The Weekend thru Christmas:
Partly-mostly sunny skies are expected each day through Tuesday. Highs into the 40s for Thursday, cooling down into the 30s behind a dry cold front for Friday, and then back into the 40s for the weekend through Tuesday.
That means nice weather for the holiday weekend through Christmas Day and possibly lasting into the start of Wednesday. The storm track will stay to our south and north through the period.
Wednesday – Thursday Storm:
The first storm that could move in during the last week of December is finally moving into the Short-Term forecast section. The northeast Pacific trough next week is going to try to push into CA as the Pacific jet stream tries to extend into CA. But they will be battling the amplified high-pressure ridge over the West.
The first system continues to look like it will slow, take on a bit of a negative tilt (southerly flow), weaken, and possibly eventually split as it pushes through the Sierra by Wednesday night into Thursday. The latest model runs show less than an inch over the mountain.
The snow levels look to fall to the base pretty fast. With less than an inch of precipitation, we would likely see inches of snow with this storm and not feet. But we’ll take all the snow we can get! We will continue to fine-tune the snowfall forecast as the storm gets closer.
Long-Range Forecast:
The latest model runs continue to show a second system possibly moving in by next Friday night the 29th into Saturday the 30th. This system could encounter the same issues as it looks to weaken and tilt as it moves inland and starts to encounter the western ridge. That could mean another weak-moderate system that brings less than an inch of total precipitation, and snowfall in inches.
The long-range forecast models suggest a break for New Year’s Eve and then disagree on whether or not the next storm could move in on New Year’s Day. We’ll continue to watch the trends on this storm and all the storms that could possibly move through next week.
BA
