First Alert Weather In-Depth: Atmospheric models and snow

ROCHESTER, N.Y. (WHEC) — The News10NBC First Alert Weather Team has been talking about computer models Tuesday.

The models are just a simulation of what the atmosphere is going to look like for the future. It is not an actuality.

The weather team knows these computer models very well. There is the European model. That is the one that we reference on a regular basis. We also have the American model and it is highly reliable. We call it the GFS and this is a very specific element we are measuring such as snowfall. As we go out in time on Thursday and Friday you will notice how the measurement changes. They will vary in terms of the start time or how heavy the snow is going to be.

So the team took a look at the computer models showing the total amount of snowfall and was actually pretty surprised at how close they are in terms of the total snowfall going through Thursday night and Friday morning.

The GFS is trending more to the south with the steadier snow, suggesting the heaviest snow will stay to the south of us as we go through the end of the week.

Then we can also look at the specific pinpoint of just Rochester on that map. At 8 o’clock Thursday morning, the computer model shows about 2 1/2 inches of snow on the ground. So the snow accumulation will get off to a slow start, but the snow is going to pick up as we go through the afternoon. So maybe six, seven or eight inches of snow on the ground towards the end of the afternoon on Thursday.

We can show you all of these different fancy computers models, but we know what it really comes down to is how does this impact you and your travel.

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