FLOODING: Heavy Rains Today and Tonight

It sure hasn't been Winter-like the last week or so, has it? I think the groundhog might have been wrong, as it sure has felt like Spring lately.

On Monday and Tuesday we had highs in the 70s. A rarity for sure. But on top of that, we've had quite a bit of rain over the past 7 days. Here at home I've recorded rain 6 of the past 7 days. When you take the light, melting snow we had last Saturday, combine it with a completely saturated ground, and then add even more rain on top of it.... you get a Spring-like mess.

The good news for Central Ohio is we haven't taken the brunt of the heavy rain lately. While any rain could become runoff flooding with completely saturated grounds, we aren't in nearly as bad of shape as areas to our south and west:

We're kind of in a donut hole here in Central Ohio. For reference I put the 1.62" I've recieved here in Canal Winchester, but areas around the Ohio River in Cincinnati has seen over 3", with more on the way today and tonight.

I think we have a solid 24 hours of off and on heavy rain coming for us here in Central Ohio. The good news is, the first round of it should stay in Northern Ohio, leaving the heavier totals to our north. Then we'll see a brief break before round two hits us later this afternoon. That should bring some of the heaviest rain we've seen yet.

Then after all of that rain, we'll end this storm with... well... storms. We have a slight risk of some severe weather overnight, but I think the real risk will be with a developing squall line early tomorrow morning:

I'm not super confident on storms being severe tonight or tomorrow morning, but I think it would still be a good idea to make sure your weather radio is plugged in and working before going to bed. Don't be like me and plug your weather radio in to an outlet that's controlled by a switch that's turned off. That's a problem.

I'm going to try and track some flooding with my drone sometime today and then tomorrow, hoping to get some good shots from around town. If you're out and come across high water, turn around, don't drown.

Storms Turn to Snow

I just wanted to briefly address the chance for snow tomorrow. I don't think it'll be a very serious threat, but the threat is still there.

After thunderstorms last night, temps in the 60s and a general feeling of Spring yesterday, we fell back to reality today. Typical transition period for us here in Central Ohio.

A southern low will make its way toward the east coast tomorrow, putting areas south of US22 in a favorable spot for periods of moderate snowfall. We should stay in a pretty steady temperature zone here in Central Ohio, never really dropping lower than the upper 20s or higher than the low 30s in the next 24 hours. So snow may fall, but the general accumulation should be limited to grassy areas, with some slush in heavier snow.

The NAM probably still over does the accumulation:

I would be surprised if southern Ohio actually got cold enough to accumulate this much snow, but flakes will be flying heavier in that area.

For us in Central Ohio, I bet we may get half an inch on grassy areas. The one exception may be in southern Fairfield County where they'll be closer to the higher QPF.

Mild and Wet Rest of February

Remember that 3-5" snowpack we acquired last week? Yeah, this is just about all that's left in my neighborhood:

If it weren't for snow piles from shoveling our driveways, we wouldn't have a sliver of snow left. Temperatures since February 9th have gone above freezing every day, and I've seen 0.34" of rain also. Rain, humidity, warm temperatures... that's a perfect recipe for some serious snow eating.

And to be honest, I'm not sure if we'll see a steady snowpack any more this winter. That doesn't mean we won't see snow, but the sun is rising higher in the sky, fighting back the arctic air and leaving the chances of a true cold snap pretty slim for the coming weeks.

We've switched the east coast pattern to warm for the foreseeable future. The next 5 days at least are showing above normal temps. That's because we have a pretty persistent high pressure setup over the Atlantic, pumping warmer air in and forcing storm tracks up and over the Great Lakes region:

Late February is a prime time for one of those sneaky southern lows to dump on us, but with a pattern like this we have no shot at that. As I've illustrated above, most storms that would normally drop out of the Rockies and head our way, are now being forced well west of us. As we know, being on the east side of a low is always wet.

That's what we can expect the next couple days, too: wet. We have a couple of systems that'll take this exact track and leave us "warm sector'd," with the potential for some minor flooding, too. I think some areas of southeastern Ohio could see up to 3" of rain between now and Saturday morning. Our ground will be pretty saturated from snow melt up here in Central Ohio, so if we got close to that, we would see some more serious flooding. Luckily down by the Ohio River, they had far less, if any, snowpack at all to saturate the ground.

I think most of Central Ohio will see closer to 1.5" of rain, but I wouldn't rule out some isolated areas of heavier precip in Fairfield County, which will be closer to the heavier areas of rain. I also won't rule out the occasional rumble of thunder sometime tomorrow evening! For storm lovers, this is just a tease of what's to come this summer.

Slight Chance of Freezing Rain Tonight

There's been talk for several days of the chance of some freezing rain this weekend. I've held off talking about it because the chances have seemed small, and I've not seen an awful lot of support for a heavy icing event.

Now about 12 hours out I can say with confidence that tonight's ice event should mostly be a non-event. There's a couple reasons. First, we've been above freezing for about 24 hours now. By the time freezing rain possibly hits the area, temps will have been above freezing for over 36 hours. Now we've not been way above freezing, but considering we won't drop much lower than 30 degrees tonight, I don't think we'll have a super cooled surface to freeze our rain on contact.

Another reason would be that we're between the northern and southern stream of high moisture:

That doesn't mean we won't see any icing at all. You can see on the simulated radar that small showers could drop a quick couple hundredths of an inch over an hour, which may be enough to put just a very slight ice accumulation on elevated surfaces.

I also think Pickaway and Fairfield Counties will be more likely to see some icing because of their proximity to the southern stream of moisture. That's not great news for them since they got the brunt of our Wednesday ice, too.

Overall I think this will be a low impact event, but don't rule out some slick conditions tomorrow morning.

SUMMARY: February 7th Storm

I'd say this storm performed just how it was forecasted. Areas south of US22 got glazed pretty good with freezing rain and little to no snow. Further north, snow with some mix in there for good measure (or the inability to measure your accumlations!).

While the snow and ice totals weren't eye popping, this was by far our most disruptive storm of the season. Here's a comparison of my map from yesterday with totals from the NWS:

I think I nailed the 3-5" in the middle, a little off on the amounts to the south, but got pretty close with my 0.1" to 0.25" of ice to the south. In fact, I believe Chillicothe may have even gotten up to a half inch of ice. The snow barely even mixed in down south.

Most counties went to a level 2 snow emergency early this morning, simply because snow was accumulating so fast that the plows couldn't keep up. My drive in was awful, with main roads untouched and slippery. My car had layers. Some snow. Some ice. Then some slush. Then some sleet. Then more snow. It was truly a mix overnight. The 3.5" I got could have been way more if we didn't have the mixing in. That's probably where those high 4" totals came in for northern Franklin.

I'd expect more closings and delays tomorrow, as rural areas may take a couple days to clean this mess up. Temps will also dip in to the teens tonight causing some refreezing, so be careful on the roads tomorrow. For our friends in southern Pickaway and Fairfield, well... you experienced the true southern low. The ice!

UPDATE: Don't Forget The Ice

I've focused all of my attention on where this heavier snow will setup, but something extremely important to watch will be where the heaviest of the freezing rain falls. With this slow progression north with the latest model runs, I believe this could eventually put Central Ohio under the gun for some significant icing.

The latest HRRR shows the potential for almost half an inch of ice in Souther Ohio!

This model already puts Pickaway and Fairfield Counties in to the moderate icing scenario, but just a slight bump northward and they could be in for serious icing. The kind of ice event that brings down power lines and leaves roads impassible. For areas like southern Fairfield County and in to rural Hocking County, this is a worst case scenario for areas with poor power grids and hills that get hard to drive on with just a dusting of snow.

This, along with the heavier snow, is something I'll be keeping an eye on.

UPDATE: HRRR Trends Heavy Snow

Shortly after my last post, the latest 3km NAM came out and dropped some insanity on us, suggesting areas of 6-8" of snow for Central Ohio. I laughed it off and assumed it was typical NAM over reaction.

Now a few hourly runs of the HRRR have started to agree with my idea of a more northerly track. What that does is put Pickaway and Fairfield Counties in more of a sleet/ice situation, and puts Madison, Franklin and Licking Counties right in the sweet spot of the heaviest snowfall:

I forgot to mention in my last post, but the area just north of the ice line will be where the heaviest snow will fall. Above is the 4am snapshot from the HRRR. Don't take this as a forecast, as this storm still has time to move north or south. Not to mention, this will not be a stationary line. The ice and snow line will wobble throughout the night and early morning, so this is will not be a perfect line in the sand after it moves out.

That being said, I think we could be looking closer to the high end of my forecast for areas right along the ice/snow line.

Who will be staying up watching this?

FINAL CALL: Wednesday Night Storm

Have you seen forecasts over the weekend with a weather person claiming to know what the snow totals and rain/snow line will be? I hope you didn't believe them. This is a textbook southern low. No one knows with certainty what we were going to get that far ahead of time.

As of now I can say we're going to see some snow in Central Ohio, and we will probably see a little sleet and ice too. That's all I feel confident putting out there. The details are going to be hard to pin down.

The NWS has us under a Winter Weather Advisory until tomorrow evening:

I think that's just a place holder for now. I expect Winter Storm Warnings to come up for at least a two county ribbon across the I-71 corridor sometime this evening.

Most models are very slowly coming further north with the snow/ice line. That's what I've expected for a while just because this is what southern lows always seem to do to us. You can have model consensus for days ahead of time, but when it comes time for the low to develop, these models all correct to a more northern track.

I'll be interested to see how close we come to this snowfall layout from the NAM:

When I say layout, I mean the thin area that is depicted for the event. That's a 50-75 zone from the northern edge to southern edge in Central Ohio. I don't subscribe to this scenario being exactly what happens tonight in terms of totals and locations, but I do like showing this to prove that the margin for error is so small.

Our southern low is just now coming together in Louisiana, while the northern branch of this storm is coming in from the upper Midwest. Those two will marry very close to Ohio overnight. That's the reason you see a "v" shape to the above snowfall area also; because this is just getting going over us, not before getting to the region. That fact, along with our general uncertainty that comes with the track of any southern low, means predictions could change every hour.

For now, I want to try to give you an idea of what we could expect from our most complex system of the season so far, and what impacts we'll experience tomorrow morning.

Temps will slowly drop over night, but not by much. We should get to the mid 20s before temps slowly rebound as warm air rushes in aloft. Snow should start in Central Ohio around midnight, with light to moderate snow rates. By 3-4am snow will become pretty heavy at times. As of now I don't think we'll get above freezing anywhere in Central Ohio. That means if it doesn't snow, it'll be a sleet or freezing rain mix at times. At no point should be switch over to all rain above freezing.

If at any point an area unexpectedly changes over to sleet or freezing rain, our snow totals will drop. Maybe steeply. For every hour of sleet or freezing rain, we could be losing 1-2" of snow from possible totals.

That being said, here's what I think we'll see for totals in Central Ohio:

The pink area is what I expect for ice accumulation, south of the pink line specifically. In that area, I think we could actually even see less snow than I have posted, it all depends how intense the snow is in the beginning.

I usually don't post two inch ranges like I have here, but this storm is still hard to pin down.

By the way, Winter Storm Warnings have now been posted south of I-71. This doesn't mean the heavier snow will fall south, but because the criteria is bigger for areas north. All along I-71 we should see the same amount of snow, but different criteria means different advisories.

Expect absolutely awful driving conditions in the morning, especially with snow still falling near the beginning of rush hour. Areas south of US22 could be really ugly. Ice would make traveling unbearable.

If we see any changes in track I'll post again later.

Active But Fast Pattern

Last night began the first of many disturbances we'll see over the next couple weeks. We only saw about a half an inch, but it was enough to cause some school delays this morning.

I think tonight's showers will be more of the same. Perhaps a half an inch, a lot of slick spots with extra cold temperatures, and I wouldn't be surprised if we see some more school delays in the morning.

For a few days the real show has been with Wednesday's storm. We're looking at a southern low that has the potential to give us the kind of decent snow we haven't seen all winter. The potential. Not saying it absolutely will happen, but this setup is a very moist one.

This low will come from Louisiana in to a cold airmass, with a strong southern flow from the Gulf:

What does that mean? Lots of Gulf moisture and over riding warmth. The setup is there for ice, snow, rain... all? Some?

It's the typical southern low. The margin for error for snow accumulations or even ice is so narrow, we could take a guess at it tonight but I just don't think it's worth it.

Here's now the Euro looks for Wednesday morning which pretty much tells the story:

I can't even tell you how textbook this looks right now. Probably every southern low has had this model signature at some point in its maturity. Our typical I-71 benchmark for snow/ice, which would normally put the area just north of I-71 in the high snowfall zone. That's how it looks for now. I think this storm has the potential to overachieve, as this is the first time this winter I've seen a storm tap in to the Gulf quite like this with a decent High over the Atlantic.

However... does this surge of warmth and moisture lead to a rainier scenario? I'm not ready to make that call until tomorrow!

Snowy Super Bowl Sunday

Greetings from NYC! I just have time for a very breif post about our snowy Sunday coming up, so pardon the brevity.

We should actually see two rounds of snow Sunday. First in the early morning hours a rain snow mix will start before changing over to all snow by daybreak. Then after a break in the early afternoon, more snow will filter in as the second wave of our northwest flow quickly comes in:

The first round should drop about an inch, which round two may bring another half an inch or more. This shouldn't be a giant storm, but with people out and about for the Super Bowl, there could be some travel concerns. Luckily this all gets out of here by Monday morning rush hour.

I think our Wednesday storm is the one we really need to keep an eye on after this thing clears out tomorrow. I'll definitely be posting more about that once I get back home. I'll be driving through all this mess tomorrow, so hopefully Pennsylvania road crews are on their game.