tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-86882086629325274092024-02-02T16:55:49.468-08:00Looking AloftA commentary on weather-related topics by Luke Madaus.Luke Madaushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00342287184407373669noreply@blogger.comBlogger182125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8688208662932527409.post-53223479416461530732016-10-16T21:24:00.001-07:002016-10-16T21:24:43.104-07:00A warm, mixed-out day in ColoradoAs I mentioned in my last blog, I've recently moved to Boulder, Colorado. While I'll continue to post about interesting weather tidbits that show up around the world (like last Friday/Saturday's storm in Seattle, which was actually rather well-forecast despite the winds not being as strong as the worst-case scenarios were advertising. See Cliff's blog and NWS Portland's discussion forLuke Madaushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00342287184407373669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8688208662932527409.post-2166853709221813142016-10-13T10:31:00.001-07:002016-10-13T10:31:50.232-07:00The scary, potentially historic set of windstorms expected in Seattle over the next few days
I've been quiet on the blogging front for the past several months as I've been transitioning out of graduate school life and into the postdoctoral world. I've moved from the University of Washington out to NCAR in Boulder, Colorado, which will give me any entirely new wealth of weather phenomena to talk about. But, I could not resist putting up a blog about the forecasted major wind Luke Madaushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00342287184407373669noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8688208662932527409.post-72189402289466208752016-01-06T17:19:00.000-08:002016-01-06T17:57:54.639-08:00Temperature forecast skill sinks in SeattleToday I was surprised to see that the NWS had forecast a high of 41 Fahrenheit this afternoon here in Seattle, but the temperature had gotten up to 51F!
They aren't the only ones who have been struggling with the temperature forecasts recently. Let's look at some of the forecast performance.
Here is an image showing the last 30 days of high temperature forecasts for Sea-Tac Airport (Luke Madaushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00342287184407373669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8688208662932527409.post-62253080637596123162015-11-18T12:11:00.000-08:002015-11-18T12:11:34.766-08:00Very Un-El-Nino-Like cold next week for the NWThe GFS ensemble (and the ECMWF ensemble as well) are showing a large pattern shift to highly-amplified flow coming by the end of this weekend and into next week over the western US. This would represent a pretty stark change from the weather we've been experiencing here (which has been wet, but not unseasonably so). Let's look at what this change means.
I apologize for the somewhat Luke Madaushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00342287184407373669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8688208662932527409.post-75609105353462657472015-11-10T15:46:00.001-08:002015-11-10T15:46:45.842-08:00The OLYMPEX field campaignAfter being told enough that I should write a blog post sometime soon, I figured I could write up a blog post about why I've not been writing blog posts recently...
I'm a part of the OLYMPEX field campaign to observe precipitation processes in complex terrain. "Why do we need to do that?" you may ask. "Haven't we observed enough precipitation in mountains? Why do it again?"
The US (Luke Madaushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00342287184407373669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8688208662932527409.post-8615410089226540162015-09-30T15:08:00.000-07:002015-09-30T15:08:06.427-07:00Joaquin is very sensitive; or why meteorologists are freaking out about this stormWe have a hurricane in the Atlantic at the moment---Hurricane Joaquin, a category 1 storm. It's currently milling around in the Bahamas, slowly strengthening as it churns over the warm Gulf Stream waters.
Obviously any hurricane near the US east coast would raise concerns, but in this case meteorologists don't know what to do with the forecast. Why? Because even with our manyLuke Madaushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00342287184407373669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8688208662932527409.post-81014158041262413942015-09-11T11:46:00.000-07:002015-09-11T11:46:28.337-07:00Waviness in the tropicsDespite this being one of the most significant El Nino years we've had in a while (with the potential to become one of the strongest on record), we've still managed to have some tropical storm activity in the Atlantic. So far there have been eight named storms, only two of which have actually reached hurricane strength. Depressed tropical cyclone activity in the Atlantic is Luke Madaushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00342287184407373669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8688208662932527409.post-60217223970832819372015-08-04T14:56:00.001-07:002015-08-04T14:56:02.784-07:00El Nino and Precipitation--Depends on Who You AskI came across an interesting divergence in opinion on what the impacts of El Nino on wintertime weather here in the Pacific Northwest might be. First, a reminder that El Nino conditions are present in the Pacific Ocean. Here are the latest weekly sea-surface temperatures, with anomalies on the bottom. The next several images are from the Climate Prediction Center's ENSO page.
Luke Madaushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00342287184407373669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8688208662932527409.post-55274301289023533472015-06-15T16:32:00.000-07:002015-06-15T20:36:11.557-07:00Even the tropics are aiming the faucet for the central USAfter the eastern Pacific got off to an early, rapid start with its tropical storm season (which isn't unexpected in an El Nino year), we're looking at our first tropical storm developing in the western Gulf of Mexico in the next 12 hours. On satellite, this storm has been getting its act together:
And the National Hurricane Center thinks we'll likely see Tropical Storm Bill by tonight. &Luke Madaushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00342287184407373669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8688208662932527409.post-64189789523834617422015-05-12T12:23:00.000-07:002015-05-12T12:23:15.540-07:00The high desert gets soaked, but not as bad as OklahomaAfter days and days of high-precipitation thunderstorms with embedded tornadoes and large hail, Oklahoma is finally getting a bit of a break. Just how wet was it there?
The Oklahoma Mesonet recently published rainfall totals for the past two weeks. Here's what it looked like:
Huge rainfall totals across the state. Over 12 inches in some locations in only 2 weeks. The Luke Madaushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00342287184407373669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8688208662932527409.post-1032165309750089312015-05-04T12:35:00.002-07:002015-05-04T12:35:25.961-07:00Forecasting a Subtropical StormModel forecasts have now been consistently hinting that a small, but powerful storm could form off the eastern Florida coast by the end of this week. This storm isn't quite "tropical" but it's not quite "extratropical", so we use the term "subtropical" to describe it, as it would have characteristics of both tropical and extratropical cyclones. Let's see what this looks like in the Luke Madaushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00342287184407373669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8688208662932527409.post-41633906575345659892015-04-24T12:16:00.000-07:002015-04-24T12:16:14.204-07:00Volcanic Eruptions and ClimateMany people have been awestruck by the amazing images and video coming out of Chile this week, where the Calbuco volcano has dramatically erupted. Here's an example I lifted from weather.com:
(David Cortes Serey/AFP/Getty Images)
The dramatic ash plumes from multiple eruptive phases have been visible on satellite, as these blog posts from the CIMSS satellite center illustrate.
This Luke Madaushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00342287184407373669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8688208662932527409.post-57547978132493153542015-03-28T12:17:00.000-07:002015-03-28T16:07:23.916-07:00Who has the better forecast? It depends...This week's tornadoes in Oklahoma and Arkansas have gotten a lot of press coverage, as this was the first real tornadic event of the season and there was one fatality in the Tulsa tornado. The environment for tornadoes, particularly in central Oklahoma, was somewhat marginal, and this contributed to a slow reaction from the National Weather Service in issuing a tornado warning for a Luke Madaushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00342287184407373669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8688208662932527409.post-5872797388325410252015-03-16T13:19:00.000-07:002015-03-16T13:19:03.350-07:00Cyclone Pam, Seattle rain records and the MJOLast week the small island nation of Vanuatu was devastated by a major tropical cyclone: the Category-5-equivalent Cyclone Pam. There has been terrible damage to the infrastructure on the islands, with estimates of up to 90% of the buildings in the capital of Port Vila. Power was lost early on in the storm and is just now being restored in some places. We can actually see this Luke Madaushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00342287184407373669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8688208662932527409.post-26002113417116685862015-03-04T17:56:00.002-08:002015-03-04T17:57:13.658-08:00Today's classic case of isentropic liftAn incredible band of snow and rain currently stretches across the eastern half of the country, as seen here on the radar composite from around 0100 UTC tonight:
Widespread precipitation from Texas all the way up through New York. You'll notice in the middle of that band there is an area of relatively strong reflectivity. This doesn't necessarily mean it is precipitating Luke Madaushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00342287184407373669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8688208662932527409.post-41994124540264042992015-02-26T14:14:00.000-08:002015-02-26T14:14:23.487-08:00Cold, warmth and the PNAThe weather patterns for the past month over the continental United States have been remarkably persistent. Though we've been hearing a lot about the continued cold and snowy weather in the eastern US, not as much has been said about the unusual warmth of the western US. Here's a map from the Southeast Regional Climate Center showing the percentile of the average high Luke Madaushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00342287184407373669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8688208662932527409.post-92072798225797549442015-02-17T11:58:00.000-08:002015-02-17T11:58:19.321-08:00Snowpack and Surface TemperatureHere's an interesting case today of an area in central Illinois that somehow has managed to miss out on all the snow. Here we have the NWS National Snow Analysis of snow depth:
We can see that extraordinary swath of snow that the most recent set of storms this weekend has brought to the mid-Mississippi and the Ohio River Valley---much further south than the snow we've seen so far this Luke Madaushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00342287184407373669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8688208662932527409.post-18059661199326720632015-02-13T14:24:00.000-08:002015-02-13T14:24:02.035-08:00A different blizzard trackLooking at the National Weather Service's hazards map for today, it's clear where the story is:
Another powerful snowstorm forecast to hit the northeast. Let's run through a quick overview of what the current model forecasts are doing with this storm.
Here's the GFS sea-level pressure (black contours) and relative humidity at the surface (colors; not as important here...) starting with Luke Madaushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00342287184407373669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8688208662932527409.post-42147044078209325792015-02-08T12:58:00.000-08:002015-02-08T12:58:20.833-08:00More snow doesn't mean more liquidKeeping on the theme from the other week, I wanted to look at the snowfall to date this year in Chicago and Boston given their recent near-record snowfall. Fortunately the National Weather Service in Chicago makes it easy with their year-to-date climate plots. Here's the most recent one from O'Hare Airport (KORD) in Chicago.
In the top panel you're seeing the daily temperature Luke Madaushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00342287184407373669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8688208662932527409.post-54700998821965927382015-01-28T17:37:00.002-08:002015-01-30T12:01:32.231-08:00Sad Skiing in the NorthwestWe go from blizzards in the northeast to an extraordinary lack of snow in the northwest. Here are the most recent snowpack estimates from the NRCS Snotel sites:
Instead of our booming snowpack we had last year, the Washington and Oregon Cascades are well below normal for this time of year---many locations only have around 25% or less of the snow they usually have. It improves somewhat asLuke Madaushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00342287184407373669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8688208662932527409.post-89176446243145754782015-01-27T15:42:00.001-08:002015-01-27T15:42:19.313-08:00Stumbling about in the snowLet's talk a bit about the forecasting of this blizzard event in the northeast yesterday and today. A lot of people are writing about what went into this forecast and why New York and Philadelphia did not get nearly as much snow as was forecast (thought Boston and points east did!). The common theme? Forecasters didn't adequately communicate the uncertainty regarding this Luke Madaushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00342287184407373669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8688208662932527409.post-13648759028082934112015-01-22T12:26:00.000-08:002015-01-22T12:26:05.199-08:00A Western Washington TornadoWell, with a new year I decided it was time for me to resume my blogging activities. So, I'll try to have regular updates on a weekly/biweekly basis at least as new weather topics come to me.
On Sunday afternoon, January 18th, most people in the Puget Sound area were glued to the television to watch the Seahawks game. Passing outside their windows was a series of strong showers Luke Madaushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00342287184407373669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8688208662932527409.post-76072324998347424192014-04-24T16:44:00.000-07:002014-04-24T16:44:09.917-07:00Analogs to Saturday's potential for severe weatherAs many people are now aware, this weekend looks to have some potent severe weather in the southern Plains. The SPC has a day three slight risk for a wide area of Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas on Saturday:
The model forecast fields are pretty good---a strong upper-level trough digging across the central Rockies with a powerful jet streak entering the base of the trough on Luke Madaushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00342287184407373669noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8688208662932527409.post-72931002426985253732014-02-26T12:15:00.001-08:002014-02-26T12:15:24.804-08:00Finally some rain for CaliforniaAs most people are probably aware by now, California is in the midst of a drought of historical significance. The past several years have had below-normal rainfall, and combined with a particularly dry winter so far, water levels are extremely low. Much of the west has been suffering from below normal precipitation. Here's the estimate of the percentage of normal snowpack from Luke Madaushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00342287184407373669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8688208662932527409.post-91038740188766478802014-01-31T14:16:00.000-08:002014-01-31T14:16:12.659-08:00Questioning the Bering Sea Rule: Part 2In my last blog post I used the ERA-Interim reanalysis to look at a long-range forecasting technique called the "Bering Sea Rule". This has been used by many bloggers to attempt to forecast the general weather for various parts of the eastern US several weeks in advance. In its general form, it claims that whatever happens in the Bering Sea (weatherwise) will happen in the eastern US Luke Madaushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00342287184407373669noreply@blogger.com1