February 8- A Winter Storm Warning has been issued for central Maryland, contrasted with A Winter Weather Advisory or Winter Storm Watch in other places. This is a classic example of variety of weather and National Weather Service Offices that cover our area. Please keep in mind that my forecasts are my own, but I like to let you compare to outer sources. All watches and warnings come from the government- aka National Weather Service. It is designed to help, but sometimes can be confusing. I want to clarify what this means, plus give an update on the forecasts model snow cast maps.I am staying with my snow cast, and you can see that map for comparison below.
UPDATE: The Winter Storm Warning was expanded into southern PA.
Winter Storm Warning:
- 10 AM Monday through 6 AM Wednesday.
- Harford, Baltimore (city and county), Anne Arundel, Howard, Carroll, Frederick, and northwestern Montgomery Counties in Maryland.
- Start as rain, changing to moderate snow by midnight. Snow most of Tuesday.
- General 4 to 8 inches of snow (according to NWS). This overlaps with my forecast zones for 3″to 6″ and 5″ to 9″.
Winter Weather Advisory
- Metro Washington and western Maryland.
- General 1 to 3 inches of snow (according NWS). This is close to my zone for 1″ to 3″.
Winter Storm Watch
- Southern Pennsylvania, northern Delmarva, metro Philadelphia.
- This will be upgraded to an Advisory or Warning shortly. These areas are under the National Weather Service Office in State College PA or Mount Holly NJ. It really is just their timing issue. They usually wait until later in their shifts to do their upgrades but adjacent to the Maryland Counties in the Warning can be confusing.
Simulated Radar
Notice the system now displaying what we’ve discussed for a few days: This will start as rain, then turn to snow and develop right on top of us.
GFS Model
Since the HRRR Model only went to early Tuesday morning, here is the GFS Model plots for the rest of the day. The main issue to keep in mind is where the energy sets up with the Deformation Zone. The GFS has the bullseye just north of Baltimore. The moderate to heavy snow is in dark blue. Compare the total to that of the NAM/WRF and Canadian Models below
Snow Totals (From Computer Model Forecast)
Also See: Just The Maps from NWS compared to my forecast
GFS Bullseye north of Baltimore in York PA
Canadian Model has the bullseye northeast of Baltimore between Bel Air and Philadelphia
NAM/WRF Model has the bullseye much smaller and closer to the Phildelphia with almost nothing over Baltimore
My Snowcast
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