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Early January 2014 cold snaps - featuring the polar vortex of doom


Ian

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6.2 for my low. 

 

Looks like the big three will come in with lows of:

 

BWI: 7

IAD: 9

DCA: A balmy 17

 

Looking ahead to Monday/Tuesday....I don't think I've ever seen wind chill watches hoisted before. Western MD, parts of WV and Western PA have them for WCs in the -20 to -40 range. And after today's high, International Falls will not reach 0 again until sometime on Thursday. Would love to just spend one winter up there. 

at 6:54 BWI shows the minimum temp for the last 6 hours was 6 degrees

it wasn't an hourly reading so it must have come in between but will still be recorded as the low of the morning

http://www.nws.noaa.gov/data/obhistory/KBWI.html

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It was down to 15.8 in Round Bay/ Severna Park this morning.  The river water temps in the 30's is helping keep our overall temps elevated a little bit.  Not suprising - many mornings on the way to work it can be as much as a 5 degree difference in temps 4 miles away as I move away from the river!

 

What are everyones thoughts on tomorrows predicted icy system?  Doesn't have it's own thread at the moment?

 

Mark

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It was down to 15.8 in Round Bay/ Severna Park this morning.  The river water temps in the 30's is helping keep our overall temps elevated a little bit.  Not suprising - many mornings on the way to work it can be as much as a 5 degree difference in temps 4 miles away as I move away from the river!

 

What are everyones thoughts on tomorrows predicted icy system?  Doesn't have it's own thread at the moment?

 

Mark

I was also looking for a thread on the event tomorrow. I live in Pasadena and it's a solid 9 degrees.

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Nice pic Kay. My parents were big boaters when I was a kid. I grew up on the bay on the weekends. Some of my fondest memories were the big freezes in the 70's. I remember people driving pickups across the upper end of the west river and ice boaters doing 60 with howling nw winds. Not sure we'll ever see that again but your pic brings back memories

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Nice pic Kay. My parents were big boaters when I was a kid. I grew up on the bay on the weekends. Some of my fondest memories were the big freezes in the 70's. I remember people driving pickups across the upper end of the west river and ice boaters doing 60 with howling nw winds. Not sure we'll ever see that again but your pic brings back memories

 

Kay's picture reminds me of a ridiculously cold Sunday in February, 1979, when my sister and I were ice skating on St. Leonard's Creek down past Wes's current location in southern Calvert county.  Late that afternoon the snow began that was expected to bring 1 - 3" but didn't end until noon the next day, President's Day.

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Nice pic Kay. My parents were big boaters when I was a kid. I grew up on the bay on the weekends. Some of my fondest memories were the big freezes in the 70's. I remember people driving pickups across the upper end of the west river and ice boaters doing 60 with howling nw winds. Not sure we'll ever see that again but your pic brings back memories

That's awesome, Bob. I've seen it freeze over here at least briefly or partially many times, but only rarely to the point where people bring out the ice boats, and never the pickups! My family didn't do boating/bay stuff, and I moved out here after years in Balto. City...so have to make the memories as an adult. It's a great way to grow up around here.

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Are the weatherbugs that reported 15/16/17/18* lows located properly? Roof tops and balconies and really anything surrounded Solely by macadam, building, concrete are going to radiate warmth which produces artifically high values.

From what I understand the temps are not raw but get run thru a proprietary algorithm to 'guess' the standard level temp since most are on rooftops etc. I would think in a lot of cases you're colder on a rooftop than street level in the city anyway.

Considering we were pushing above 0c at 850 by mid evening the cold performed pretty well.

UHI is very real unfortunately.

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Are the weatherbugs that reported 15/16/17/18* lows located properly? Roof tops and balconies and really anything surrounded Solely by macadam, building, concrete are going to radiate warmth which produces artifically high values.

 

there are PWS's that are sited lower/on the ground, which corroborate weatherbug's.....I'm all for moving the station from DCA....but having lived in DC proper for 15 years now, you are not going to get anything substantially different moving it into DC, unless you go up near Tenleytown or Friendship heights...I lived within spitting distance of the zoo for 8 years, and UHI is significant there.....I kind of like Andrews for an official station...they seem to be less susceptible to UHI, though they still occasionally share DCA's microclimate....I think we can all agree, DCA is the absolute worst place to have an official station

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there are PWS's that are sited lower/on the ground, which corroborate weatherbug's.....I'm all for moving the station from DCA....but having lived in DC proper for 15 years now, you are not going to get anything substantially different moving it into DC, unless you go up near Tenleytown or Friendship heights...I lived within spitting distance of the zoo for 8 years, and UHI is significant there.....I kind of like Andrews for an official station...they seem to be less susceptible to UHI, though they still occasionally share DCA's microclimate....I think we can all agree, DCA is the absolute worst place to have an official station

 

I think people who have watched weather for long enough and have a brain can figure out how to extrapolate based on DCA.  Not sure why we always end up having these conversations. If you want a big snow total or a super cold low it's obviously not the place to go but it's still valuable. 

 

There are a ton of official locations that suck.  The only great answer is probably to double or triple them .. but I guess PWS/wxbug etc are filling in the holes. 

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I think people who have watched weather for long enough and have a brain can figure out how to extrapolate based on DCA.  Not sure why we always end up having these conversations. If you want a big snow total or a super cold low it's obviously not the place to go but it's still valuable. 

 

There are a ton of official locations that suck.  The only great answer is probably to double or triple them .. but I guess PWS/wxbug etc are filling in the holes. 

 

I have a big enough sample to know I average 125% of DCA's snow.....and it is very very consistent...most I have ever received is 142% of DCA's total dating back to 98-99...so you are only going to get a slight bump in snow given the paltry amounts we often get....temps will be the same, as I also get the insane 77 degree mins in the summer....so in the end, DCA isn't representative of the burbs, but is for the city

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HAZARDOUS WEATHER OUTLOOK
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE BALTIMORE MD/WASHINGTON DC
1246 PM EST SAT JAN 4 2014

MDZ003>005-009-010-501-502-VAZ025>031-036>040-042-050-051-501>504-
WVZ050>053-055-501>506-051000-
WASHINGTON-FREDERICK MD-CARROLL-MONTGOMERY-HOWARD-
EXTREME WESTERN ALLEGANY-CENTRAL AND EASTERN ALLEGANY-AUGUSTA-
ROCKINGHAM-SHENANDOAH-FREDERICK VA-PAGE-WARREN-CLARKE-NELSON-
ALBEMARLE-GREENE-MADISON-RAPPAHANNOCK-LOUDOUN-ORANGE-CULPEPER-
NORTHERN FAUQUIER-SOUTHERN FAUQUIER-WESTERN HIGHLAND-
EASTERN HIGHLAND-HAMPSHIRE-MORGAN-BERKELEY-JEFFERSON-HARDY-
WESTERN GRANT-EASTERN GRANT-WESTERN MINERAL-EASTERN MINERAL-
WESTERN PENDLETON-EASTERN PENDLETON-
1246 PM EST SAT JAN 4 2014

THIS HAZARDOUS WEATHER OUTLOOK IS FOR EASTERN WEST VIRGINIA...
NORTHERN AND CENTRAL VIRGINIA...AND CENTRAL AND WESTERN MARYLAND
WITH THE EXCEPTION OF GARRETT COUNTY.

.DAY ONE...THIS AFTERNOON AND TONIGHT

POCKETS OF FREEZING DRIZZLE MAY DEVELOP LATE TONIGHT ACROSS
PORTIONS OF THE CENTRAL VIRGINIA FOOTHILLS AND NORTHERN VIRGINIA
PIEDMONT.

.DAYS TWO THROUGH SEVEN...SUNDAY THROUGH FRIDAY

A PERIOD OF FREEZING RAIN IS POSSIBLE SUNDAY.

BITTERLY COLD CONDITIONS WILL MOVE IN BEHIND AN ARCTIC FRONT
MONDAY THROUGH TUESDAY NIGHT. RECORD COLD TEMPERATURES ARE
EXPECTED ACROSS THE AREA. THIS AIR MASS MAY TURN OUT TO BE THE
COLDEST AIR MASS IN 20 YEARS. DANGEROUSLY LOW WIND CHILLS ARE
ALSO EXPECTED DURING THIS TIME.

ACCUMULATING SNOWFALL IS EXPECTED SUNDAY NIGHT AND MONDAY...
PARTICULARLY ALONG THE WESTERN SLOPES OF THE ALLEGHENY FRONT.

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