to leave Friday instead.
Actually, George, freezing rain advisory for Roanoke area; ice storm warning for Rockbridge, Bath counties.
Typically in situations like this, the floor of the Roanoke Valley hovers slightly above freezing and there isn’t much ice. But be careful driving on Wednesday morning just in case this is an exception, or there are spots of ice. Higher elevations around the city probably will see some light glazing, and maybe a bit of sleet accumulation, before changing to rain.
Jennifer: Looks like Saturday for now. Thinking a lighter event than what we’re having tomorrow. All precipitation types possible at this point.
Off the blog now to help my son assemble a toy airport. Merry Christmas! See you this evening.
I hope that everyone else here, especially those of you with young children and grandchildren in “attendance,” have a very Merry Christmas. It was 42* here at 6:50, so we are going to have yet another day quite a bit above normal here in ROA and probably throughout SW Virginia.
I just watched The Weather Channel for 20 minutes starting at 10:00, and there is HUGE news nationally. TWC has posted (although it was actually created by the NWS probably/maybe?) a TORCON (Tornado Condition) Index level of 8 (!!! out of 10) for SE Louisiana and Southern Miss. for later today. Also an 8 for tonight for Southern and Central Alabama. And even a 5 for tomorrow for Central and Eastern SC and NC. The 8 means that conditions are so prevalent for twisters that they think that there is an 80% chance of a tornado within 50 miles of where they pinpointed their bullseye. It was near Slidell, LA for the westernmost region I mentioned.
The area in red for tomorrow includes parts of Southside and even more land in Virginia east of Southside. Likely for severe weather tomorrow.
Jennifer, if I were you, and assuming that you plan to trek home in a single day (like friends of ours who also are visiting in Atlanta and will be calling me either later today or tomorrow), I would plan to leave Fatlanta on Friday morning and get here Friday evening. No bad or even windy weather on tap (supposedly) then anywhere between Georgia and here. Yeah, traffic might be a little heavier. Still very windy on Thursday, at least for part of the day.
The precip now affecting the western Gulf states is showing hardly any signs of a changeover to snow yet, except for NW Arkansas, but the wunderground forecast for Jonesboro (Kevin’s original hometown) still calls for 100% chance of snow. And with accum.s “up to 8 inches.” We will see.
Jared, I like your thinking about travelling to Giles County this evening. You still might have to be wary the last 30 miles from I-81 exit in C-burg to Giles, depending on when you get there and when the precip starts there.
Jared, ignore the previous comment about being “wary.” I looked up the hourly forecast for Newport, and even there the precip chances only go up to 20% at 11 PM. Looks like a dry day and evening.
Kevin: The wording of the advisory actually states that the valley floor has a better shot at ice than higher elevations this go around. I assume this is because they expect the cold air to get trapped down here and linger a little bit longer when the “warm” air surges in.
I just called up NEXRAD radar for Jonesboro, ARK, and widened the coverage to the regional map, and the change in the last 90 minutes is amazing. The northern edge of the precip runs on a west-east line through central ARK and the SE corner of OKLA, and the northern edge is all snow now. Definitely looks like the outlook map for Arkansas that Kevin posted as a link on Saturday or Sunday here will verify at least in terms of what type of precip Jboro will receive.
Had one side of the family’s Christmas dinner last night and the other side this evening. I wish a Merry Christmas to all and many thanks to Kevin for all he does for this blog. Doug: I am keeping your “Blondie Boy” in my prayers.
Merry Christmas Kevin! I read your blog regularly and it the source I trust the most when the weather is getting interesting. But I never comment or ask questions, just the blog the and comments. But I did want to say thank you for what you do.
Merry Christmas!!
Euro is looking really sweet right now for a good snow! I’m sure it will be rain by this weekend. LOL
Take a look at the top graph (the one with the red spaghetti lines at the right end of it) for the AO: http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/daily_ao_index_/ao_index_ensm.shtml All of the red strands end up into + levels by January 7th or so, except for two. One strand goes all the way up to +4. The GFS outlooks (no link here) stay in negative territory until Jan. 2nd, then go +.
Most of the NAO ensemble strands also go into + territory, but immediately, and about half of them stay there after January 1st, the other half go negative.
The PNA just edged into + levels today, and will go more positive past Jan 1st, but then start to decrease starting about the 3rd or so, and a few of the red strands in the Ensemble even return to negative levels by Jan. 7th-8th. Link: http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/pna/pna_index_ensm.shtml
Overall, this is NOT a bright outlook for a prolonged cold spell after January 6th or so. Could this be a pre-cursor to all three oscillations going in favor of a continuing warm winter? +AO, +NAO, -PNA? I doubt it, but remember, the NAO has not had an extended swing into + territory (by “extended” I mean more than two weeks) since Spring. A big switch in the NAO (to strongly +) is overdue. But it might remain overdue for several more months …..
The first link did not work. I put an extra underline in there. http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/daily_ao_index/ao_index_ensm.shtml
In route from Snowshoe to Charleston WV to Pulaski…Merry CHRISTmas to all and here’s a link to a web cam that my son has overlooking the parking lot at the Top of the World at Snowshoe….http://www.dakjrstatic.com/webcamD.php?w=5 maybe a second generation weather gawker….mainly interested in weather for snowboarding purposes :0)
Merry Christmas, Kevin and all the weather bloggers! Your blog is a wonderful thing, thank you!
Things keep changing. The ice storm warning for Rockbridge Country has been canceled. It is now a winter storm warning which helps our prospects for electricity.
First-ever blizzard warning for my home turf in NE Arkansas tonight. Some places may get a foot with 45 mph wind gusts.
Also — large wedge tornado on the ground in Mobile, Alabama, just a little while ago.
Incredibly dynamic storm.
@”Postal Officer”, SW ROA County, 1420 Ft — December 25, 2012 @ 4:36 pm
21.
Overall, this is NOT a bright outlook for a prolonged cold spell after January 6th or so. Could this be a pre-cursor to all three oscillations going in favor of a continuing warm winter? +AO, +NAO, -PNA?
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Ignore the indexes and instead look at the forecast long-wave pattern during the first week of JAN.
- PNA ridge ==> arctic air and short-wave energy diving into east coast trof
- Split flow ==> active sub-tropical jet is an opportunity for moisture and phasing
- Deep Newfoundland LOW ==> forces storm track toward lower latitudes and delivers cold air into eastern US
All in all…looks quite promising.
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More @
http://newxsfc.blogspot.com/2012/12/winter-12-13-january-2013-week-one.html
Merry Christmas!
Gulf Coast is getting hit very hard right now with a very large and very dangerous Tornado outbreak especially in Alabama. Mobile just had 3 massive tornadoes hit with numerous injuries and damage. Mobile AL loop radar…some other links.
http://radar.weather.gov/radar.php?rid=MOB&product=NCR&overlay=11101111&loop=yes
http://www2.wkrg.com/live/
Brandon: As a matter of observation, I generally find the Roanoke Valley an exception to those “ice in deeper valleys” situations. Likely due to the urban heat island, and perhaps also the wider structure of the valley as opposed to the more narrow “protected” valleys that do trap cold air for longer ice.
I can think of one exception several years back when the worst ice was the higher elevations of Floyd County and the lower elevations near downtown Roanoke. That probably won’t be the case in a marginal situation where we’re dropping from highs in the 50s to flirting with freezing.
NEWxSFC…
serious question for you. Looking at this current PDS in the south (AL), I’m seeing that the 850 thru 500 mb winds are shearing and picking up speed in the jet streak, is this the beginning of the cyclogenises and will this energy pick up strength in the next 6-12 hours as it pivots east? Just getting worried that this PDS is just starting up and could move east into GA/FL/SC towards morning. Lots of energy down south. thanks
Do over.
@Captain Glen Quagmire at Christmas — December 25, 2012 @ 8:25 pm
31. “…is this the beginning of the cyclogenises and will this energy pick up strength in the next 6-12 hours as it pivots east?”
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Wouldn’t call it cyclogenesis b/c 1) the surface LOW has already formed and 2) the LOW isn’t deepening rapidly.
What’s driving the event is a digging mid-level trof becoming negatively tilted and a strong LLJ feeding rich Gulf moisture into the storm system.