The Year Without A Winter...Warming Up into February

After some thunderstorms tonight and early Friday, we'll clear out in the Southeast for theWeekend, with a couple of cooler days (but still above normal). Next week we begin a warmup and drying out period. If you're wondering where the cold and snow is, you have to look to Alaska and Siberia. Most of the United States continues to be warm with snowfall well below normal, and we're about to get even warmer entering February.  This turning out to be one of the warmest Winters in a decade, and possibly a top 5 warmest overall for the mainland United States in over 100 years, with no end in sight.  If we get through mid February and still see no signs of Winter or cold air, it will be very unlikely that any cold air coming into the Southeast would be cold enough to produce snow. Instead, late February and March could be cold, and possibly rainy. However anything is possible in March and there are years where even in March parts of the South and east had big cold waves and snow, but that's the exception rather than the rule.  I do think that the longer we go without cold air, the worse the Spring will feel.

Day 10 map, valid Feb 5.  Blues and purple are cold air, greens and yellows warm air.

Speaking of Spring, with all the warmth and wet weather lately, and now the increasing sun angle, look for plants that usually wait to bloom in March, begin their opening up period. Next week could see daffodils, irises, azaleas, bradfords, cherries and other trees opening up way ahead of schedule.  For western NC I've never seen a snowless Winter, but so far nothing is in sight to produce any flakes at all. We'll see if history is made.