US and Canada Daily Snow
By Joel Gratz, Founding Meteorologist Posted 6 years ago December 25, 2017
Powder headed to the Northwest & Northeast
Summary
Following a brief southern shift in the storm track, which brought deep powder to Utah and northern Colorado leading up to and on Christmas Day, the storm track will once again shift to the north and focus this week’s snowfall on the Northwest, the Northern Rockies, and also in the lake effect areas of the northeast. The long-range outlook for early January shows that the pattern might shift a little bit with cooling along the entire west coast.
Short Term Forecast
The refrain for October, November, and the second half of December has been consistent snow in the Northwest, the Northern Rockies, and cold air with lake effect snow in the Northeast.
This pattern shifted briefly in the days just before and on Christmas. Resorts in northern Utah and northern Colorado caught two storms with 10-30 inches of total powder.
Starting on the day after Christmas, and through at least the end of 2017, we should see the storm track retreat back to its standard position for this season. That means more snow in the Northwest, the Northern Rockies, and in the Northeast.
Here is the forecast for December 26-29.
Looking at the final weekend of 2017, the snow will once again favor the Northwest and the Northeast. While the forecast for the Northwest is more certain, the exact track of the storm moving through the Northeast is much less certain.
Here are two forecasts, made 24-hours apart, for snow during the weekend of December 30-31.
The first forecast.
The second forecast.
Notice that both forecasts agree about the snow in the Northwest, but there is a big disagreement about the snow in the Northeast. Keep your eye on the forecast for your favorite mountain (we have all mountains covered here on OpenSnow), to see how the Northeast storm will shake out.
Extended Forecast
The forecast for early 2018 is still too far away for us to have much certainty in where the deepest snow will fall, so we need to use the five-day forecast for temperature vs average to figure out a signal for where to find the coldest air, and thus perhaps the deepest powder.
During the first five days of 2018, it looks like the Northeast will stay cool, and perhaps an area of storminess will form near the West Coast as well.
Then going deeper in January, it appears that the cold may fade in the east while stormier and colder weather develops along the west coast.
I hope you are having a relaxing and powder-filled holiday season, thanks for reading, and check back for the next US & Canada Daily Snow on Sunday, December 31.
JOEL GRATZ
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About Our Forecaster
Joel Gratz
Founding Meteorologist
Joel Gratz is the Founding Meteorologist of OpenSnow and has lived in Boulder, Colorado since 2003. Before moving to Colorado, he spent his childhood as a (not very fast) ski racer in eastern Pennsylvania.
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