Saturday Morning's Weather Discussion - Is This the Pattern Change?

Well, snow lovers, you may get your chance again on Thursday morning. First, it will be beautiful today, but cool, with the high in the middle to upper 40’s. Tomorrow will again be quite nice, with a high in the lower to middle 50’s. Monday the nice weather will continue and it will be quite warm for December, with the high in the upper 50’s and I would not be surprised to see some areas break 60 degrees on Monday if the sun is still out in the afternoon, as the winds will be coming from the Southwest ahead of the cold front. Clouds may start to build, especially late in the day on Monday, as a cold front starts to approach our area. Tuesday will still be quite mild with highs in the middle 50’s ahead of the cold front but there will be showers, as the cold front gets closer to our area. Wednesday the cold front will move through slowly during the day with the showers continuing. In addition, the colder air will start to filter in to our area with temperatures dropping through the day on Wednesday from the upper 40’s in the morning, to the middle 40’s in the afternoon, and the lower 40’s by evening. Then things might (and I repeat might, no guarantees here snow lovers, just possibilities), get interesting on Thursday morning as an upper level disturbance will drop down from Canada and form a wave of low pressure along the front over the Southeastern United States. If this storm does develop along the front, it would ride along the front, moving northeast towards our area, likely remaining to our south and east, which would allow the cold air to remain in place for Thursday morning. By Thursday morning the temperatures are expected to have fallen to the upper 20’s to lower 30’s behind the cold front, so any precipitation that falls would fall in the form of snow across ALL of Northern New Jersey. This is the solution that the European, Japanese, American and United States Navy models are currently showing, and all four models show the potential for a couple of inches of accumulation on Thursday morning. The British and Canadian models however produce a MUCH stronger storm with this disturbance that could produce either rain or snow, and continue this precipitation throughout the day on Thursday. Some of the parallel runs of the American model, run with different parameters than the operational run of the model, also produce a much stronger storm on Thursday, so the potential does exist for this storm to be even stronger than the models are currently showing. There is also the very real possibility that the storm will not form at all, as the models are currently showing and it could miss us to the east, or not form at all. Therefore, I will watch this potential very closely and post at least one update this afternoon, if not more. After this possible storm next Thursday, it will be quite nice but cold on Friday. Then there is the slight chance of snow next Saturday as a storm might form in our area, although it is much too early to tell if that will happen or not, so I introduced just the slight chance of snow into the forecast for next Saturday. Next Sunday and Monday should be quite nice but cold, unless that storm does develop next weekend, which could extend the bad weather into Sunday as well.