(12-11-10) Dry Slot Now Visible

| Saturday, December 11, 2010
As predicted by the models I discussed earlier, a nice dry slot is setting up behind the cold front. A dry slot is a pocket of relatively low moisture in the atmosphere caused by a low sucking in cold air from Canada. This can be seen clearly in the water vapor image below. I've placed a Low on the spot where the low currently sits. The white images you see are not clouds, but rather water vapor in the atmosphere. Water vapor in large quantitites is needed to form any significant weather system. The brighter the white, the more the vapor is present. You can see that this system is bright white along the cold front and the Low. But you can also see a darker swath of air coming into the center of the low pressure. This represents the absense of moisture.

Lows move in a counter-clockwise direction and essentially its sucking down cold, dry air from Canada into this low. This is partly why the cold front will be so impressive, bringing significantly colder temperatures to our area once it passes. This is the dry slot I've been talking about. This can also be seen by looking at the radar image below. Rain is only infront of the cold front and none behind.

What does this mean for us? It means that we shouldn't get much in the way of snow accumulation overnight once the front passes. I expect we will see some, but it won't be much and this will drastically cut down on our totals.






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