Thanksgiving Pattern Change?

Lately, I've been keeping an eye on the consistency of the GFS between the Nov. 24th to Nov. 30th timeframe. So far, the runs have been consistent in showing an outbreak of cold weather around Thanksgiving. The month of November has been everything but what the month of October was. The National Weather Service mentioned that this October was the third coolest October on record and the wettest ever. The pattern for November has been a mild one. In fact, according to the Climate Prediction Center (CPC), next week there will be warm weather over much of the country. The image below gives a graphical depiction of this.


The GFS, while not too good with giving the exact time of a major weather event, does a good job at giving hints of pattern changes. With the current warm up and the morning GFS run continuing to support cold air invading the middle of the country, it will become interesting to see how things will pan out after next week.

It's not important at this time to point out any major storms. However, it is important to note that our current zonal pattern, that has been ushering mild Pacific air into the States, may break in the next couple weeks.

El Nino will be the biggest wildcard in all of this. El Nino has recently gained strength.

This may not necessarily mean that there will be no snow across the middle of the nation or the East Coast. I think that this Winter will experience a split pattern (being active and variable). It will be interesting to see what El Nino does in the next month or so. Models have been showing a decrease in Sea Surface Temperatures (SST) after December which will indicate a stormy second half of this Winter. Only time will tell.