Geoboy645

Bare ground, sun, and WAA is always a recipe for an overperformance. Going to make the next 5 days feel that much more brutal.

Say what you will about this winter, but this incoming cold wave is impressive considering the lack of snowpack both here and upstream. As of rn Monday is forecast to be 0 for a high and both Sunday and Monday nights are supposed to be around -10 for a low. That's pretty significant even if it's not historic or anything. We usually only have one or two 0 or below highs a winter, and pretty much all of those have snow and several inches of snow OTG. So pretty unusual. Of course, if we did have anything resembling a snowpack this would be a major if not historic cold wave. Still will be a frigid few days early next week.

Not even the 2021 event? The one that dumped 18" downtown?

Do not envy the LSX mets at all rn. If the storm goes even just a bit S, STL gets a foot plus of snow for one of the few times ever in it's record. If it goes just a bit N, STL gets a crippling ice storm of potentially an inch of ice with wind.

So are we the Commanders or are we the Bears in this scenario?

My top weather events, in chronological order: #1: The 1/6-1/13 snow and subsequent cold period: This one week of snow gave Madison almost 20 inches of snow, including 8.6 on 1/12 and 5.7 on 1/9. Madison had a maximum snow depth of 12 inches, a rare mark for any winter let alone the warmest winter on record. The snow, particularly the 1/12 storm, was incredibly wet and heavy and was an absolute pain to shovel. ANd the pack was so frozen by the cold thereafter that it took a solid 2 weeks to melt with sunny days in the 30s and 40s. If it was a normal winter, that pack would have lasted well into March. The subsequent cold lead to 5 consecutive subzero nights, and one of the deepest winter stretches that I have personally been around for in the last 10 years. Pretty crazy considering it was a strong Nino winter. #2: The 2/8 tornadoes: And less than three weeks later we had one of the most unusual tornado setups in WI history. The day wasn't really all that warm, only in the 50s, and yet somehow there was enough instability to not only get storms, but thanks to some favorable storm interactions a cell dropped multiple tornadoes. Including a 25 mile long sig-tor, in Wisconsin, in February. In a month that previously had no tornadoes recorded ever in the state of WI. And the tornado was a high end 2, and barely missed going through Evansville. Such a strange event to say the least. #3: The warm and dry February and March. February and March were both very warm and dry months relative to the time of year. Madison recorded barely any precip, and had a +10.8 departure for February. And had a +5.1 departure in March. It was genuinely nice out for most of the month, and was capped off by the earliest 70 degree day in Madison's history. Which was then followed by a 73 degree high on 03/03. Easily the nicest weather stretch ever for that time of year, even more than 17 and 12 IMO because of how long it was like that. #4: The 4/2 mix/snowstorm: This one is more Green Bay than Madison, but the 4/2 storm was also an incredibly odd storm. It came up very suddenly, with models only catching on about 48 hrs before the start of precip, and had some pretty major totals forecasted with up to 12 inches of snow forecasted for the city at one point. While these totals did not come to pass, it was an incredibly close call and one of the rare times where terrain played a role in accumulation in Wisconsin. In Green Bay along the river, there was maybe 3-4" of snow. But on top of the Ledge and the Appleton moraine, there was easily 8+" of snow in spots. The warm ground, plus some very low-level marine influence from the Bay led to most of the snow in the Fox valley switching over to sleet. Was a wake-up call after the previously mentioned warm and dry February/March. #5: The 5/21 severe storms: Back home around Madison, we got hit hard locally by the severe storms on 5/21. MKX issued 42 severe warnings and 13 tornado warnings for their CWA for the event. The environment that afternoon was highly conducive for supercells along the warm front, and the only reason we did not have an outbreak along the warm front that afternoon was a deck of stratus to the N of the front that did not move out as quickly as modeled. Forcing the warm front further S and capping it all afternoon with only a couple attempts at initiation. We got very lucky around here considering what happened further W in IA. After the cells from IA congealed into a line, they rapidly advanced into the area. The first round of cells had some significant wind develop with them prompting a PDS severe warning at one point for Dane, Lafayette, and Green counties. This line also had several broad areas of rotation, leading to an absolute mess of tornado warnings. While the main show was happening to the S, we had a downburst move up from the S through my area. This downburst easily had 60-70mph winds, and the winds from the SW meant no terrain protection unlike our usual NW or W winds during squall lines. This led to several trees down in the area, including a particularly bad area right off the lake where going by tree damage, they may have had up to 80-85 mph winds. To add insult to injury, about 30 mins after the winds came through, a second cell developed and came through with at least quarter if not ping-pong sized hail for about 2 mins. Between these two events, the rest of the summer was busy with contractors through the area fixing roofs and siding. Oh, and we also got 4" of rain which ended up becoming a common theme the following two months. This rain was very poorly timed for farmers in the area, as it was just after planting but before emergence. During this period of time, if you get a heavy enough rain you can have something called bedpanning where essentially the soil becomes very hard from the erosion of the heavy rain and it becomes much harder for plants to emerge. There were several fields in the area that ended up not really emerging all that well because of this phenomenon, as well as the river and marsh flooding that resulted from this first round of heavy rain. This is long enough so I will put #6-10 in another post.

With the New Year here and final climactic data in for 2024 in, I figured it would be a good time to make the 2024 year in review thread.

Yeah it's kind of annoying that whenever cold and snow happens, everyone brings up the trio of late 70s winters and then 13-14/14-15 and that's pretty much it. Like we have had so many other cold and snowy stretches in the intervening and subsequent years that are just not talked about. We had several major snowpack and cold winters in the 80s with stretches that tied or beat the late 70s winters such as Dec 83, Jan 85, and Dec 89. The 90s had 92-93, 93-94, and 95-96 which were all all-time winters in parts of the forum. The 94 and 96 cold waves literally set state records that still stand to this day. And recently, 18-19 had one of the most intense second halves of the winter ever with snow and had the coldest period since the mid 90s. And 20-21 literally was the largest cumulative snowdepth (not just one storm like GHD I) since 1979 for large areas of N IL, IA, and S WI. And yes 76-77 was the ultimate tundra winter for the midwest. The infamous Jan had a max snow depth of ...4 inches at Madison. And 8.7 inches of which the max snow was 1.6 for the entire month. Which is incredible for just how cold the temps got that month.

Well the clipper that passed through today dropped a localized band of 1-3" across the area. Nothing crazy, but combined with the snow from last Thursday, we should have enough of a snowpack to get a White Christmas this year. Unfortunately it's going to all melt later in the week with the incoming 40s, but at least it actually lasted to Christmas and didn't melt right beforehand like previous years.

So we ended up well overperforming with the clipper yesterday here. At home Id say we got about 7" here. It actually looks like December outside for once. This is the first time it has looked like this out on Dec 20th in many years. And our first significant clipper since at least 21 if not earlier. Too bad it's supposed to get warm before Christmas, because this would be a perfect snowpack for the holiday. Although we do have enough that we should have at least some OTG for the holiday.

This is looking to be a pretty significant clipper event for the northern areas of the subforum. Even down here we could get 3-5" of snow from this thing tomorrow into Friday. Our first real significant snow event of the year, and our first significant clipper in a long long time.

Meanwhile, back to our regularly scheduled December programming. Guess it'll be yet another Christmas in the 40s/50s for the Midwest with that look.

Yeah if we could do this flurry/mood flake pattern with actual snow OTG over Christmas Eve/Day that would be great.

Yeah it's been flurries since like 11 here from that plume. We have actually accumulated a dusting from it, which is cool I guess. This happens a few times a winter here with the right conditions. Iirc a few years ago we had a sustained stretch with more favorable conditions and we actually got like an inch of just power plant effect snow.

In other news, the rain and snow the last week here has bumped 2024 up to #4 all time for precip at Madison with 47.23 inches. The only years ahead of 2024 at this point are 1884, 2018, and 1881 with 49.19, 50.64, and 52.91 inches respectively. I think we can surpass 1884, and mayyybe 2018 if we get a QPF bomb at some point in the next month. I don't think we reach 1881 at this point unless something very strange happens, especially with the incoming cold/dry NW pattern. Although, at least yesterday we continued the overperformance streak at least further to the east. An area of Dodge County from Beaver Dam Eward got 6" of snow, which is definitely an overperformance. It'll be interesting if the streak continues as we start winter here.