South Of Cloudcroft, NM.
At 5 AM MST This Thursday Morning.
ECMWF 500 MB (18,000') Forecast.
Valid At 5 AM MST Saturday.
Valid At 5 AM MST Monday.
Valid At 5 AM MST Tuesday.
Valid At 11 AM MST Friday.
One Storm Departs - Two More Headed Our Way.
Our current active parade of winter storm after winter storm is set to continue into the middle of next week. Our latest winter storm to dump snow on the state was centered over the center of the nation this morning. Storm number two which will impact mostly the western and northern sections of the state Friday into Sunday. Heavy snow is forecast for parts of the northern mountains and the northeastern plains where a Winter Storm Watch is in effect for Friday into Saturday.
This storm isn't expected to impact our local weather much. Once again southwest to west winds will gust up into the 25-45 mph range locally Friday and Saturday especially over the Sacramento and Guadalupe mountains.
Confusion continues to plague the forecast models in this changing upper air pattern. This morning's run of the Euro or European (ECMWF) model depicts a strong winter storm in the form of a closed low cat the mid-levels of the atmosphere (18,000') centred over central Arizona at sunrise Monday morning. By sunrise Tuesday morning the Euro has the center of the closed mid-level low (18,000' MSL) centered over El Paso. The US GFS model and the Canadian (GEM) models have similar forecast tracks but with less snowfall over the state. The Euro spits out moderate to heavy snowfall over the northern two thirds of the state Monday and Tuesday. Including the Sacramento mountains and the eastern and southeastern sections of the state. This isn't set in stone yet so I do expect to see the models dance around this outcome between now and next Monday. A winter storm sees likely but what will it's exact impacts and where is up in the air for now.
Friday & Saturday's Storm.