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Virginia mountains were snow-capped like Western scenes on Monday morning, but some lower, flatter areas got dusted also.
The pattern of snowfall from the first sort of fairly widespread episode of flakiness in Cardinal News’ coverage area of Southwest and Southside Virginia this season late Sunday and early Monday is difficult to describe, geographically. From about Lynchburg to Martinsville and westward, it was mostly higher elevations that turned white, with lower elevations only getting some ice pellets or sloppy wet flakes briefly at the end of an all-day rain, if that. But in the eastern parts of our region, even in some parts of Southside, cold air caught the back of a heavier rain shield for just long enough to turn grass and exposed objects white at some much lower elevations.
For some locations, as much or more snow collected in one night 10 days into December as accumulated in total for every day through the end of March last winter.
Copper Hill in Floyd County more than doubled its snowfall for all of last winter, measuring 2 inches, after getting only 0.8 inch in the 2022-23 winter. Appomattox equaled its snowfall for all of last winter with half an inch.
But while the plopping white flakes in the lights and a little white on the ground (or, at least, the sight of ivory ridgetops on your horizon) may have seemed like a novelty after the last snow-challenged winter, and maybe even a sign that snow is about to become much more frequent in this one, let’s put some brakes to that thought, for the moment.
It probably won’t snow again beyond maybe some mountain flurries between now and at least Christmas.
A strong upper-level flow of air from the Pacific appears poised to flood much of North America with mild air over the next couple of weeks at least.
Meanwhile, winter’s coldest air remains deep and widespread on the other side of the North Pole, in Europe and Asia. You may have seen some news about the large snowstorm in Germany paralyzing Munich’s airport.
A mild pattern does not necessarily mean a lot of highs in the 70s, or that there won’t be any cold fronts that bring a day or two of breezy chill. Most of the next couple of weeks will probably see 50s highs, 60s at times, with some cloudy days staying in the 40s. You’ll often need jackets and sweaters.
But what looks almost certain through at least Christmas is that there won’t be any patterns developing that deliver Arctic air for multiple days of below-normal temperatures or crinkle the jet stream into routes that favor storm systems that would produce widespread snow or ice for our region.
Chances of wintry precipitation during this period are not quite zero – upslope snow showers may happen in the mountains behind cold fronts, a brief as-yet-unseen cold-air damming pattern could catch a little moisture, and there’s always an outside chance of that perfectly timed and located storm system that sweeps moisture into a narrow window of barely cold-enough air. But the chances of anything significant with snow or ice happening before Christmas are thin enough to consider that a white Christmas is almost certainly not in the offing for 2023.
Most long-range modeling and quite a few climate indicators have pointed to a warmer than normal December for some time, so this is not surprising, and doesn’t yet endanger any predictions of eventual cold weather and enhanced chances of wintry precipitation in the winter as a whole. (My prediction for winter was for normal to slightly warmer than normal temperatures this winter, but with enough cold interludes and windows for wet storm systems for slightly above normal snowfall – mostly in January and February.)
But the big question as we move past Christmas into the new year will be whether and when the pattern realigns to bring colder air across the North Pole and into North America, and whether a subtropical branch of the jet stream consistent with many El Niño winters will undercut that.
One factor working against the spread of cold will be the lack of snow cover over North America. This is a chicken-and-egg kind of thing, as milder air prevents snowfall and snow accumulation, and lack of snow cover makes it more difficult for cold air to build over it and expand southward.
But warm Decembers are fairly common in El Niño winters, particularly a stronger El Niño – or the warmer end of equatorial Pacific sea surface temperatures – as this one appears to be becoming. Winters in 1965-66, 1982-83, 1997-98, and 2015-16 are among strong El Niño years that were warmer than normal in December, especially around Christmas, but then produced large winter storms across all or a large section of our region by mid to late January or February.
As we discussed months ago, there are no guarantees with El Niño, just historic tendencies – and that’s before factoring in myriad other climate oscillations and shifting jet stream patterns. So just because these previous years were mild for the holidays and then turned cold and snowy sometime later doesn’t mean this one necessarily will. But lots of long-range modeling has shown a shift to a colder pattern by sometime in January, so for now, we’ll go with the idea that this will happen, eventually.
This Christmas season doesn’t look like one for sledding or building snowmen, but then, only about three in the past 15 years have been something like that in our region. This one may be better for hiking or fishing or maybe even an outdoor cookout if we do get an abnormally warm day or two in the 70s at some point.
The mild spell ahead, even if it’s not a “torch,” as weather geeks sometimes describe much warmer than normal periods, will likely solidify Roanoke’s run for its first year on record to average 60 degrees or more and close out several other sites having a year among the 10 or so warmest on record. The warmth last winter is the chief reason those averages are so high. (Warmer annual and seasonal averages are becoming more frequent regionally, largely linked to a warming global climate, but there still can be significant variability from season to season or within seasons at a regional or local level.)
There is always some chance that we are not seeing something clearly yet that could lead to a faster pattern shift or a storm system that looks like mostly rain now (early next week, for instance) but might become a marginal-temperature wet snowfall for at least part of our region, so I’ll continue to keep my eyes peeled for that. For now, though, expect a buildup to Christmas that is relatively mild and probably lacking in large-scale inclement wintry weather travel problems, not just for our region, but for most of the contiguous 48 states.
Much-needed soaking rain
Snow even in small quantities often steals the attention this time of year, but really, the biggest story from Sunday’s storm system was the widespread soaking rainfall as our region continues in moderate to severe drought.
Widespread rainfall totals of 1-3 inches were observed on Sunday. That isn’t enough to end the drought, but it is certainly helpful.
While lightning and thunder awoke many people with a squall line moving eastward on Sunday morning, Southwest and Southside Virginia were spared severe storms that spawned a deadly tornado outbreak in Tennessee at least one confirmed tornado in Wake County, North Carolina.
The next chance of rain may come as early as the Sunday to Tuesday period next week with a low-pressure system somewhere near the Gulf of Mexico or southeast U.S. coastline. Details on this storm system’s development and movement are fuzzy at this point, and there is a chance it could miss our region out to sea or remain suppressed to the south.
The location and potential track of this storm system would often pose some wintry precipitation risk to our region in mid-December. There appears to be no source of deep cold air for this storm system to feed on, but, as previously noted, it’s worth keeping an eye on whether a just-cold-enough pool of air could develop for some snow or mixed precipitation primarily in higher elevations. At this time, all indications are that any precipitation early next week would be all rain in our region at all elevations.
While the frequency of wet systems seems to be picking up, we are not yet in what would be the common El Niño train of storm systems traversing the southern U.S. toward us, arriving up to twice a week. That’s another thing we’ll be on the watch for developing as 2023 moves into 2024, with or without the arrival of cold air from the other side of the North Pole.
Journalist Kevin Myatt has been writing about weather for 20 years. His weekly column, appearing on Wednesdays, is sponsored by Oakey’s, a family-run, locally owned funeral home with locations throughout the Roanoke Valley.
