12 years ago at this moment I arrived home from work to discover that radar looked like this

[Deck Pic]

[Ji]

hopefully it looks like that this saturday. I wasnt really into models back then so i got my update from sue Palka. That storm really got me interested in weenie boards and models...before that...i thought i was the only moron on the planet that liked snow

[Deck Pic]

hopefully it looks like that this saturday. I wasnt really into models back then so i got my update from sue Palka. That storm really got me interested in weenie boards and models...before that...i thought i was the only moron on the planet that liked snow

I knew something was up....winds were howling and it smelled like snow so I called 936-1212 and then when I got home, Bob Ryan was on at the top of the hour

[TJ3]

I knew something was up....winds were howling and it smelled like snow so I called 936-1212 and then when I got home, Bob Ryan was on at the top of the hour

I almost felt sorry for Bob Ryan at the 6:00 news that night. I got the sense he knew what was coming but he just couldn't pull the trigger on his forecast in his time slot because he would be out there on an island with other TV mets and NWS. I think he talked about "close call" and dropped other hints that he really had a low confidence in his forecast. I think it was about at this time I saw the scrolls come across the TV screen of the issuance of Winter Storm Warning. Maybe closer to 10. What a night

[PhineasC]

I don't remember the storm itself at all, but I remember feeling shocked looking at the radar as it crawled up the coast. My dad and I were huge TWC fans back then and we couldn't believe it when we saw it coming up the coast. I remember calling him from school and him being shocked. LOL

[Grothar of Herndon]

One of the most beautiful storms to see develop on radar. It just kept coming west and north. It was clear by 7 pm on 24th that something special was about to happen.

[Avdave]

Great snowstorm in Richmond. I just moved down there from Jersey two months prior and was missing snow in a big way and then this gem happened. I still cant beleive how long things were shut down in greater Richmond area from this storm. Was a helluva event

[usedtobe]

Great snowstorm in Richmond. I just moved down there from Jersey two months prior and was missing snow in a big way and then this gem happened. I still cant beleive how long things were shut down in greater Richmond area from this storm. Was a helluva event

and I was in St Louis given seminars so I missed the event.

[Avdave]

and I was in St Louis given seminars so I missed the event.

so that what we have to do to get a good snow huh? I can send you one way to STL and Im sure we can find you a seminar to attend

[Huffwx]

I saw radar at 230 and was convinced it was coming north. I told my friend 6 inches +-- I somewhat got luck in that 8 miles west of LYH was 0. I knew nothing about the dry air aloft--etc. Still I didn't know it was called negative tilt, but knew when you say the bands moving NW in a system it was a good thing.

Close the heaviest snow ever in LYH-- a couple hours a 2-3 inches an hour.

[Eskimo Joe]

Wasn't there a thread relegating the awesomeness this event was awhile back? Anybody have a link?

[RIC Airport]

Great snowstorm in Richmond. I just moved down there from Jersey two months prior and was missing snow in a big way and then this gem happened. I still cant beleive how long things were shut down in greater Richmond area from this storm. Was a helluva event

The wind and drifting were the most unique aspects of this storm. The RIC obs for that day came in with 7 consecutive hours of +SN BLSN. I think the subzero temperatures and the ice storm few days after the snow helped to delay getting everything back to normal. Overall, there was a pretty long streak of snowcover days, more than 10 days, which is pretty unusual for the Richmond area.

[Deck Pic]

I was working 70+ hours a week at that time and slept through the heaviest snow. The next day was awesome though. It was still ripping snow much of the day and so many people went to sleep clueless that there were tons of people out early trying to get to work. I remember walking through Dupont circle fairly early and it was jammed with people and they were all kind of like WTF.

[weathafella]

Messenger was one of 2 people who called that storm. DT and LC both were making fun of him on irc. Also, Brian Monahan, now a tv met and occasional poster here but then in hs. LC to his credit gave props to both in the post mortem in his daily newsletter. They were the only 2 who pcked the right wave to amplify.

[yoda]

I remember it from middle school... I knew that the local forecasters were only calling for an inch or less... but I felt like we would get a lil more.... like a few inches. I remember my weather radio going off around 10 PM or so when the WSW was issued for 4-8 inches... then the 6-12 I believe was issued later that night. Waking up around 8 am... was total awesomeness.

[brettjrob]

Probably my favorite storm from my DC-area tenure (1997-2005), since I was sick as a dog during PDS2. It was a year or two before I really got into following the models, etc., but I vividly remember the beginning of the 10pm FOX 5 broadcast after whatever show I'd watched the hour before. One of those incredibly rare dream-come-true moments for a clueless weenie who, at that time, could only stay glued to TWC and call up WeatherUnderground on 56k. As I recall, the initial set of warnings sent out around 10pm only provided a WWA for Loudoun Co. (2-4"), but even without looking at models, my excitement shot through the roof given radar trends and extrapolation of the forecast. Final total in Sterling was 10-11", which was about what we'd received in the clipper on steroids a year earlier (1999-03-09), but accompanied by the best and most prolonged wind of any significant storm I've witnessed.

[D-Money]

http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/Blizzard/blizzard_2.php

[Sparky]

A wonderful wind blown affair. Not the biggest of the biggies, I got a little over a foot, but the wind and cold made it great.

[Bob Chill]

It was a fun one for sure. I moved back to the area after 7 years in the Rockies in Apr of 99. I was working in DC as a Govt contractor with unlimited hourly billing. I watched the weather all evening knowing it would be a good storm. Woke up at 5am and drove from Gaithersburg to SW DC. It was a fun drive. Heavy snow and drifting on GW Pkwy.

When I got to the office my manager laughed and thought I was nutz for showing up. I said this is a light event in the rockies. I told him I didn't want to miss work because I was hourly. He told me to write in a 10 hour day and drive home safely. I actually got promoted a week later. Too much fun.

[gymengineer]

Doug Hill on the afternoon (4 or 5 pm) newscast talked about the radar in SC and said that he was keeping a close eye on the way the precip shield was looking at that point. The rest of us weenies had already noticed precipitation in an area that had not been modeled to be there... his words inspired and I remained glued to radar the rest of the afternoon into evening, until that infamous LWX discussion came out-- baroclinic leaf, negative tilt, etc. etc.

[Amped]

That storm weakend rapidly over New England. The storm looked like it got hit by a steamroller by the time it was over Northern ME.

[BethesdaWX]

I was really young, I remember the storm vaguely. I think for hours I was just standing in the front driveway watching the blowing snow whirlwinds and trying to get in the middle of them

[mappy]

This was the snowstorm that got me interested in weather. I was 15 and was down the street at a friends for the night when my mom called saying to come home and watch my sisters while she ran out to the store as a storm was coming. I went back to my friends after she came home and didnt come back home for 3 days. We got 20 inches in Pasadena, school was already closed for the first few days for administrative stuff, but we ended up closed all week. I was amazed at the storm and how it changed course last minute catching many people off guard. My weather obsession started after this storm.

[usedtobe]

so that what we have to do to get a good snow huh? I can send you one way to STL and Im sure we can find you a seminar to attend

I was in Kansas City for a flash flood forecasting course in 1983 and missed that even bigger storm.

[RickinBaltimore]

If I didn't know better I'd say that was a tropical storm hitting the coast

[mattie g]

So...*this* is the storm that I've often wondered about when thinking back on past snowstorms.

I was living near Van Ness-UDC at the time, and worked just north of Old Town. I went to bed that evening with a feeling that we were going to get a bit more than most forecasts were calling for (I wasn't on any weather boards at the time), but I wasn't quite expecting a wind-whipped snow like we got. I woke up, looked outside, and started getting ready for work, but soon after got a call from a co-worker to let me know not to come in. I gladly obliged and went walking down Connecticut Avenue and vividly remember the snow as it was blowing off the roofs of the low rises around there. Sweet storm!

Someone mentioned the 9 Mar 1999 storm, as well. Funnily enough, for some reason I've often gotten the two storms confused - actually thinking they were one storm. The 9 Mar storm is one that sticks out because of the stripe of heaviest snow that ran west-to-east right through the city. Very cool to have finally figured out what both those storms were!

[marked8]

I loved that storm, one of my favorites of all time. My part of North Carolina got 24 inches and we had 5+ foot drifts. We still has snow on the ground nearly a month later.

[marked8]

A good link about that particular storm:

http://www4.ncsu.edu/~nwsfo/storage/cases/20000125/

[mitchnick]

A good link about that particular storm:

http://www4.ncsu.edu...cases/20000125/

here's another re the model issues and other goodies

http://www.emc.ncep.noaa.gov/mmb/research/blizz2000/

[brad1551]

The storm that came out of knowwhere. I remember that being the first real pound for pound snow storm since 1996. I remember 1999 snowstorm that packed a punch in my senior year of high school. This was a storm that even buffed all the local tv meteorologist. This put 99 to shame in my book because of the power and most of all surprise . "WISH IT WOULD HAPPEN THIS WINTER".