Kevin Myatt

Latest entries from the Weather Journal blog

• Weather Journal taking a long break
• Yes, there's still an Atlantic tropical season going on
• Freezing temperatures likely tonight

About Kevin

Kevin Myatt grew up in Arkansas to the tune of tornado sirens and the rhythm of hailstones, aspiring to be a meteorologist before his studies and career were turned to journalism instead. Though he often chases storms, he prefers living in the cooler, more tranquil weather of the Blue Ridge. He moved to Roanoke in 1999 to take a job on the copy desk of The Roanoke Times; writing headlines and editing copy is his principal work for the newspaper today.

Each May, Kevin assists Pulaski County High School / Virginia Tech meteorology instructor Dave Carroll in leading college and high school students to the Plains to observe severe weather firsthand. The accounts of many of his storm chases can be found here on the storm chasing page of his weather blog on roanoke.com.

Kevin was an editor for "Hurricanes and the Middle Atlantic States," a book written by D.C.-area weather enthusiast Rick Schwartz and published by Blue Diamond Books that documents hurricanes striking the mid-Atlantic states since colonial times.

The Weather Journal column began in 2003 and appears on Friday's Virginia section front in The Roanoke Times. The Weather Journal blog began in 2006 and follows weather day-by-day between the larger columns.

Complex storm system could end the snow dearth

There's no better way to celebrate the beginning of meteorological spring and the end of a winter without widespread snowfall than trying to outguess a complicated winter storm that has at least some chance of ending Roanoke's snow dearth.

Meteorologists don't wait for the vernal equinox to start spring they start it about three weeks earlier, declaring March 1 the start of spring, for statistical convenience.

As the calendar flips from Feb. 28 to March 1 overnight Saturday into early Sunday, a complex storm system is likely to be affecting Southwest Virginia, and much of the southern and eastern United States.

It's so complex that there may not be a really good idea of what it's going to do until it's already under way, but here's a short and dirty version of what may happen.

While there are many moving parts to the developing storm, the centerpiece is a strong upper-level low that will be moving east-southeastward across the South.

This powerful swirl of cold winds aloft will, first, pull up Gulf of Mexico moisture ahead of it Saturday. Widespread rain is expected across the area Saturday as a result. With rain also expected today with a cold frontal passage, it looks at least as if there will be some drought help this weekend.

The first question is how quickly cold air will leak in from the north during the day Saturday. As cold air spreads southward, the rain will begin to change to sleet and snow. Higher elevations and locations north and northwest of Roanoke have the best chance of seeing significant snow Saturday, mainly overnight.

But the bigger question is what will happen to the upper-level low itself.

The low is likely to contain so much wind energy that it will eventually close off, or spin so rapidly that it becomes a swirling entity largely disconnected from the steering winds aloft.

This would slow the system down dramatically, and possibly trigger a strong surface low pressure system somewhere over the Southeast.

Various scenarios exist at that point.

The surface low might be fairly weak and get bumped out to sea, while the upper-level low spins aimlessly over the Southeast. If that happens, we might get only brushed with light rain or snow Sunday while somewhere to our south, such as Alabama, Georgia or the Carolinas, gets buried by heavy wet snow.

Conceivably, Roanoke could see the first round of snow affect areas to the north while the second batch Sunday goes south. Star City snow fans would find that a particularly cruel twist at the end of a long and disappointing winter, but it would be an appropriate ending.

But another possibility is that the upper-level low and surface low will ride together up the East Coast, the upper-level low somewhat inland.

Depending on the exact track of the systems, this development would create the possibility of widespread, and possibly heavy, snow.

Long term, it appears likely that milder weather is still on the way, and this coming cold shot for a few days is only a blip. So I think it is likely that this is the very last chance at a true winter storm in 2008-09.

It certainly looks like this very odd winter may be headed for an interesting conclusion, whether that ending is a big snow or yet another big miss.