Northern Ohio Obs/Discussion Part 2

[dta1984]

1 hour ago, OHweather said:

Looks like a very potent event for the primary belt later tomorrow and Tuesday, with a very heavy band likely impacting the metro area during the Tuesday AM rush. 

Ya looking like Tues is the better day away from the lake.   Hoping for the band to slow down as it gets our way.

[NEOH]

16 hours ago, dta1984 said:

Ya looking like Tues is the better day away from the lake.   Hoping for the band to slow down as it gets our way.

Looks like the Route 6 corridor on north will be the jackpot zone. Should be fairly intense down this way for a few hours as the band pushes south. Hopefully it moves slowly with a strong land breeze on the south side of the band. Not too confident in the forecasted amounts in this area. 

 

 

 

 

[OHweather]

Things still look pretty on track. The flow comes around to a good 290 degrees for several hours Tuesday morning, so I don't doubt snow will get into most of the metro area and probably will at least briefly get down to me (I'm in Macedonia now). I'm not expecting more than a quick couple inches here, though some models have a bit more this far south. Should be a fun commute home from the office in the morning. In the Cuyahoga/Geagua area, there is still some uncertainty regarding exactly how heavy the totals are (though I don't doubt the entire area will get a very intense burst that puts down a few inches early Tuesday, at least). Pretty confident that Lake, northern Geauga, northern/central Ashtabula and most of Erie County will be under banding for several hours tonight before it starts pushing farther inland, so they'll do just fine. The band may end up sinking across Cuyahoga and the rest of Geauga a bit quicker, so for those areas to get higher-end totals closer to 8 or 10" it'll need to snow more Tuesday and Tuesday evening behind the initial band. I do think there's a chance that we end up seeing a more fractured (but still coherent) band sit across parts of Cuyahoga into southern Geauga and maybe even northern Summit/Portage/Trumbull for the rest of Tuesday morning behind the initial burst, as winds end up locking in around 290 for several hours which can focus a band in that area. Instability and snow growth are supportive of heavy snow through a good portion of Tuesday, but the question after the initial burst early in the day is how organized any banding can be. Activity probably does get pretty disorganized for a few hours Tuesday afternoon (some subsidence/shear) but may organize into one final burst Tuesday evening as winds start backing and pushing the activity back up the lakeshore. 

[NEOH]

2 hours ago, OHweather said:

Things still look pretty on track. The flow comes around to a good 290 degrees for several hours Tuesday morning, so I don't doubt snow will get into most of the metro area and probably will at least briefly get down to me (I'm in Macedonia now). I'm not expecting more than a quick couple inches here, though some models have a bit more this far south. Should be a fun commute home from the office in the morning. In the Cuyahoga/Geagua area, there is still some uncertainty regarding exactly how heavy the totals are (though I don't doubt the entire area will get a very intense burst that puts down a few inches early Tuesday, at least). Pretty confident that Lake, northern Geauga, northern/central Ashtabula and most of Erie County will be under banding for several hours tonight before it starts pushing farther inland, so they'll do just fine. The band may end up sinking across Cuyahoga and the rest of Geauga a bit quicker, so for those areas to get higher-end totals closer to 8 or 10" it'll need to snow more Tuesday and Tuesday evening behind the initial band. I do think there's a chance that we end up seeing a more fractured (but still coherent) band sit across parts of Cuyahoga into southern Geauga and maybe even northern Summit/Portage/Trumbull for the rest of Tuesday morning behind the initial burst, as winds end up locking in around 290 for several hours which can focus a band in that area. Instability and snow growth are supportive of heavy snow through a good portion of Tuesday, but the question after the initial burst early in the day is how organized any banding can be. Activity probably does get pretty disorganized for a few hours Tuesday afternoon (some subsidence/shear) but may organize into one final burst Tuesday evening as winds start backing and pushing the activity back up the lakeshore. 

Thanks Jim. 290 is a great wind direction as it maximizes the fetch from the western basin. Hoping the band doesn’t drive south too fast. I’m always skeptical of these early season events as winds don’t seem to turn as nw’erly as forecast. 

[Chinook]

This might be the beginning of higher reflectivity for some areas near Cleveland over to Erie.

[NEOH]

Picked up 4" of snow as the band moved through this morning. All of it came down in the 5am - 7:30 am time frame. Perfect fetch now off of the lake... hopefully add a few more inches today. 

[OHweather]

Ended up with slightly under 3" at home...the snow rates at the office and across the Cleveland area during the commute were nuts. It started snowing at about 6:15am at the office...by the time I got to my car at 7:20 there was damn near 4" on it. The drive home in the middle of all of that and the AM rush was a slow one...a couple of hills that no one was getting up, a few cars off the road and very slow going in between. It was actually a more annoying commute than what I had on December 23 last year (in the middle of the blizzard with brutal cold), though I think that was more a product of more traffic volume this morning. Overall am pretty happy with how the event played out, although northern Erie County PA got way less than forecast. As we move into December, I think it's time for us to get a more widespread snow at some point! 

[NEOH]

15 hours ago, OHweather said:

Ended up with slightly under 3" at home...the snow rates at the office and across the Cleveland area during the commute were nuts. It started snowing at about 6:15am at the office...by the time I got to my car at 7:20 there was damn near 4" on it. The drive home in the middle of all of that and the AM rush was a slow one...a couple of hills that no one was getting up, a few cars off the road and very slow going in between. It was actually a more annoying commute than what I had on December 23 last year (in the middle of the blizzard with brutal cold), though I think that was more a product of more traffic volume this morning. Overall am pretty happy with how the event played out, although northern Erie County PA got way less than forecast. As we move into December, I think it's time for us to get a more widespread snow at some point! 

Finished with 5.5" IMBY. Missed out on some of the heavier bursts of snow. Looks like areas around here were in the 6-7" range. Nice start to the season so far. 

[TheClimateChanger]

Paltry calendar year for snow so far across northern Ohio. A few sites eyeing a record if we get a mild December. Toledo and Cleveland doing a bit better than most with the recent snowfall at those locations, although some of that is simply a result of longer PORs at those sites. While this is the 12th least snowiest calendar year to date in the Cleveland threaded climate record, only three years at CLE airport have seen less snowfall to date (1998, 1946 & 1961).

Due to a lot of missing data and irregularities in the early snowfall data in the MFD and YNG threads, these are based only on years with less than 50 missing days. Wanted to select a target that would allow the most data possible, while excluding clearly erroneous data. Of course, that also means some of the early years may have had more snow than shown - although I believe most of the missing days were days without snow.

Below each box, I've added the existing target to beat for the full 12-month calendar year.

Akron/Canton [3rd least of 74 years]

Record least calendar year snowfall is 17.5" in 1998.

Mansfield [2nd least of 79 years]

Record least calendar year snowfall is 19.7" in 2006.

Youngstown [Least of 78 years]

Record least calendar year snowfall is 26.8" in 1939.

Toledo [9th least of 84 years]

Record least calendar year snowfall is 6.6" in 2006.

Cleveland [12th least of 131 years; 4th least of 84 years at airport observation site]

Record least calendar year snowfall is 13.0" in 1931. At the airport, the record least snowfall is 21.7" in 1998.

[NEOH]

3 hours ago, TheClimateChanger said:

Paltry calendar year for snow so far across northern Ohio. A few sites eyeing a record if we get a mild December. Toledo and Cleveland doing a bit better than most with the recent snowfall at those locations, although some of that is simply a result of longer PORs at those sites. While this is the 12th least snowiest calendar year to date in the Cleveland threaded climate record, only three years at CLE airport have seen less snowfall to date (1998, 1946 & 1961).

Due to a lot of missing data and irregularities in the early snowfall data in the MFD and YNG threads, these are based only on years with less than 50 missing days. Wanted to select a target that would allow the most data possible, while excluding clearly erroneous data. Of course, that also means some of the early years may have had more snow than shown - although I believe most of the missing days were days without snow.

Below each box, I've added the existing target to beat for the full 12-month calendar year.

 

Yeah, the past two seasons have been bad for snowfall. Regression from previous snowy seasons sucks. I guess if temps don't deliver you'll find something else to be negative about. Did you notice that CLE has had BN temp departures 5 of the last 7 months (including Nov)?

[TheClimateChanger]

56 minutes ago, NEOH said:

Yeah, the past two seasons have been bad for snowfall. Regression from previous snowy seasons sucks. I guess if temps don't deliver you'll find something else to be negative about. Did you notice that CLE has had BN temp departures 5 of the last 7 months (including Nov)?

Temperatures are delivering just fine. With one month left in 2023, it's been 3rd warmest at Toledo, 7th warmest at Cleveland, 10th warmest at Youngstown, and 12th warmest at Mansfield and Canton/Akron. Would be even higher in the ranks if not for a number of recent, even warmer, years at most of these locations.

And these are based on even longer PORs than the snowfall numbers, with 150 years at Toledo and 153 years at Cleveland. That's a predicted exceedance of about once every 75 years at Toledo, and about once every 25- or 26-years at Cleveland. So I would say temperatures are performing VERY well.

[NEOH]

1 hour ago, TheClimateChanger said:

Temperatures are delivering just fine. With one month left in 2023, it's been 3rd warmest at Toledo, 7th warmest at Cleveland, 10th warmest at Youngstown, and 12th warmest at Mansfield and Canton/Akron. Would be even higher in the ranks if not for a number of recent, even warmer, years at most of these locations.

And these are based on even longer PORs than the snowfall numbers, with 150 years at Toledo and 153 years at Cleveland. That's a predicted exceedance of about once every 75 years at Toledo, and about once every 25- or 26-years at Cleveland. So I would say temperatures are performing VERY well.

Aren't you "Trent" that used to post here? If so, I feel bad for you man. Hope everything is ok with you. 

[TheClimateChanger]

2 minutes ago, NEOH said:

Aren't you "Trent" that used to post here? If so, I feel bad for you man. Hope everything is ok with you. 

No, I don't know who that is.

[OHweather]

We're approaching our brief allotment of winter for this two week period Monday into Tuesday. Looks like a half decent NW flow lake enhanced snow setup, peaking Monday evening through early Tuesday AM. Models disagree regarding how quickly the deeper synoptic support and moisture pull away, but the Euro and RGEM hang onto it until early Tuesday which would probably be enough to drop a good 3-6" on the higher terrain southeast of the lake, with potential for locally 6-10" wherever a Huron connection gets involved...probably in the vicinity of Ashtabula County and western Erie/Crawford PA in this sort of flow? Amounts will probably be quite a bit less near the lake with a strong flow across the short axis of the lake and warmer temperatures/lower ratios close to the lake than farther inland. 

[dta1984]

31 minutes ago, OHweather said:

We're approaching our brief allotment of winter for this two week period Monday into Tuesday. Looks like a half decent NW flow lake enhanced snow setup, peaking Monday evening through early Tuesday AM. Models disagree regarding how quickly the deeper synoptic support and moisture pull away, but the Euro and RGEM hang onto it until early Tuesday which would probably be enough to drop a good 3-6" on the higher terrain southeast of the lake, with potential for locally 6-10" wherever a Huron connection gets involved...probably in the vicinity of Ashtabula County and western Erie/Crawford PA in this sort of flow? Amounts will probably be quite a bit less near the lake with a strong flow across the short axis of the lake and warmer temperatures/lower ratios close to the lake than farther inland. 

Trends are looking good for Mon-Tues.  Would be nice if what falls could stick around until Christmas...

[OHweather]

31 minutes ago, dta1984 said:

Trends are looking good for Mon-Tues.  Would be nice if what falls could stick around until Christmas...

I agree that would be nice…it’s probably unlikely for most of us, but I’m looking forward to at least getting a couple of days of a solid amount of snow on the ground with all the Christmas lights and decorations out. 

[NEOH]

Nice to wake and up and see this in the forecast. Will be interesting to see where the lake huron band sets up. Looks like the models have taken it more to the east toward the OH/PA border. 

 

[OHweather]

Starting to try to stick here a bit…looks like Chardon already has an inch or two on the webcam. It does look like the Huron connection will be most persistent near or just east of the OH/PA border. The synoptic support and moisture are good for most of tonight, and ratios/accumulation efficiency should get better quickly between 0-3z (should start accumulating better by sunset but ratios may not be great until a bit later when it gets colder). The synoptic support and moisture quickly pull out of NE Ohio 9-12z and out of PA 12-15z, but it’s still a pretty good period where the upslope areas should rack up some fluffy snow. We haven’t seen a NW flow event with favorable moisture and synoptic support like this in a little while. I think inland NW PA will see a general 6-12”, best shot at a foot with the Huron band. I think it’ll be more of a 5-9” type deal in the higher terrain of Geauga/Ashtabula tapering to 3-6” in the hills of the secondary Snowbelt south of Cleveland, with lower amounts in general near the lake. Accumulations will carry well inland but will gradually taper south of the higher terrain. A solid event overall. No major disagreements with the “official” forecast overall. 

[NEOH]

1 minute ago, OHweather said:

Starting to try to stick here a bit…looks like Chardon already has an inch or two on the webcam. It does look like the Huron connection will be most persistent near or just east of the OH/PA border. The synoptic support and moisture are good for most of tonight, and ratios/accumulation efficiency should get better quickly between 0-3z (should start accumulating better by sunset but ratios may not be great until a bit later when it gets colder). The synoptic support and moisture quickly pull out of NE Ohio 9-12z and out of PA 12-15z, but it’s still a pretty good period where the upslope areas should rack up some fluffy snow. We haven’t seen a NW flow event with favorable moisture and synoptic support like this in a little while. I think inland NW PA will see a general 6-12”, best shot at a foot with the Huron band. I think it’ll be more of a 5-9” type deal in the higher terrain of Geauga/Ashtabula tapering to 3-6” in the hills of the secondary Snowbelt south of Cleveland, with lower amounts in general near the lake. Accumulations will carry well inland but will gradually taper south of the higher terrain. A solid event overall. No major disagreements with the “official” forecast overall. 

Everything is covered here in South Russell. Snowing heavily now. The heaviest snow has been just north of here but starting to push south into the area. 

[LakeEffectOH]

Coming down much harder here in Solon.  Flakes have gotten much bigger too.

[OHweather]

Yeah this current burst has finally turned the tide here. All covered now (about 0.5”), but the hill half a mile from my house has noticeably slightly more and the middle of Macedonia (a bit lower than my house) is still struggling to cover the grass. 

[OHweather]

Off and running here, easily 3-4" so far and a nice amorphous blob of lake enhanced snow anchored over the terrain just inland from Lake Erie from the Cleveland metro across the snowbelt. I actually may get 6" down here in Macedonia, which would not be shabby at all. 

[Chinook]

constant lake-effect snow band onshore, with little offshore

 

[vpbob21]

Got about 1.2" here.  More than I expected.

 

[OHweather]

6.8” here! Secondary snowbelt seemed to do well. 

[NEOH]

Just over 6" IMBY. Very picturesque snowfall as the snow was pasted to everything before the strong winds late last night. 

 

 

[LakeEffectOH]

In Chesterland, I got at least 8".  However looking at the storm reports around me, by certified spotters, accums are between 3.5 - 5".  I checked pretty well for drifts before...estimating the depth.  Strange.  Maybe I better get a snow measuring device.  

[NEOH]

9 minutes ago, LakeEffectOH said:

In Chesterland, I got at least 8".  However looking at the storm reports around me, by certified spotters, accums are between 3.5 - 5".  I checked pretty well for drifts before...estimating the depth.  Strange.  Maybe I better get a snow measuring device.  

Your area always does well so I don't doubt 8" fell. There was a consistent blob of heavy snow around and just north of 322 yesterday afternoon. The ground was soaked from the rain prior to the snow so definitely some compaction. 

[dta1984]

I came up with right at 7" of snow.   Very scenic outside just in time for Christmas.  Should stick around until the end of the week at least.  

[OHweather]

1 hour ago, LakeEffectOH said:

In Chesterland, I got at least 8".  However looking at the storm reports around me, by certified spotters, accums are between 3.5 - 5".  I checked pretty well for drifts before...estimating the depth.  Strange.  Maybe I better get a snow measuring device.  

There are a lot of 6-8”+ type amounts just to your south and east farther into Geauga, but a lot of lower reports to your west and north into Cuyahoga and Lake. Most of the Geauga snow was split between reports last evening and reports this morning, but when you add reports from the same spotters together they’re almost all 6”+ in Geauga. I’m guessing there’s a gradient in there but that those higher totals in Geauga are more representative for your area. Our warning for Cuyahoga will end up being somewhat ill-fated unfortunately, with Medina, Summit and Portage all probably getting enough that they could’ve been warned instead . It’s been a while since we’ve had a strong NW flow event that pushes the best snow into those southern secondary Snowbelt hills like this.