Just as I was preparing maps for a blog post on the possibility for severe weather in Dixie Alley next weekend, I got a call from my brother Pat in Port Townsend, Washington. Was I aware of the deep low off the northwest coast, he wondered? A local meteorologist named Cliff Mass had been talking about it and posting about it in his blog. Today he opened with the following:

The new high resolution forecasts (4km grid spacing, initialed 4 AM) are in and the potential for a significant coastal wind event remains. Here are two plots of sea level pressure and surface wind speed for 4PM, 10 PM, and 4 AM, starting on Sunday afternoon. A deep low center moves up the coast and sustained winds on the coast are 45-50 kts. Gusts could easily be 15-20 kts higher.

The Sunday 00Z NAM shows a persistent surface low bottoming out at 974 millibars, with some mighty tight isobars there along the coast. All I can think is, dang! There’s a wind machine, if you please. But that’s just for starters. The GFS shows the low deepening to 958 mbs late Tuesday night. By Wednesday, lower pressure is invading much of the west, and the scenario for Friday, Saturday, and Sunday across Dixie Alley begins to shape up.

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That was really what I was going to write about. Please don’t preach to me about long-range models and wishcasting. Of course I know it’s nothing but wishcasting right now. In the middle of January, can you blame me? And anyway, there’s at least some consistency established in depicting a walloping low moving into the Central Plains and then on up toward the Great Lakes. That much looks good.

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But what about moisture and instability? Heck, I don’t know, and right now I don’t care. Give it five days and let’s see what happens. It’s enough at this point to have something to keep an eye on. Here are some 18Z maps to ponder. Click on them to enlarge them.

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