WX-MAN's Musings

(Looking for the forecast for the 2007-2008 Winter season? The JET Pinpoint team of meteorologist will release our forecast for Erie and the surrounding Northwest Pennsylvania region in November, until then as I find various winter weather forecasts I will post them in my Winter Forecast Category or you can look on the left sidebar at my 2007-2008 Winter Weather forecast blogroll, Enjoy and if you have any questions you can leave a comment or email me at wxman.com <a.t> gmail.com)

Below is last years forecast….

First of all I want to stress like other long range forecasts, our forecast has its limitations. None of us in the JET Pinpoint Weather Department will claim to be great long range forecasters, but there is a demand and we give it a try.

We look at all the seasonal forecasts we can find, from the National Weather Service to Accuweather, and several others. We also look at the features being discussed in those forecasts. This year it is El Niño, and looking at NOAA’s Winter Weather Forecast they relied very heavily on that, as well as Accuweather did when it comes to temperatures.

The above graphic is more inline with what we are thinking in the JET Pinpoint weather department. This is a map of past Moderate El Niño temperature departures. This is very similar to Accuweather’s Forecast and close to NOAA’s temperature forecast, with the exception is that they bring the warmer than average temperatures farther south and east which includes Northwest Pennsylvania. Our Forecast for temperatures tend to follow the above Moderate El Niño graphic. With more seasonal temperatures.

Whether the forecast says above normal or normal temperatures you will still see the swing in temperatures through the winter. There will be times when we get really cold outbreaks that could last for a week, as well as get very warm temperatures that might make you think winter is over. We see them every year. The last two Januaries we have seen temperatures in the 70s then come crashing down very quickly ahead of a strong cold front.

Here is a look at the current El Niño conditions in the Pacific…

Our outlook for snow weighs heavily on past Moderate El Niño events. The Average snowfall for Erie in any given year is 90″.

Average Snowfall for NW PA:

When you factor in the El Niño years, including all Weak to Strong El Niño’s, we average slightly above average at 95″. So we look back at past years, or analogs. Here are some of the years we looked at because they were mentioned in the Accuweather forecast, 1963-64, 1986-87, 1992-93, 1994-95 and 2002-03. These years have wide variety of Snow Amounts:

• 2002-2003: 143″
• 1994-1995: 53″
• 1992-1993: 108.5″
• 1986-1987: 68.2″
• 1963-1964: 115.9″

As we saw last year analogs can be good but not always right. In general we are forecasting slightly above average when it comes to snowfall. Near 100″ in the Erie area, and 135″ to 190″ in the Snowbelts.
Snowfall Forecast for NW PA 2006-07:

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