Montgomery County has activated a Hypothermia Alert for extreme cold from 1am to 9am Mon., 11/20. Expect the wind chill to be below 32° it’s suggested to Wear layers if […]
MoCoSnow
The First Weather Alert Team at ABC 7 has released its 2023-2024 Winter Weather forecast, and as just about every other winter outlook so far, they’re predicting higher than average snow for the region. Let’s recap the outlook below:
“Folks living along the I-95 corridor from Washington to Boston, who saw a lack of wintry precipitation last winter, should experience quite the opposite, with lots of rain/sleet and snowstorms to contend with.” With many local weather forecasters projecting higher than average snow, the Farmers’ Almanac Winter Outlook for 2023-2024 seems to fall in line.
As the slightly chilly weekend concludes with a Sunday in the low to mid 50s and mostly sunny skies, a more seasonable to mild week awaits for the area.
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The MoCoSnow team has been recapping Winter Weather Outlooks. So far, Fox 5 was first, stating that it’s likely we get “more snow, more chances for blizzards” in their outlook. NBC Washington was next and expects a “big winter” with lots of snow in their outlook. The Washington Post’s Capital Weather Gang (CWG), a group of that includes meteorologists, forecasters, weather experts, writers, and more, has released its Winter Weather Outlook with more snow projected than we’ve had in the last five years.
Yesterday we took a look at Doug Kammerer’s Winter Weather Outlook map and highlighted a few of the important items he went over on a subsequent Facebook live. Today, we’ll be analyzing the outlook as a whole, as many snow lovers are excited for what could bring a few feet of snow to the area.
Kammerer and Storm Team4 state that “we could see one or two big snowstorms that really make their mark on the winter of 2023-2024.” In our eyes, that means a storm that drops at least six inches across the region, but could also bring snow that’s measured in feet to the area. Since the El Niño patter is expected to bring above average temperatures and an active storm track, plenty of storms will come in the form as rain. The snow will be there when we are dealing with colder temperatures, which is what they expect January and February to bring.
Doug Kammerer of NBC4 has released his winter outlook, which is currently only available on NBC4 newscasts. In the outlook he projects as much as 38-52 inches for places like Frederick and Hagerstown, 30-40 inches for places like Gaithersburg, Leesburg, and Rockville, and 22-30 inches for Bethesda, DC, and Prince George’s County.
Kammerer had some of the lowest snow totals projected for last winter, and provided one of the most accurate outlooks for the 2022-2023 winter. This year, he’s going the other way. In a Facebook Live following a 6:50 presentation of the 2023-2024 Winter Outlook, he stated that “if this sets up correctly, we can see more than predicted.”
The coming week is expected to pick up exactly where this weekend left off, with high temperatures expected to reach the 60s and 70s for most of this week.
Today we are expecting partly sunny skies with temperatures getting into the low/mid 60s in the afternoon. Tuesday is expected reach the low 70s with variable cloudiness, but rain is not expected. Wednesday should be similar to today with temperatures getting into the low/mid 60s in the afternoon with plenty of sunshine. Thursday brings the highest chance of precipitation out of this upcoming stretch of four nice days, but right now it’s only at about 25% and it’s also going to be the warmest day of the bunch, likely reaching the mid 70s.
The National Weather Service has warned of impending cold for the DMV area over the next couple of nights as we leave 80° days behind and head into November. “The coldest weather of the fall thus far is in store over the next couple of nights. We also have our first accumulating snow forecast of the fall in the Allegheny Mountains Tuesday night into Wednesday morning.”
Warmer Friday, Saturday, and Sunday with temperatures in the 60s for November’s first weekend. Featured photo courtesy of the National Weather Service
Earlier this week Tucker Barnes, the Emmy award-winning meteorologist on FOX 5, was named the station’s chief meteorologist. He takes over for Sue Palka, the longtime FOX 5 chief meteorologist and local legend who retired from her weather duties after 36.5 years back in 2022. The announcement was made just before Barnes introduced FOX 5’s 2023-2024 Winter Outlook.
According to FOX 5, Barnes grew up watching the network and joined them in 2003 as an intern. His passion for the weather began at the age of 5, when he began issuing forecasts to his kindergarten class. By his teenage years, he was immersed in hisfavorite subject, offering often highly-inaccurate, long-range forecasts to his own high school class.
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Fox 5 has released its 2023-2024 Winter Weather Outlook forecast and they’re expecting “more snow than an average winter, but big winter events may not arrive until the new year.” The backloaded winter could come with a warm December that brings more rain storms than snow storms, but the chance for 1-3 storms at the 5″+ level later in the winter. The outlook states that we have an “above average chance for a blizzard-level storm.”
The outlook discusses a strong El Niño weather pattern (typically wetter and warmer) that Thomas described as “feast or famine” for our area. Out of eight previous strong El Niño winters, four of them have brought us well-above average snowfall (average snowfall for DC is 13.8″), one has been at about average (13.1″), and three have been well-below average (one at 6.6″ and two with almost no snow at all- .1″ in 72-73 and 97-98). Since 1950, El Niños have brought almost twice as much snow in average than La Niñas have (18.5 inches to 9.5 inches).