White Christmas...NOT!

As I sit here and tickle these keys with our advent wreath adorning our table, 3 candles afire, traditional Christmas music playing in the background, I too dream of a white Christmas.  However, it seems to not be in the cards; not for this year.  In fact, it might just get quite mild in these parts prior to the arctic opening up on PA.  In fact, a white New Years Day is looking more and more likely.  Remember, living here in the sub-tropics, a white Christmas is climatologically not a very frequent event.  Take a look at this graphic...

If you would've asked me a few days back, I thought the probability was pretty good...over 70% as I believed cold would hold after a healthy snow event for this upcoming weekend.  However, that system will simply progress off the east coast too far south from our area to have much of an impact.  The map below shows the greatest precip for a 3 hour period as per the GFS this weekend...maybe enough to get the ground white...at best!  A few flakes Saturday night is the most likely outcome...but come to think of it, aren't there always a few flakes Saturday night?

But a major...and I do mean major storm will phase and drive warm air up the coastal plain for Christmas Eve into our region...look at this cyclone!

Here's the warmth being advected northward thanks to this massive storm...the map shows temps above normal in degrees F.  I wonder what the heck is happening around Cape Hatteras?

However, the bottom will drop out a few days later with some serious cold coming straight down from the north pole!  Take a look at this!  Note the streamlines!  Now our air will take the scenic route through the Dakotas and MN, but still a real change of air mass for the day after Christmas.

And that serious cold remains until New Years Day...and by the looks of the climatological modeling, as far as the numerical eye can calculate!  So I'm sorry to bring disappointing news as I know many of you like the prospects of having a white Christmas...but if you are a lover of snow, cold and winter wx in general, I believe the weeks following Christmas will not disappoint!  With that said, maybe this song will be appropriate for us this Christmas living here in KMDT; aka the sub-tropics!  Well, maybe a stretch...but...just saying!  Enjoy!

Thanks for reading!

Smitty

AA:  Typical Decemberish weather through the weekend.  Near miss with storm Sat night off to the south.  Not real strong either!  Big storm to our west Tuesday makes Christmas Eve and Day above normal with temps...then the cold is comin' in spades...and hearts...and diamond...and even clubs!