Noon Update

We’ll get to the weather in a second, but first let’s go ahead and take a look at the January 2012 weather for Toledo, Ohio. The record high for the month of January was 71° set back in 1890 and 1950, and this is followed by the record January low which is -20° set back in 1984. Toledo, your monthly low was only 1° and your monthly high was 58°. This month, Toledo didn’t fair so well with the temperatures, coming up to about 5° above average for the month as a whole. The average high for January 2012 was 37.5°, the average low for this month in 2012 was 23.0° (which is amazingly 9° warmer than the average low we saw in January 2011). The overall mean temperature for this month was 30.2°, which for January 2011 was 21.1°. Toledo didn’t do well with snow during the month; the most snow you got in a single day was 3.0 inches that fell on the 20th, so far this month, you guys only picked up 6.7 inches of snow which is about 5 inches below normal. Now let’s get to some present weather shall we:

Clouds in the region will clear out briefly this afternoon, however they are going to return this evening and we’ll go with off and on clouds in the forecast for this evening. Temperatures are going to be a little tricky as well today, as the clouds are going to keep them cool. Depending on when exactly the clouds roll out will determine if anybody gets above 40° for a high today, but I am expecting that a good majority of the region will get into the lower 40’s briefly this afternoon. Temperatures will fall again tonight, however the clouds will trick things up again. Depending on how early those clouds roll in will determine if the region will get into the lower 30’s tonight or the upper 20’s…maybe in the mid 20’s if the cloud deck isn’t that thick. But for now, generally I am going to give the region as a whole upper 20’s for overnight lows tonight.

Sometimes, following a system from close by, but not being affected by it directly is amusing…just not during the winter time when that system holds snow. Actually, for once this winter, not getting this system is a good thing because if we got it to the full, we’d probably have a flooding issue because of the rain. But we’re going to miss this, however it is going to be a close system…and a rather interesting one to track, here is why: unofficially, we could call it a “precip shield” which is what it sounds like – a blob or precip with a sharp end and start point.

An area of high pressure is moving into Indiana/Ohio this afternoon and this high pressure will dominate the regional weather for a few days – but differently than most high pressures. This area of high pressure will almost “split” for a lack of a better word, and part of it will retreat northward while the other part continues to slide south and east of the region. The retreating portion of the high pressure will interact with a second high pressure tomorrow and Saturday, and the two high pressures will get stronger and they won’t move either. A though this may sound reasonable enough for a simple forecast, it actually gets a bit complicated during this time.

For the past two days, I’ve been watching an upper level trough that slammed into the Rockies yesterday and is producing an upper level low pressure system with its surface low and essentially creating a little bit of a snow storm in the Colorado and Kansas area this afternoon. This low pressure however is going to run into a few problems with the upper level low.The SREF shows it rather nicely. Neither system can advance in its typical direction because of the high pressure and ridge in its way. This means that the dense air with the high pressure will keep the less dense air of the low pressure away. The low pressure, trying to move NE into the region will end up being deflected and forced to ride through Tennessee and Georgia over the weekend.

At the same time this deflection happens, the high pressure in the northern Plains will taunt the region by sliding due southward into the central Plains. The low pressure will basically be too far away to see that influence and it will basically begin to die. However, the low pressure, though way to the south, will have its precip near the region and going in that in the motion. However the fun question this afternoon is actually whether or not the precip will be stopped by the high pressure (or how close the highs’ influence will be for that matter).

For now, things are looking like we’ll remain fairly dry over the weekend, so I am going to start cutting back some of the precip chances a bit more this afternoon. However, that part of the forecast might be out of the way, but there is one spot in the forecast where things get interesting (and a bit tricky to explain).

A very broad trough of low pressure will be over Quebec during the weekend and this trough actually extends its westward side into the Ontario area. Though we are actually not directly under the trough during this time, the ridge of high pressure over the Plains will start to lessen up a bit on Sunday night and slide southward and this is going to allow for a disturbance/area of low pressure to sneak its way in between both the trough and the high. This will quickly race down from Canada and slide through the eastern half of the region in a matter of a few hours. As to how much snow will fall from this, I am not going to put totals on it quite yet because I am not expecting it will be anything that big. However, I might give Erie some snow shower chances during this time, depending on what the 12Z and 18Z charts say today.

So due to the fact that I am not expecting that I will have to change the forecasts a whole lot, my next update will not be until 8.30 p.m. this evening. I will also be revising the forecasts around that time as well if need be. But for now, I am Timmy Albertson and that’s the weather! Keep checking back for updates because I’ll have them for you as always.