Two major storms to affect the eastern US the next 5 days

We have two significant weather systems to watch over the next 5-6 days. The first is a strong area of low pressure which will form in the western Gulf later today and lift north into the Deep South and west of the Appalachians then into the Ohio Valley and interior Northeast. This system will induce heavy rains over the southeast and possibly severe weather tomorrow for the Carolinas and Georgia. There is potential for several inches of snow on the back side of this system in the Missouri Valley and Mississippi River Valley as it lifts north as well.

 

The next system is the potential development of a wave of low pressure as an upper level shortwave trough interacts with a stalled front on Friday and Saturday near the Texas coast with an eventual possible redevelopment off the Carolina coast. This is an interesting event as we will see significant cold air spreading out of the plains to the south and east. It is possible we could see some snow in places far to the south such as eastern Texas and a good deal of Louisiana. Maybe even Houston or New Orleans see flakes in the air? Depending on what model you trust some snow could also spread into Alabama, Mississippi, and Georgia as well as to the Carolinas northward. The 6z GFS showed a very strong storm that brought snows to parts of the interior southeast and then nailed the I-95 corridor from Richmond to Boston with a heavy snow event. Right now I think this run of the GFS is overdone. The ECMWF shows more of a light event mostly for western and central sections of NC, and central and eastern Va as well as the southern Delmarva, with only minimal impact north of this.

 

Right now I favor more of a less amplified system with the main threat being a light to moderate snow event for portions of Georgia, the Carolinas, and Virginia. However, this event is still 4-5 days out so we could trend away to a dry solution or trend towards the 6z GFS, it is just too early to be confident either way. I also think some snow flakes will fly in east Texas and parts of Louisiana, but I am not sure how much yet. The extreme 6z GFS produced a 4-6 inch snow just north of the Houston area. Stay tuned to my column as I will try to, if time permits, update on this system even if it just blurbs, throughout the next several days. And before I could publish this, I saw the 12z GFS which is now less amplified and not as big an event. It does look to bring some snows again to east Texas, and then some light moderate snows from the interior southeast through the Apps to the mid-Atlantic coast. That is a reasonable solution to me. The main problem with this system for the east coast

 

Down the road, confidence is very low in the weather pattern beyond day 10. IT seems to all depend on how a trough plays out in the Northwest US underneath our massive omega block over Alaska. If this trough digs southwest into the Pacific Northwest, all the cold air in Canada will stay there or come down in a modified form into the NW US or the northern plains, and only have a minimal impact further to the east and south. This pattern could also lead to a warmer pattern by mid-month. The other option is that the trough kicks into the plains and we see a massive arctic outbreak into the central US which eventually spread east in the 11-15 day period. Right now the models favor the former more than the latter, but as usual stay tuned.