I've been posting these thoughts on the upcoming winter just about every week or so for the last couple of months. I've been trying to keep you up-to-date on how the pattern is evolving heading into the upcoming winter. Let me know if you like how I went about doing it, And what else you think I could do in the future to make it better.
This is likely going to be my last post on how I think this upcoming winter is generally going to unfold. I will touch on the areas that have been changing slightly that I think are important. I will also place at the end of the post details on how I think the individual parts of our region are going to generally fair. Including the general temperature profiles as well as impacts of the predominant storm tracks and how I think those are going to impact various parts of our region, including an overall feel of the snow amount possibilities for various parts of the region.
Remember seasonal forecast and outlooks can't really show any exact details on what's going to happen week to week. But they do show how the overall pattern looks to unfold. In past outlooks I have gone into perhaps too much detail as far as temperature profiles and how snowfall amounts broke down for several parts of the Northeast and northern Middle Atlantic. Looking back I think that added and caused more confusion than was intended when people were reading the outlooks. So this time I'm going to try to keep things more general.
Snowfall and Arctic ice extent
The snow extinct over Siberia had been growing at a very quick rate. But over the last 7-10 days The snow extent has slowed way down. Where there's snow in Siberia it is very deep. So there's plenty of cold air locked up over Siberia. The snow extent in the Northwest Territories of Canada is more spotty than it was at this time last year. We still have time to see if the snow extent grows at a quicker pace and moves into the areas that are lacking.
Arctic sea ice extent had been growing quickly over the Arctic Ocean and extends down very close to the north shore of Alaska. But the Bering Strait remains ice free. The ice extent north of Alaska is much further south than we saw last year at this time. Looking at the ice extent in the Chukchi Sea near Russia and into the Bering Strait it's looking about the same as it did at this time last year. Until we can get the ice bridge to build between Russia and North America; the cold air that is bottled up over Siberia will have a tougher time moving into Alaska and into the Northwest Territories and eventually into the United States.
Looking at ice extent on the Atlantic side. There is virtually no arctic sea ice. If that remains the case going forward the polar vortex is going to be very weak this year.
Long range anomalies and what it could mean!
Looking at the ECMWF long range temperature anomalies over North America. We can see the low pressure that is in the Northeast Pacific and low pressure sitting over the Southeast US. This is a result of the evolving winter pattern. This setup means we have the jet stream looping up into Alaska over into the Northwest Territories, then it dives down into the northern Rockies and Plains, then heads east ending up arching back up over the Southeast US and exiting over the Middle Atlantic region.
This is looking out 10-14 days, So we will have to see if it verifies. If it does we could be talking about the possibility of some kind of snowstorm in the Northeast around November 10 to around November 14. But that's not really the point I'm trying to make. This pattern that is setting up is a result of what's going on in the Pacific Ocean. I've been talking about the impacts of these teleconnection patterns for months And I believe this pattern is going to be persistent as we move through winter 2025/2026. And I think it's going to set up the predominant storm track pattern; that I will go into greater detail about later in this post.
Sea surface temperatures (SST)
We can see the SSTs in the North Pacific are still well above average. I have talked about this area of the pacific a lot (Perhaps too much) and how it's going to impact the jet stream and the overall pattern for the winter. I still think this is going to be the prime driver for the overall winter time pattern.
La Nina:
As I said this will increase the odds of a weaker polar vortex, more in the way of high latitude blocking. Along with increased odds of Stratospheric warming events.
Miller B Nor'easters are going to be one of the predominant types of storms we see this winter or at least for the first 2⁄3 of the winter. We might not see any Miller A type Nor'easters during the entire winter. But if we do it would most likely be towards the end of the winter when the La Nina is reverting back to a neutral ENSO state.
Generally what can we expect for winter 2025/2026.
For this winter we are going to be dealing with a weak La Nina. This means it won't have a lot of influence on our weather over the winter. So other teleconnections like the PNA, QBO , NAO and Arctic oscillation (AO) will be in the driver's seat and overall being a major factor in how the winter will unfold.
The setup that looks to be developing supports the idea that the Northeast and northern Middle Atlantic will generally be north of the primary storm track this winter. If you're a cold and snow lover this is a good thing. As this would place us on the colder side of the storm track, increasing the odds for more snow events.
The vast majority of Pennsylvania and much of Maryland and Delaware. As well as New Jersey the eastern half of New York State and all of New England. Can expect temperatures to generally be average to below average. Generally precipitation will end up above average over the winter. Y'all can expect at least some snowstorms that are significant, while other events will range from smaller snow storms. But depending on the amount of cold air in place and the individual storm tracks, there will be the chance for mix and ice and possibly even rain events at times
For southern Maryland, southern Delaware, far southern New Jersey, Delmarva and the rest of the Middle Atlantic region, y'all will be close to or on the warm side of the storm track. So your overall temperatures look to be average to above average. Due to this you look to see above average precipitation through the winter; with a predominance of your storms being either rain or mix events, along with a chance for more than a few thunderstorms.
A general breakdown for the major cities along and near the I-95 corridor.
Washington DC, Baltimore over to Atlantic city look to be under the main storm track. As the storms evolve and redevelop along the coast, y'all could end up dealing with a lot of warm air mixing into this region. This would mean you would see a lot of mixed events That result in the possibility of little snowfall. Generally You should see around average temperatures with average to below average snowfall.
For Philadelphia, Newark, New York City, Providence up through Boston. This area should end up with some mixed events, But you will have a greater chance for snow events as well, some of these snow events could be significant. This area also looks to see generally average temperatures, with average to above average snowfall being a good possibility.
What about the rest of the region?
Lake effect snow is looking like it could be a big deal this year in the snowbelts. Overall this area should see below average temperatures. Last winter saw well above average to record snowfall amounts across many areas downwind of Lake Ontario and Lake Erie. Winter 2025/2026 looks to be more of the same, with Northwest Pennsylvania, Western half of New York State into northern New York State seeing well above average to in some cases epic snow amounts throughout this winter.
The bottom line is, while this winter won't end up being historic for much of the Northeast and Middle Atlantic. There is a lot of potential in the pattern to end up with a generally decent winter across a large part of the region.
That's it please tell me what you think and how you feel my approach went involving winter 2025/2026.
