Northern Ohio Obs/Discussion Part 2

[OHweather]

26 minutes ago, MAIDEsNow said:

So much for a double-digit event. Can this large body of water to my north provide big snows anymore west of Chautauqua county? Synoptic snow certainly is an impossibility. Well on our way to another below average snowfall for winter, that is 5 out of the last 6. This "great" pattern for LES has simply bled warmth from the lake. On to next winter, er, the next event.

Sour grapes rant over.

It would be a rather spectacular and pretty inexplicable fail if you don't get at least a few inches at some point tonight and an event total of say at least 8".  For NE OH this is always a possibility with NW flow events if there isn't a ton of moisture around, but NW PA usually does better especially with a fetch off of Lake Huron.  Not the first time this has happened in the last couple of winters, so I'd probably be frustrated too. 

[MAIDEsNow]

From 7am yesterday morning until this morning, I just recorded in my snow tracking file 2.5" of new snow for that 24hour period - yielding an event total of 4.5" starting Monday night. Some blowing & such and I tend to hedge low on the numbers I record, but very little snow fell yesterday and last night. There was some snow in the air, but flake size was miniscule.

There are school closings in Union City & Corry districts today, my guess is that only far southeastern inland areas of the County received any appreciable snow with that Huron fetch that never backed any more westward. I can sort of verify this as last night going on a snow drive / property search, it was snowing at a good clip from Wattsburg south to Union City on Rt 8. As I headed west back toward Edinboro on Rt 6, snow was intermittent and much lighter.

 

[dta1984]

I went with 3.5" total up until now.  A little fell overnight,  but not much.

At the moment getting a nice burst.  Not sure how long it'll last as I think it's moving quickly.  

Clipper and enhancement looks decent for tonight still. 

[NEOH]

The band really consolidated as its pushing off to the northeast with the backing winds. Picked up a quick inch in a short amount of time. Still coming down hard.

It will be nice to get some synoptic snow tonight for a change. Relying on LES for snowfall is always tricky.

[OHweather]

I got another 0.2" this morning to push my "event total" to 3.1"...knock on wood but I should easily do better with the clipper. 

Will wait for all the reports, but it looks like Geauga County generally only saw 4-8" total, maybe locally more in the extreme north but not widespread.  Cuyahoga County saw from an inch or two along the lake to 4-6" in far southern and also probably 4" or so in some of the hills east of 271.  A nice portion of Medina and western Summit Counties did well with a nice area getting 4-7" there.  In NW PA, it appears about the eastern 1/3 of inland Erie County and extreme NE Crawford County did manage storm totals of 8-14" give or take...Corry did get over a foot...but near I-79 and west as MAIDEsNOW can probably verify, it was very underwhelming.  Must've just been too much dry air even there...really wish we had decent radar in NW PA to see these events play out. 

[NEOH]

23 minutes ago, OHweather said:

I got another 0.2" this morning to push my "event total" to 3.1"...knock on wood but I should easily do better with the clipper. 

Will wait for all the reports, but it looks like Geauga County generally only saw 4-8" total, maybe locally more in the extreme north but not widespread.  Cuyahoga County saw from an inch or two along the lake to 4-6" in far southern and also probably 4" or so in some of the hills east of 271.  A nice portion of Medina and western Summit Counties did well with a nice area getting 4-7" there.  In NW PA, it appears about the eastern 1/3 of inland Erie County and extreme NE Crawford County did manage storm totals of 8-14" give or take...Corry did get over a foot...but near I-79 and west as MAIDEsNOW can probably verify, it was very underwhelming.  Must've just been too much dry air even there...really wish we had decent radar in NW PA to see these events play out. 

What are you thinking with the clipper, 4-6?

[OHweather]

21 minutes ago, NEOH said:

What are you thinking with the clipper, 4-6?

Yes.  Pretty good shot of moderate to briefly heavy snow for a few hours should put down a few inches, and at the moment that still looks in line to hit us...though farther south towards Akron they may get a bit less.  Then perhaps minor lake effect adds another inch or so.  4-6" should be a safe call, could see some 6-7" amounts downwind of the lake if everything goes perfectly (which, lately it hasn't).

[NEOH]

37 minutes ago, OHweather said:

Yes.  Pretty good shot of moderate to briefly heavy snow for a few hours should put down a few inches, and at the moment that still looks in line to hit us...though farther south towards Akron they may get a bit less.  Then perhaps minor lake effect adds another inch or so.  4-6" should be a safe call, could see some 6-7" amounts downwind of the lake if everything goes perfectly (which, lately it hasn't).

We are overdue for a decent synoptic event... but knock on every piece of wood you can find. Just hope the low stays a little stronger before it starts to fizzle out.

[RogueWaves]

1 hour ago, OHweather said:

I got another 0.2" this morning to push my "event total" to 3.1"...knock on wood but I should easily do better with the clipper. 

Will wait for all the reports, but it looks like Geauga County generally only saw 4-8" total, maybe locally more in the extreme north but not widespread.  Cuyahoga County saw from an inch or two along the lake to 4-6" in far southern and also probably 4" or so in some of the hills east of 271.  A nice portion of Medina and western Summit Counties did well with a nice area getting 4-7" there.  In NW PA, it appears about the eastern 1/3 of inland Erie County and extreme NE Crawford County did manage storm totals of 8-14" give or take...Corry did get over a foot...but near I-79 and west as MAIDEsNOW can probably verify, it was very underwhelming.  Must've just been too much dry air even there...really wish we had decent radar in NW PA to see these events play out. 

GRR was also bullish on double digit totals for SWMI but it ended up a nice 4-8" event instead..you're not the only region that suffered that fate

[WestMichigan]

25 minutes ago, RogueWaves said:

GRR was also bullish on double digit totals for SWMI but it ended up a nice 4-8" event instead..you're not the only region that suffered that fate

I was supposed to get 10-14" and ended up with a trace so there were a lot of busts out there.

[dta1984]

Kind of interesting that as soon as the lake effect moved out, the clipper is beginning. Small flakes already.  Good returns out west. 

[NEOH]

3 minutes ago, dta1984 said:

Kind of interesting that as soon as the lake effect moved out, the clipper is beginning. Small flakes already.  Good returns out west. 

Yep, out with the LES and in with the synoptic. Snowing lightly in Chagrin under the weak returns. Must be mod to heavy under the better returns.

[RogueWaves]

1 hour ago, WestMichigan said:

I was supposed to get 10-14" and ended up with a trace so there were a lot of busts out there.

Yikes! So sorry for that mega-bust. Thought those were a thing of the past tbh. Tho LES is prolly the most challenging to nail. Hopefully, we'll get something to make up that loss later. Plus, we're all getting in on this decent clipper. - Cheers

[vpbob21]

Got 1.4" with the first part of this clipper.  Hopefully can tack on a little more this evening.

[NEOH]

CLE upgraded the Northeastern counties to a WSW. Looks like the back edge is about to push through. A nice moderate snow with the first batch. We'll see what happens tonight.

[dta1984]

Before the next round moves in my total stands at 6".   3.5 yesterday,  and the rest since this morning. 

[NEOH]

5.6" total from the clipper. The radar looked good when I went to bed... wonder if the heaviest snow fell south of here.

[dta1984]

18 minutes ago, NEOH said:

5.6" total from the clipper. The radar looked good when I went to bed... wonder if the heaviest snow fell south of here.

Is that just since last evening (not including the early morning and early afternoon rounds)? Didn't get a chance to measure this morning. 

[NEOH]

47 minutes ago, dta1984 said:

Is that just since last evening (not including the early morning and early afternoon rounds)? Didn't get a chance to measure this morning. 

My total includes an inch with the first wave yesterday afternoon, and I measured another 4.6" this morning.

[OHweather]

5.9" from the clipper...not sure I'll tack on any more with the LES to give me a 6" total.  Definitely not bad for a clipper! Have around 8" in the ground. 

[vpbob21]

Right around 5" for me.  Pleasantly surprised - felt like this system had major bust potential.

[dta1984]

1 hour ago, NEOH said:

My total includes an inch with the first wave yesterday afternoon, and I measured another 4.6" this morning.

Ok thanks!

Looks like some les starting... not sure how much it'll add up to.  

[Speedskater]

Just checking in from near Lakewood Park. At Noon I measured 5 inches.  Although Nick the young Meteorology student next door only saw 4½ inches.

[OHweather]

Really odd setup from Friday afternoon through Saturday, but it could produce warning criteria snows over parts of far NE Ohio or Erie County PA (famous last words, lol). 

First, a surface trough moves through Friday afternoon.  BUFKIT shows steep lapse rates and moisture to 7-8k feet and through the DGZ and a half decent vort max will accompany the surface trough, so a round of snow showers producing 0.5" to locally 1.5" of snow seems likely Friday afternoon/early evening.  Then it gets odd.

A wind shift will get hung up over the lake near the southern shore Friday night through Saturday.  The isobar pattern becomes oriented W-E or WNW-ESE which suggests the convergence band will affect Erie County, especially near the lake, and perhaps get into northern Ashtabula and northeastern Lake Counties.  Many of the 0z higher res models eventually get this into NE Ohio and possibly as far south as around 322 or so.  I'm honestly skeptical of this...the low-level cold over Canada will be strong, which does suggest the front/convergence surging south...however, the air will be modified by lakes Huron and Erie, and will be fighting rising mid-level heights and a weak pressure gradient north of the boundary, both of which argue against the boundary surging that far south. 

The location of this boundary is important because Friday night into early Saturday lake effect conditions will be favorable with good moisture and instability to 8-10k feet, which along with a long fetch and good convergence will support a moderate to heavy band.  Beginning late Friday night and through much of Saturday, mid-level isentropic lift (basically warm air advection) will occur over NE Ohio and NW PA, causing light synoptic snow to break out.  Lake effect conditions dwindle Saturday morning and become pretty weak by Saturday afternoon as the warming mid-levels cause the inversions and instability to lower, but where this convergent lake effect band is seeded by the synoptic snow it will likely remain moderate to heavy into Saturday afternoon before weakening by early evening.

All in all, the ingredients are in place for this lake enhanced band to produce heavy snow at times from Friday evening through early to mid Saturday afternoon, with some shots of lighter snow elsewhere.  This band may not move a ton and could produce warning criteria snows.  Given model biases to push these bands too far south and my concerns about a lack of "oomph" north of the boundary to push it and the band well inland, I suspect this will favor northeastern Ashtabula County and parts of Erie County (likely closer to the lake) for the best snow.  Elsewhere there could be 1-3" type amounts from the off and on synoptic snow.  This is a sensitive setup and may move around a lot, and it may be hard to get advisories or warnings out until Friday afternoon or evening...but will be interesting to see if it can play out somewhere.  

[NEOH]

It will be interesting to see how far south the band comes. The wrf-arw is the southern most at this point.

[NEOH]

The 12z WRF paints a snowy picture for lake, northern geauga and ashtabula. Once again the heaviest snows will be northeast of here, but they do show a little snow down this way.

[NEOH]

On 12/6/2017 at 2:29 PM, NEOH said:

Speaking of the lake cooling off. It will be interesting to compare lake temps another week from now. If the cold pans out the way the models are showing, I wouldn't be surprised to see some ice later next week in the western basin. Current temps --

 

Now that is just over a week since the cold set in here are the updated lake temps. Ice has formed near the shoreline around the western basin.

[OHweather]

36 minutes ago, NEOH said:

Now that is just over a week since the cold set in here are the updated lake temps. Ice has formed near the shoreline around the western basin.

We've gotten zero good events locally to show for it too, which is the worst.  Still some juice though and the lake temps should level off over the next week. 

[NEOH]

The snow should be gone in another day or two. Awful timing. Hopefully we'll see some positive trends in the models soon.

[dta1984]

5 hours ago, NEOH said:

The snow should be gone in another day or two. Awful timing. Hopefully we'll see some positive trends in the models soon.

One thing looks likely is that it will get really cold around Christmas.   Hopefully that leads to some le before freezing more of the lake.