Watch out! Nature may let the dogs out over the next 4 weeks. Snow is back in the forecast next week in the form of flurries. The dog above is anonymous, so I just call him the Blizzard dog since that was when the picture was taken. It has been about 9 months now since our blizzard and the memories are as fresh as the picture above. It was poetic justice for all of us snow-lovers that had very little to cheer about for most of the winter of 2006-07.
Speaking of poems, I have gone poetic on you because nobody gets as excited about snow as I do. We are getting ready for a beautiful sunny weekend so despite the Thomas Hood poem above we will have no-worries this weekend, but it is a reminder that things can change in a hurry now that it is November. You can see the sand hill crane in the picture above next to the poem. We have had many reports of these birds migrating to the south over the past couple of weeks. Their loud honks are telling us something like the poem. In November here in Lafayette we have been as warm as 82 and as cold as -5. That is right we have an 87 degree spread in temperatures and these record highs and lows were set in the same year of 1950 which makes it even more impressive. November can be a scary month. The polar jet stream begins to make a move toward our backyards with some winter air masses while there is still plenty of autumn warmth and moisture trying to hang on. This causes a clash to take place in the atmosphere which can bring severe weather ranging from tornadoes to snowstorms. Basically there is no-doubt our atmosphere is revving up for winter.
This morning it certainly felt like winter with temperatures falling into the upper 20s with a heavy frost. It was only our third freeze compared to our average of 7. This time last year we already had 7 freezes as you can see above. This may be a sign of a new pattern trying to set in. The six to ten day outlook put out by the Climate Prediction Center has us in a below average temperature regime it seems like for the first time since the Blizzard of 2007. I do expect the pig ridge to our southeast that has devoured our autumn to no end to finally be supressed here in November and allow a more dominant ridge of high pressure to develop out West. This should detour a powerful Polar jet stream toward us here in the Midwest with cold spells of weather and even some chances of snow. Take a look at the big change.
The October jet stream was in a position we normally see in late August and September bringing us our third warmest October since 1896 and warmest October in 60 years. But do not expect this to continue and you can see why below.
I do expect temperatures to run about 1 degree below average and would not be surprised to see more than the average one inch of snow we normally see in November. I am not ready just yet to call for a big snowstorm, but it is not out of the question. I have another month of above average precipitation. I see us having about 3.5 inches of rain and snow when you melt it all down with the active jet stream helping to lift the air and bring plenty of mid-latitude cyclones our way. I will keep you updated on Live Doppler 18, but for this weekend at least we have no troubles. It will be sunny and beautiful. Make sure to remember to turn your clocks back one hour before going to bed on Saturday night. This will make it much lighter out in the morning when you wake up, but darker in the evening.
Here are your new sunrise/sunset times on Sunday.
I will have more on this tonight on the news, including friendly fronts sweeping through the area. Have a great weekend and GO COLTS!
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