Sunday January 24 2021 Forecast (7:27AM)

49 Comments

DAYS 1-5 (JANUARY 24-28)

It may not be pure arctic air, but after a mild January up until a couple days ago, it feels pretty cold this weekend, and the wind is making it feel more harsh. At least we’ll have a day of bright sunshine today, sun that you are probably starting to notice rising a touch earlier, setting a little later, and climbing just a little higher into the sky each noontime. The weather lore says “as the days lengthen, the cold strengthens”. This refers to the coldest part of winter, on average, being from later January to the start of February, as we are noticing the sun’s higher angle after the dark days of December and early January are behind us. Well, that weather proverb is not always 100% true, but it often holds a good deal of truth, and this winter it does. We’ll continue to see colder than normal temperatures the next 5 days. But what about snow? This short answer is: no. Although that answer may not be completely accurate either. First, we continue to have high pressure centered to the west of New England and a large low pressure circulation in the Canadian Maritime Provinces as part of the ongoing blocking pattern. This keeps us dry/cold/windy today. The low edges away and the high center shifts a bit to the north Monday allowing the wind to relax. At the same time, low pressure is going to be making a run at the Northeast via the Midwest, but it’s going to run into resistance because the large scale pattern is not going to change enough to allow it to make an unimpeded trip into and through the Northeast. Instead, it gets stretched out and forced south of New England. While computer guidance will give you the idea that a solid area of snow tries to make it into the area, this is very likely an over-representation of what will happen, and we’ll probably see a solid area of cloudiness move in, while the snow falling out of it will be largely evaporating before reaching the ground, but we can’t yet rule out a little bit of that synoptic snow working its way down to the ground level sometime Tuesday night. This would be most likely in southern portions of our area. In addition, we should see enough of a northeast wind by then between high pressure to the north and the low passing to the south into Wednesday that some ocean-effect snow showers may develop and work in from the Gulf of Maine, at least into eastern areas. As we get to Thursday, a follow-up area of low pressure will emerge off the Mid Atlantic Coast. This storm is likely to become much stronger than the one before it, but also be tighter and a little further south, so we will probably never hear from its precipitation shield, but the circulation around this storm working with high pressure to the north may continue the ocean-effect snow shower chance and more wind is likely across the entire region. So while we may not be getting buried in snow any time soon, the feel of winter is definitely here to stay for a while.

TODAY: Sunny morning. A few patchy clouds but still plenty of sun afternoon. Highs 24-31. Wind N-NW 10-20 MPH with higher gusts.

TONIGHT: Mostly clear. Lows 12-19. Wind N-NW 5-15 MPH.

MONDAY: Sun & high clouds. Highs 27-34. Wind NW 5-15 MPH.

MONDAY NIGHT: Variably cloudy. Lows 18-25. Wind N 5-15 MPH.

TUESDAY: Partly sunny morning. Cloudy afternoon. Highs 26-33. Wind N up to 10 MPH.

TUESDAY NIGHT: Mostly cloudy. Some very light to light snow possible favoring southern MA southward. Snow showers possible near eastern coastal areas. Lows 17-24. Wind NE 5-15 MPH.

WEDNESDAY: Mostly cloudy. Snow showers possible, favoring southeastern NH, eastern MA, and RI. Highs 27-34. Wind NE 10-20 MPH.

WEDNESDAY NIGHT: Mostly cloudy. Snow showers possible, favoring southeastern NH, eastern MA, and RI. Lows 17-24. Wind NE 5-15 MPH, higher gusts.

THURSDAY: Mostly cloudy to partly sunny. Additional snow showers possible favoring Cape Cod. Highs 25-32. Wind NE to N 15-25 MPH.

DAYS 6-10 (JANUARY 29 – FEBRUARY 2)

Low pressure to the east & high pressure to the west results in dry/windy/cold weather January 29 then high pressure moves in with dry but more tranquil weather January 30. Next window to watch for potential low pressure impact is January 31-February 2. A shifting of upper level features may allow a better chance that the next system gets into the region instead of being forced to the south.

DAYS 11-15 (FEBRUARY 3-7)

Expecting a weakening of the blocking pattern and as a result somewhat more active weather here with another potential low pressure impact by the middle of this period.

49 thoughts on “Sunday January 24 2021 Forecast (7:27AM)”

  1. Thanks TK!

    Fingers crossed for ocean effect snow showers along our eastern shores. Maybe Boston “doesn’t” tie the record for least January snow?

    0.3” = January 1913
    0.3” = January 2021

  2. Wouldn’t a patten change/relaxing of the block only lead us to be more vulnerable to coastal huggers, inside runners and cutters than coastal snow events?

  5. Good morning and thank you TK.

    Down to 16 this morning, but NOT coldest of the Winter as one day in December we were down to 14.

    A NOTHING Winter so far. And yes, it is cold now, but Nothing
    unusually cold. No big deal whatsoever.

    Rooting for at least some Ocean Effect snow this week. We shall see.

    1. Ocean effect snow is our only hope for now, especially for Boston.

      Logan “might” actually have a better opportunity than you JPD depends on how far westward any snow shield gets.

          1. Sometimes. Wind with moisture coming in from the ocean is lifted up over the buildings. Then there is friction where the wind doesn’t move as well over
            the city and is forced up, which adds to the snow. Hey maybe those are the same.

  6. Thanks, TK.

    At least it sort of feels like winter today. But, overall it’s been a dud. And the chickadees, sparrows, and titmouse know it better than we do. In all my years of observing these birds in winter I’ve never seen them this active. I also saw small blossoms on a number of trees yesterday. Clearly they were premature and will be affected by the cold. Yet, nature knows when a `real’ winter just isn’t in the cards.

    If a SE ridge take shape in February, I do think that we’ll see record temperatures across the region on days that the southwesterly is in play, similar to what we saw in February of 2018. This doesn’t preclude snow or some cold outbreaks. But, without a sustained and ample cold source if you will – namely, parts of Canada that impact us – winter just can’t get going.

    However much I like winter, I’m not a fan of a cold March, especially following a mild January and February. We’ve had this inverted `winter’ for several years now, so it wouldn’t surprise me if it happens this year.

  9. Summary of Winter 2021 so far…
    We’ve seen Bernie Sanders far more than salters & sanders. 😉

      1. Love it. This is fun I think we all needed

        The sweatshirts he had made sold out in a flash. He donated all to a VT food pantry

  11. Thanks, TK

    Cooking done. Need to just make OJ for the grand mimosas. Some munchies also being brought in from a place we are comfortable with, although we still dispose of containers outside and heat all.

    And I am spending the day in my PJs.

  13. Daughter just wrote from London: “There were lots of people (kids + adults!) sledding today. It was really refreshing to share a communal experience again, after so long just living in our own little bubbles. Lots of snowball fights and people out taking pictures and everyone was so happy.”

    It’s unusual for London to get accumulating snow. My daughter lives near Hampstead Health and Waterlow Park. When I was there in August 2019, we walked up one of the hills and I said “this would be a great sledding hill.” To which Lisa responded, “if only we would get snow.”

    Well, they got a little snow, and I can only imagine how happy it made the people feel.

    3. It’s funny you bring up London & snow, because we see London depicted as a snowier place than we’re used to seeing it in Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol” although in the book the specific year is never mentioned. We know that the book having been published in 1843 it obviously envisions the story taking place in the early to mid 1800s, coming out of the Dalton solar minimum and at the end of the “Little Ice Age”, a time where that area saw much more frequent snowfall.

      We know that the sun is a major climate driver, so this makes sense.

  16. No surprise that guidance is over-doing it a little bit with the snowfall. Forecast above stands as is. There is still the chance of some light synoptic snowfall mostly Tuesday night as it looks right now.

    Will continue to monitor for those ocean-effect snow shower chances.

  18. I’m not sure I can handle much more. I also hope the Bills win

    But great games last week and this for TB…..both of them

  19. I love seeing TB do well. Are there actually Pats fans that don’t? Not saying there aren’t, but I’ve seen few if any and really can’t understand why someone would feel that way. You can argue he should’ve left years before he did, as the Pats franchise really did not treat him well at all in his later years here.

    Having lived almost exclusively in the Pats dynasty era, I always wanted to see them win a Super Bowl on my birthday (2/7), which occasionally falls on Super Bowl Sunday. Won’t get the Pats part but maybe the Brady part this year!

    1. There are but I think a lot fewer than those who don’t support him.

      I absolutely agree with your comment about being mistreated. The fun part tonight was watching his long passes. Some were not complete many were, but we all know he struggled with them when with the Pats…..and now with good receivers which he repeatedly asked for…..we know why

      Now to enjoy Allen and his Bills.

      2. Likewise. 🙂
        You already have a bday on the anniversary of a little bitty kind of memorable storm called the Blizzard of ’78. 😉

        1. I hear that was a good one, maybe one that woulda satisfied even some of the toughest customers here 😉

              1. I definitely feel for what happened to all those people on the coast, but as a 10 year old living in one of the snow jackpot zones, what an incredible experience! I’d take that one storm over the 2015 snow blitz weeks over and over.

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