NY NJ PA Weather Forecasts

The January Outlook

7:40 PM

December has come and gone along with all the holiday cheer, it’s time to look to see what the rest of January holds for the forecast area.  Will the negative NAO be a major factor?  Will the Pacific get back into the game or will January be a warm and boring month?

The basic idea of behind January is that the upper atmosphere will be in a state of flux from one type of amplification to another. 

The influence of the strong negative NAO block that is in place currently will begin to weaken, but will still be present through the first half of January.  The negative NAO block though will be weakening as the Pacific begins to become favorable for winter events, so I think the potential for several significant winter events will be hindered by the timing of the Pacific and Atlantic patterns. 

Lets start at top once again and examine the situation.  The stratosphere overall has slipped back down to a level of slightly below normal.  We still are not any where near the extreme cold seen at 30 MB from last year, which means that the placement of the anomalies are still very much important.  Currently, the coldest anomalies continue to be centered over the North Pole and over northern Asia, which hints at the warmest tropospheric temperatures at the higher latitudes over Asia and not North America.  The position of the stratospheric anomalies also suggest support for a returning negative EPO for the last three weeks of January along with a waning negative NAO signature.

Meanwhile, sea surface temperatures in the Pacific and Atlantic are starting to show a similar story as the stratospheric anomalies.  The warming of the Pacific waters around Alaska over the past 30 days strongly supports a return of the negative EPO.  Meanwhile, the Atlantic SST simply do not support a prolonged negative NAO pattern.  So here is how January should break down.

The first week of January is going to feature the breaking down of the strong negative NAO block that is in place.  The models are being a bit aggressive in the break down, but I think the overall pattern of the negative NAO will still be present until the middle of the second week of January or say about January 15th.  Meanwhile, the Pacific will continue to improve.  The upper low over Alaska will break down into two pieces of energy.  One piece will slide towards central Canada to enhance the upper low developing over Canada and the other will slide to the southwest of Alaska, which will enhance a building ridge over the western coast of North America.  The negative EPO pattern will return towards the end of the negative NAO period, which means that a high potential for a winter storm will exist around the second weekend of this month.  Model guidance is already strongly hinting at the potential of two winter storms impacting the forecast area.  Whether these storms produce snow, ice, or rain will have to depend on the position of upper level features at the given time, but the point is that we will be in a stormy pattern through the middle of the month.

The third week of January strongly reminds me of the second week of December as a large ridge dominates Alaska, a strong upper low sits over central Canada, and a positive NAO signature can be expected over the Atlantic.  There is potential for a brief 50/50 low developing via a strong clipper, but the overall idea here is that the second half of January will be cold and dry up through the middle of the last week of the month.  The overall storm track will basically be of fast moving northern branch disturbances moving from western Canada through the Ohio Valley and off the Mid Atlantic coast.  Unless one of these clippers happens to intensify rapidly, I don’t see this period as being a good heavy snowfall period for the region.  Cold yes, but not snowy or stormy.

The last few days of January I think will trend warm as the negative EPO pattern relaxes and (at this time) there is little support for a negative NAO to rebuild.  As such, the last few days of January will likely be warm as a trough digs over the Rockies and a ridge begins to build over the Southeast and eventually into the Mid Atlantic. 

That’s how I see January as of now.  The potential is there for some stormy conditions mid month, which may lead to some good snow potential.  However, much like any winter, timing and interaction of the various upper level components will be key in determining the impact of individual storms.

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