More thoughts for the next few weeks

Last post verified in terms of intensity with a significant outbreak in central Florida which killed 20 people and attracted national news. However, the warm front did not far as north as I expected, which led to a personal bust in location.

Onto the next event which the SPC already has outlined for a risk.
http://www.spc.noaa.gov/products/exper/day4-8/

However, I believe the talk of the event will eventually just be that, talk with no verification. Taking the GFS verbatim, yes it screams major severe wx outbreak. But the GFS isn't too good in terms of verification. Major problem: 1) speed shear which often is associated with strong winter tornadoes is lacking, and 2) strong arctic sfc high across the eastern U.S. The OP GFS does not show this, but the European and the ensembles do. The second issue is by far the bigger one, and IMO will keep this from being a significant event except for fish. Given that the OP GFS has a bias of underdoing cold and warm air advection (specifically in this case CAA associated with an Arctic High that the GFS seems to be underdoing), it can be thrown out.

Of bigger concern for me is a possible event following the one mentioned above. Another shortwave will dive into the CONUS but IMO that will also be moisture starved. It is a possible event after that that is of concern to me. The signals are weak, but after contemplating this for a few weeks, I decided to post my thinking here. Won't go into detail but it seems big events happen after cold outbreaks. But there are a few conditions: first of all, the polar vortex over Hudson Bay has to move out for good. That in itself will be hard to achieve if the Arctic Oscillation (AO) does not rise back to neutral or positive. The ensembles are divided. I'm still researching on synoptic conditions that lead to synoptically-evident setups but there seems to be a subtle correlation.

Up until last weekend, the correlation was weak enough and the ensembles pessimistic enough so that I pretty much forgot about it. Originally I was thinking Feb 10-17 to be the timeframe. I'm going to move that down a week. Again, it's a mere possibility, and the mesoscale is always the key. However, the ensembles seem to be going more gung-ho around the 240-348 hr (yes, very far out!), and if there a synoptic setup in February that is clearly classic enough to support some big fireworks, this in my opinion is it. Longwave in western CONUS, longwave east of Newfoundland, and below normal SLP's across the CONUS are the general signs for synoptically evident event in the cool season months.

One final note - "El Nino rains" may finally begin for SoCal late this weekend after an excruciatingly dry rainy season so far. I'm not paying too much attention to that for now. Possible snowstorm for the NE next week as well.