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So we look ahead to the Winter of 2012-2013 for YYZ (My favorite RUSH song) and see how this will play out for the snow lovers of Southern Ontario. It has potential but a few things have to fall into place to get some decent snow for the rest of January and February.

The NAO or North Atlantic Oscillation is simply a "blocking" pattern that allows for cold air to slow down and allows LOW pressure to form off the coast and has time to explode into snowstorms.

It's basically the traffic cop of weather. Slow the pattern down and the odds of a juiced up system getting into the Eastern Part of the U.S. and even Southern Ontario starts to increase. Negative NAO = More storm chances east of the Mississippi River.

Put the NAO and AO in sync and a nice dose of El Nino moisture and you lean toward an above average winter in East and in the Rocky Mountain Region. Could it be like 2009-2010 or 2002-2003 ? Maybe but we are just too early in the game to look at that yet.

We feel 65% confident that we'll see a weak to moderate El Nino and for snow lovers this is a "good" thing.

The Positive Phase could mean colder temps for the Rockies and PacWest. Negative Phase means warmer waters near the Gulf of Alaska and that could mean wetter and warmer storms for the Rockies.