Time to Throw In The Towel for Snow This Winter?

Good Wednesday morning,

We are entering the last full week of Meteorological Winter and for the lower elevations of western North Carolina it has been another miserable winter for snow lovers. Highly transient cold snaps with no digging shortwaves into the Southeast has yielded an unfavorable environment for winter storms.

While there have been rainy spells in December and January, its been a lot drier in February as precipitation amounts are running below normal after two consecutive months of well above normal precipitation.

So, what is in the works over the next 1-2 weeks?

After we get through this weekend’s forecasted cooldown expect a fairly quick warmup going into the final days of the month. Infact looking at the global ensembles there could be quite a warm-up by March 1 as a deep trough settles into western North America.

This same pattern looks to persist through the first 6-10 days of March…

The overall teleconnections for winter-like weather are nowhere to be seen. The North Atlantic Oscillation continues in the milder (positive) phase with a slow trend toward neutral around March 10.

The more important teleconnection for cold and wintery weather in the Southeast US lies with the Pacific-North America teleconnection. A positive phase correlates with a ridge of high pressure in western North America. The current PNA forecast is the exact opposite going into a deep negative state through March 10. That fits very well with the western trough being shown on the global ensembles.

We are about to enter the end of a reasonable timeframe for synoptic winter weather for each winter season (Early Dec – Early March) in western North Carolina.

Never say never…but quite honestly it’s not looking good. The bulk of our region is now running around 720 days since the last snow of significance and that total only looks to grow larger.

Of course, the weather team will continue to keep an eye on things in the situation that something might pop up.