Stormy Along East Coast While Wet, Windy & Snowy In Southwest

Written by on October 10, 2013 in United States of America with 0 Comments

The system that ultimately died in the Gulf, has well and truly come to life as a slow moving East Coast troublemaker. The ‘Ghost of Karen’ is a system crawling up the East Coast and is caught within a high pressure system dominating the western Atlantic and eastern half of North America. The stronger heights to the north of the low is helping it tighten and drive copious amounts of moisture into the eastern Carolinas and Mid-Atlantic States. With the strongest of heights to the north, there is nowhere for this low to go and over the next 3 to 4 days, it will continue to batter the East Coast.

This system has already dropped 2-4 inches widely from coastal South Carolina up to southern New Jersey with some reports of over 10 inches falling along the Outer Banks of North Carolina.

Here’s the current setup.

Source: weather.com

Source: weather.com

Here was the scene from Hampton, VA yesterday.

Hampton, VA flooding Via @MartinMMC

Hampton, VA flooding Via @MartinMMC

Here’s Rehoboth Beach, DE this morning. Via Weather Bug.

BWNtkvwIgAEnwlp

As you can see from the below map, heavy rains continue to fall from the NC-VA border up to New York City. Gusts of 30-50 mph have been reported along the coast where there is a constant pounding of big waves and heavy surf action which is causing some miner beach erosion.

Source: weather.com

Source: weather.com

The ECMWF shows the low continuing to batter the Mid-Atlantic through the rest of today.

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

Even by tomorrow, the low remains stuck off the Virginia coast but notice the model shifts the heaviest rains up into North Jersey and Greater NYC.

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

Check out the ECMWF total precip chart for the next 72 hours! It has 5 inches of rain falling over northeast Jersey, Long Island and close to NYC. That could cause urban flooding issues and possibly some issues for Sandy hit areas that continue rebuilding.

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

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The system is going to keep pounding away this weekend but shall loose grip early next week.

Western System Brings Wind, Rain, Snow + Severe Weather To Plains Later Today

The storm out West is raising a ruckus too with strong winds, flooding rain and heavy mountain snowfall including some 2 inches accumulating at the south rim of the Grand Canyon as well as on top Mt Charleston near Las Vegas.

Here’s the ECMWF 500mb chart for later today and notice how deep that trough is all the way into Southern California. There’s tremendous upper level energy rounding the base of that trough.

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

That system will ride northeast bringing heavy snows this afternoon, tonight into tomorrow to the Wasatch Range and Colorado Rockies.

Here was the scene at Bellemont, AZ which is home to the NWS of Flagstaff. They got 1.6 inches. The average first inch isn’t till Thanksgiving.

Bellemont, AZ (Courtesy of NWS Flagstaff)

Bellemont, AZ (Courtesy of NWS Flagstaff)

Here’s a look at the ECMWF total precip over the Southwest through the next 48 hours. Note the model has .75 of an inch between LA and San Diego but the heaviest precip by later today into tomorrow will already be shifting into the Rockies.

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

The SPC has a slight risk out for today over the Plains.

day1otlk_1630

SPC has a 2% risk of a tornado

day1probotlk_1630_torn

As you would expect, there’s a bigger damaging wind threat.

day1probotlk_1630_wind

Graphic from AccuWeather sums the situation up well.

Source: AccuWeather

Source: AccuWeather

By later tomorrow the system will be hammering the same areas that got hit by the epic blizzard only this time it’s heavy rainfall.

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

As you can see from the below chart, the ECMWF prints out a solid 1-3 inches of rain over the same areas hit by between 20-40+ inches of snow so flooding is a concern.

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

As for next week. The Western system heads up into Canada while the ghost of Karen moves out too but the trough carved out by the western system looks set to provide Texas with a good much needed soaking while ANOTHER system crosses the Rockies.

Here’s the ECMWF surface chart by Monday.

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

ECMWF 500mb shows the needs deep trough hooking across the West. This looks to draw somewhat colder air out of Canada and so this one could be more of a snow maker for the Rockies.

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

Here’s the 192 hour snow forecast

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

Finally, once this system slides east and not so much northeast, a deep cold trough is seen diving into the Northern Plains. The below charts are some 10 days away but remember the PNA is trending negative while the NAO goes negative, plus you’ve got the AO returning to negative too. Those three indexes support colder weather diving into the Lower 48 towards the 18-20th.

Here’s the 240 hr ECMWF

500mb

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

Courtesy/Owned by AccuWeather Pro

500mb + 850mb temps

Geopotential3250032hPa32and32Temperature32at3285032hPa_North32America_240

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