Storm Machine is Beginning to Crank Up

These recent storms are certainly not indicative of what we would consider El Nino storms. However, after a very dry start to winter we will take it.

We have been talking about the possibility of the storm machine finally showing up and we are seeing signs of that.

First, we have another very cold slider type system, dropping out of the north for late Tuesday into Wednesday. Precip amounts for these types of storms are very tough to predict. Here is a look at the forecast for Wednesday:

This will be all snow all the way down to the valley floors. We will probably squeeze out 6 inches and a dusting in the valleys.

We are tracking a much larger storm for Saturday (1/13). The models are in good agreement about this event. This storm has the 2 elements we like to see; cold air from the north, warm and moist air from the south.

What it is lacking is a blocking force to the East which would allow the storm to stall and dump.

We don't want to get too far ahead of ourselves, but we are seeing a pattern change. The Jet will shift more from the south and that will allow a series of storms to come into our area. This type of pattern can lead to copious amounts of precip, although these storms tend to be much warmer.

Here is the forecast for the 19th of January:

Obviously, this is a ways out, but the change in pattern is being picked up by several models.

Finally, here is the precip forecast for the next 2 weeks. Needless to say, this is the best we have seen this winter as the Western Crest could be looking at 10-12 feet of snow.

Stay Tuned ...