CarlislePaWx

Hey Guys...my NWS (weather.gov page) still has me in a Winter Storm Watch issued from 4:26am. I haven't seen anyone mention being in a warning here, but they have to issue the warning at least 12 hours before the start of the event. So, ???

@Itstrainingtime Sorry I didn't get to post my storm totals from yesterday. It actually was pretty interesting in that I had a ton of liquid, none of which was rain, but not that much snow either. Total liquid (melted) was 0.47". Total snow was 0.8". It really was more than that but it kept melting as it was hitting the board. Temp was close to 33 degrees for nearly the whole event except the final hour or so when it rose to 34 and eventually to 35. For being such a wet snow you'd think it would have stuck to everything, but most of the trees had very little stuck on them except the evergreens. The snow to liquid ratio came out to a ridiculous 0.6:1 which I don't think I've ever measured from an all-snow event before!

Quick noon update. Accumulating snow pretty much winding down. Temp up to 34.0. Officially 0.8" on the board.

Best flake size and rates of the entire event right now. I'd say 1/2" / hour rate. Easily have around 0.4" on the board now. Temp still locked at 32.9.

I've had nothing but snow from the start. It's been going back and forth between very light to almost moderate with nice flakes. Grass has a blotchy couple of tenths of white. Some mulch was also picking it up but some wasn't until about 5 minutes ago. Now it is starting to stick everywhere in my backyard including my pavers. The temp has been pretty much locked in at 32.9 degrees. I've got a couple tenths of slushy snow on my board. Well after a short burst it has gone back to very light...lol. Oh, the temp has just dropped to 32.7...(yay).

Nice to have 2 events back to back here in early March. I was concerned about temps late this afternoon when it was still in the low 40's, but then despite the clouds the temp kept on dropping all the way back to almost 32.0. It was just up to 31.1 about 10 minutes ago but suddenly has dropped back to 32.7 now but the dew point is 28 and the wet bulb is 31.1. If the snow starts early enough that will send my temp down to at least 31, or maybe even 30. If rates keep up even moderately so that will prevent the temp from rising above 32 until late morning when the majority of the event will be over. Better yet, the Saturday event really could become something sweet with a nice blast of cold coming in behind it until probably Monday afternoon.

Holding at 62.6 here with CALM winds. The cold air does not appear to be anywhere close to behind the front. The rain is already half way through Pittsburgh but they're still in the upper 50s all the way back to central Ohio. Should be interesting this evening. BTW, my low this morning was 52.2. That would blow away the max min for today if it didn't drop below that by midnight. If the colder air does lag behind the front perhaps temps could still be around 50 even at midnight?

A balmy 64 degrees at 1:00 AM! as I head off to bed. These conditions literally could be a normal night in late June. It does feel nice out there...but it can wait another month while we deal with our upcoming snow chances.

Low this morning was 37.0. Clouds were slow to break all morning with the temp only slowly rising up to the low 50s. Then all of the sudden someone flipped the wind switch on and I had sustained teens gusting to 30. Temp peaked at 75.2 a few hours ago when the sun was out the most. Then the clouds returned to overcast and the temp began to slowly sink, now back down to 71.2. Today also was a 38-degree diurnal. Wild March swings for sure.

32.2 here for my low this morning. Up to 45.7 now.

At noon nearly 100% of ice has melted off. In shaded areas there are still patches of "white" remaining...but not for much longer. My temp has skyrocketed up to 41 degrees and the sun has occasionally been out. The clouds had broken up a little while ago but now a more solid overcast has returned. The windy conditions in the forecast today have yet to materialize.

Good morning all. It certainly has been interesting reading everyone's posts. I woke up this morning to the temperature at 32.0 with the freezing rain having just ended. Everything is coated in a layer of ice that appears to be roughly 0.1" thick...certainly enough to be visible but not heavy enough to weigh down most branches. As I speak the slow melting has begun as the temperature has risen to 33.3 degrees. The ground and especially mulch is very white while sidewalks and street have all melted. Here are the stats for this storm: Sleet since midnight = 0.1" ; melted freezing rain = 0.43" ; sleet yesterday = 0.3", melted sleet = 0.09" ; freezing rain yesterday = 0.02" ; total sleet for event = 0.4" ; total freezing rain = 0.45" ; total melted precipitation for the storm = 0.54" So, ultimately the short range models with their total qpf had the best forecast. Both NAMs and the HRRR showed between 0.5" to 0.6" of liquid. The GFS overdid the precip with approximately 1.10" forecast before the storm began. Yesterday saw every form of winter precipitation possible. It snowed on and off for a few hours mid-day but did not accumulate, so a trace of snow recorded. And then last evening saw rain (at the very beginning), sleet, and freezing rain. One last tidbit of weather info from yesterday...temperature-wise the high was 34.0 and the low was 29.7 for a diurnal range of just 4.3 degrees. About a week ago I recorded the largest diurnal for this season with a 42 degree spread. Now it's back to dry weather for the next week unless something pops up out of nowhere like it's done before this winter.

Boy, is it sleeting 100% out there and everything is turning white. Officially I measured 0.3" on the board at midnight. Melted down, the sleet plus the freezing rain mainly at the beginning added up to 0.11". Temp down to 29.8. It's been quite a while since I've seen heavy sleet...I'm guessing at least 5 years or more. Glad to hear nearly everyone is sleeting...just like MAG thought it would be doing. And perhaps another few hours of good sleet before losing it?

Remember...those amounts are accumulated freezing rain and not ice accretion on objects. Although I could certainly believe between 0.1 to 0.2 of ice accretion from that much liquid.

Ok. Now that precip is falling moderately the sleet has picked up quite nicely. I'd say it's roughly 80 / 20 IP/ZR. My board has a sleet accumulation on it which I would call 0.1" oficially. Temp 30.6.

Started here about 15 minutes ago as light rain / zr. I can now hear some pinging going on outside so I at least have a mixture. Temp has dropped to 30.7. The dew point is rising but the temp is not yet dropping further. DP 27. Wet bulb now 29.3. If the precip can pick up in intensity I'm certain I can get down to at least 30.0, maybe even 29.5. I'll go out again and look at my board since it's now 11:00 anyway.

I forgot to give my conditions... Currently 31.6 degrees and hasn't budged for more than an hour. Dew point is 22 degrees and the wet bulb has decreased slightly from earlier to 28.4. That at least helps increase the chances that temps will cool off a bit more once good precip is underway. Latest radar shows serious juice about to enter southwest PA. Definitely will be interesting to see how much sleet we all might get and how quickly it changes to zr.

haha...you read my mind. I think at times we all take turns hating on CTP for the timeliness of their advisories/watches. I know they have to follow certain guidelines dictated by the regional headquarters for their CWA. If I remember correctly, in order for them to issue a watch in any particular county they have to have >70% certainty that at least 50% of the county warned will reach warning criteria. Obviously it is much less strict with advisories. I also know that if they believe a watch will be necessary, they can't issue it until the start time is closer than 36 hours away. For this particular event, like MAG has said many times before, even if just a tiny bit of ice could affect roads and/or sidewalks, an advisory seems warranted to at least alert for the potential for the ice. That isn't crying wolf, and I don't think the public would mind if the advisory was lifted closer to the event.

Well it once again looks like it's all collapsing right before game time. WWA now reduced to up to 1" of sleet and .1" - .2" of freezing rain. NWS must have looked at the 18z HRRR which basically showed almost no sleet, with most of the precip freezing rain up until dawn and then rising above 32 with plain rain for a few hours at the end, which is around 10:00 - 11:00am. My high today was 34.0 which occurred at midnight. My low was 29.1. My intra-day high was 32.7. I'm back to 32.2 and holding steady. Dew point is 23 and more importantly, the wet bulb has risen to 29.3...a sign that the cooling effects of the first hour or two of steady precip will only be enough to drop back to between 29 and 30 degrees. I guess we just look forward to the dry, sunny weather all of next week with temps gradually warming back up to 50 by Wednesday.

Well the 2 NAMs are definitely drier compared to the GFS by 50%! Total QPF GFS around 1.10" with total on both NAMs between 0.5" to 0.6". 12K freezing rain (for MDT area) 0.2" with 0.15" ice accretion 3K freezing rain only 0.08" with 0.07" ice accretion. Extrapolating it looks like there are several hours of sleet between when it starts (which isn't until 10:00pm on both) and 1:00am. Then changeover to light freezing rain on and off until 7am. Then approximately 0.05" - 0.10" of plain rain at the end which is by 10:00am. Now, which ones do we believe are most likely to play out the way they currently show? BTW, I'm still 30.7 but the period of super-light snow increased the dew point up to 22. Wet bulb now 27.5 so the cooling potential remains in tact (for now).

No precip/snow here yet. Temp holding steady at 30.7 degrees. However, the dew point is 18 degrees and more importantly, the wet bulb is 27 degrees. Those numbers easily imply cooling by 2-3 degrees once serious precip arrives. Regardless of what happens aloft, I know my temp is going to struggle to reach 32.0 before 7am tomorrow morning. With almost the entire event taking place during the night, the maximum potential of freezing rain, should that be the predominant ptype, will be realized. NWS has most of us in the WWA getting up to 3" of snow/sleet and up to a 0.25' of ice. The sleet will be the main story during the first half of the storm. The second half could be the freezing rain. I'm not talking about the daytime stuff, which was never supposed to be more than a trace. The action doesn't start until after 7pm. >>update...the first flakes are just now beginning to fall here...so slowly I can practically count them (lol)

That is a fair move south with the accumulating snow line. MDT went from 0.7 to 1.2" of snow. That's more than a 50% increase between runs! (lol). Hey even I'm now not far from 1" versus less than 0.5" earlier. What I don't understand is how multiple models are practically screaming severe ice storm, and have repeatedly shown even 1" of rain that falls with temps below freezing. It really would be nice to have them explain why the models they created and programmed are putting out data that they seem to blatantly ignore. I'm not saying I want this type of ice storm. I'll take as much sleet as I can get. I'd be willing to bet almost anything that the LSV will wake up tomorrow morning to at least a WWA. We'll see...

Winds have really picked up here as well. Temp still very unseasonably warm at the current 64.2 degrees after a morning high of 66.6 degrees about an hour ago. That temperature map of PA looks pretty incredible! Oh, by the way...total rainfall yesterday was a whopping 0.07".

My temperature has dropped 8 degrees in the past 90 minutes from what was the high of the day at 62.1 now down to 54.1. Wonder what's with that?

The pendulum once again has reversed and is heading back away from majority ZR to majority sleet. Still have another 36 hours to push the snow line further towards our region. While heavy sleet is horrific for the roads, it can't hurt the trees and shrubs. Between the two I'd much prefer IP over ZR.