We of course saw the nasty multiday severe outbreak up the East Coast this week and unfortunately next week could deliver a similar scenario as another large and powerful storm system looks to take a similar track keeping the East Coast initially within the warm, moist and most unstable side.

While the latest run of the GFS doesn’t suggest quite the juicy environment as earlier this week, it does bring backside snow into the Big Cities.

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The colder scenario on it’s rear is back on the models. True arctic air to follow is plausible given the amount of blocking and ongoing strat warming as well as the phase 8 MJO.

The latest GFS sure is impressive with depth of cold which follows that system.

As has been the case throughout the 2015-16 winter, that cold drills south and as quick as it hits, it leaves thanks to another system lifting to the west.

Then as another system pushes into the West Coast, we have a run of strong southerly winds which is likely to present a real taste of spring up the Plains!

The trouble is, the models are having a hell of a time understanding the setup really beyond 5-7 days. Yes there is plenty of mild pushing east but given the level of blocking running up the west side of Canada and hooking over top with Greenland, suggests we need to watch the depth of cold that’s inevitably going to get forced into the East.

As I stated in today’s video, the first couple of systems will lift up to the west and that means rain and warmth initially for the Big Cities but I suspect in particularly that 6-10 day period, the eastern trough deepens with potentially more connection between northern and southern branch with systems eventually tracking SOUTH of DC.

Watch out also as the -NAO may put a negative tilt to the trough.

Check out the GFS op 500mb height anom a week from today, look at the depth of trough south of the Aleutians and strength of ridge from N Atlantic up over Greenland with positive over the top of NA. This promotes a deeper eastern trough than the below suggests and remember this is the same time stamp as the bitter cold over the Northeast shown by the same model above.

The ECMWF is very similar for the time period but there’s less prominence in the ridge up the west coast.

We cannot ignore this below! Strongest strat warming of the entire season. There’s tremendous southward forcing from the arctic south and models often don’t see it properly.

See the video for more.

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