Storm Eunice - Friday 18th February - Wind & Snow Potential

Dazler97 · 15-02-2022 7:14pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118636263#Comment_118636263

Ah don't say that I was hoping for some snow here in carrick on Shannon, I hope your wrong 😔❄️

JanuarySnowstor · 15-02-2022 7:28pm

The big news today is the late development of the storm! It doesn't even exist at 48hours so the timeframe for this to develop is like a 12 hour window. So for now anyway a red (re wind) is gone a solid orange looks favoured for coastal areas.

The other big news is the system races through in a couple of hours so eventhough many could see falling snow it moves off much quicker than what was on offer yesterday..

So in summary a downgrade in both wind and snow but worth watching because its still quite a potent depression!

Pangea · 15-02-2022 8:05pm

The orange warning for Donegal appears to be gone.

pauldry · 15-02-2022 8:05pm

Those snow depth maps are nonsense. They are never right. Maybe a pile of wintry precipitation will fall but only a fraction will stick. I'm afraid I'm a non believer. System will track over the country and won't be as bad as looks now.

Forecast will be like

Now: snow in the North and Central Areas

Tomorrow: some of this will fall as snow in Central and northern areas

Thursday: RAIN with some snow at times also

Thursday night: Outbreaks of rain or sleet with some snowfall mainly over high ground.

I've been stung too many times before.

castletownman · 15-02-2022 8:07pm

Can anyone tell me the likelihood of snow in the south-east, and whether the storm will continue into Saturday? Of course, I have plans on Saturday that I hope aren't disrupted.

Kermit.de.frog · 15-02-2022 8:08pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118636247#Comment_118636247

Don't take kids drugs 🧐

JanuarySnowstor · 15-02-2022 8:09pm

With this on show by the ecm for Friday morning the Met will be wide awake for next 24hours! Minuscules away from something very severe!!

pauldry · 15-02-2022 8:13pm

In fairness these kind of features are unpredictable and dangerous. I doubt this one will be bad in Northwest. More a Central hit to me re any snow but wind could be severe in Northwest like Barra.

pauldry · 15-02-2022 8:22pm

Friday morning

Kermit.de.frog · 15-02-2022 8:27pm

At least RTE will be entertaining over the next day or two

snowgal · 15-02-2022 8:35pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118636347#Comment_118636347

Very true, I feel ashamed, stupid question 🙄 ⛄️

Chris_5339762 · 15-02-2022 9:17pm

This is looking like a vile system for England. Hurricane force winds overland? That won't be fun.

igCorcaigh · 15-02-2022 9:30pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118637022#Comment_118637022

Seems like it could snoop South of us and hit Central/Southern England badly alright.

Chris_5339762 · 15-02-2022 9:34pm

Yeah, I looked again and the Netherlands will be getting an absolute pounding from it if the GFS stays as it is.

esposito · 15-02-2022 10:08pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118637096#Comment_118637096

England to get the hurricane force winds and Ireland to get the snow 😎

mumo3 · 15-02-2022 10:21pm

I always get overly excited when I see Kermit has started a weather thread, means possibility of exciting weather event and dare I say white gold 🥳

Danno · 15-02-2022 10:30pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118637361#Comment_118637361

That would make a rare change!

Another few minutes for the 18Z run to start rolling out. Hold on to your hats!

YanSno · 15-02-2022 10:35pm

ICON 18Z little further south again

JanuarySnowstor · 15-02-2022 10:41pm

Icon doesn't develop the low at all.

We need the low to develop to give decent ppn in order to assist evaporative cooling!!

We need a decent gfs pub run as I'm getting more and more sceptical that the event is slipping away

M.T. Cranium · 15-02-2022 10:52pm

With a range of options on the table, the current forecast should be based on consensus rather than trying to guess which one has the edge. The consensus looks like a track from west Munster to Wicklow and across Wales and the UK midlands. This would suggest some heavy falls of snow on higher terrain in Connacht and Ulster, mixed falls at lower elevations there, a flip from sleet to rain in coastal Leinster, and milder temperatures for the south and southeast leading to mostly rain showers ending up with mixed wintry showers in the colder wrap-around phase.

That is however just the balanced mean of several different possible outcomes. The public will have to be patient as forecasters have only these ten or so models and do not possess powers of precognition. Therefore almost anybody can make a forecast based on the evidence available, there is no "secret model" that "always works" available "only to the pros." Or if there is, they don't use it.

JanuarySnowstor · 15-02-2022 11:01pm

So that's the gfs take this evening!

A significant nudge North again with the snow risk also moving North. This is hurricane force just off the south coast. It only needs a fraction of a change to bring the South Coast into red territory for wind. As ever more rubs needed but for now the downgrades have stopped and things are slowly swinging back to severe!

M.T. Cranium · 15-02-2022 11:02pm

Also just a comment about model performance for about half a dozen actual snowstorms in the eastern U.S., this past two months, there is no clear "winner" or "loser" but the GFS has appeared to be somewhat underperforming, the ECM rated as inconsistent, the ICON was never right when it went off on a tangent, the GEM has probably done best by a slight margin (and this is unusual). The UKMO is not that widely consulted but didn't seem particularly on the ball.

There was one storm that continued to edge further north and west right up to game time and all the models were wrong to some extent. Other storms had a clear pecking order. The North American short-range meso-scale models did well, so perhaps the analogy here would be to consult those models with 24-48 hour time frames and finer grids.

The climatology part of my somewhat double-hemisphered approach says, if Wednesday hits 12-14 and Thursday cools to 5-8 then the most likely "second wave" signal is 7-10 C. You see a lot of those three-day sets in the climate record indicating a certain preference for latitude banding of dropping jet stream two-wave solutions (which are frequent). A very mild to snowstorm three-day sequence is rare although not absent from the records.

JanuarySnowstor · 15-02-2022 11:06pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118637834#Comment_118637834

Coupled with a Winter with almost zero frost all goes against snow sticking. Having said that if the ppn is extremely heavy it would have no choice but to stick and possibly quickly melt afterwards

Monkeynut · 15-02-2022 11:09pm

Will the school's be shut nationwide? I wanna sit on my arse all day watching Netflix. Maybe looking out the window in my warm PJ's drinking cocoa every now and then. Sure the schools haven't shut for over 2 weeks. It's ridiculous. 🤣

But seriously, I'll be at work. Hopefully we get some action. Non devastating, just some nice aul weather to fill some cravings. A little bit of snow is great for moral.

JanuarySnowstor · 15-02-2022 11:14pm

If these charts keep up like what gfs shows the UK Met will certainly see red which could well sway Met Eireann to do similar for coastal areas..

You just can't call it!!

Gonzo · 15-02-2022 11:17pm

The downgrades in terms of snow continue with the pub run and a shift to the north with milder air in general.

The earlier GFS runs had an ice day which was simply never going to happen, not from the Atlantic.

Temperatures now in the 2C to 6C range which is a bit more sensible given that there is several thousand km of sea track involved.

Cold rain for most eastern, southern areas with uppers of around -4 to -6C, very marginal stuff.

Lying snow mostly confined to midland, mid western and northern areas of a few cm but with 10cm+ mainly over higher ground and inland areas.

Looking at the daytime temperatures and the uppers, I don't see how there will be much in the way of lying snow in low lying areas, anything that falls will be melting all the time so it's going to have to be very heavy snow to keep a covering intact. Also add in the fact that the land is far from cold. We've had barely a frost since December so the ground is not in any way cold so conditions are not going to be great for lying snow.

On to tomorrow, tomorrow could be very different again.

Kermit.de.frog · 15-02-2022 11:28pm

Just back to the models for a moment, ICON 18z is really an outlier at this stage with how far south it wants to take this system never mind the depth of the system.

The track is everything here. That's what has to be nailed in the next 24 hours. Relatively minor changes synoptically in the track has big implications for who gets what at more macro levels. This is a complex and fast moving event. Really anywhere in the country should be expecting disruption Friday morning. Not to say it will happen everywhere but it's always better to be wary.

I agree somewhat with @M.T. Cranium but the view on the extent and elevational aspect of snowfall I don't agree with although he acknowledges it's the median, as he observes, he is working off. I think it will be more widespread than that although depending on the track timing comes in to it too. It could be it starts as snow in East Leinster for example, back to rain for a couple of hours, then snow again as it clears. Or it could be snow there throughout.

For the northwest, north midlands, most of Ulster and Connaught at low levels i'd be currently eyeing 10 - 20cm and possibly locally more and that's a decent enough amount. This extends in to Munster as well due to the tight wrap around of the occlusion.

There is so much variability involved it's impossible to be nuanced even at this point really. You can only go on the evidence in the round and intuition.

But we'll see. 😀 Hopefully tomorrow evening we'll have a much more coherent view of the track here across the models.