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Summer Banter & General Discussion/Observations


CapturedNature

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Well, I went ahead and fired up the stove a couple hours ago--does not feel like June.  It felt like the last mowing in October when you don't really give a crap about the lawn anymore.....just trying to get it done.  I also spent much of the day working on the pool.  The seasons and the chores don't seem to bye synched.

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Probably had 10 different showers move through today of the orographic popcorn cell variety.  It rains for 5 minutes then might even be some blue sky, followed by another brief rain shower, repeat all day.  Not much actual rain but enough to make it miserable.

Hoping the heat doesn't kick on tonight. 

Yesterday was the nicest day in a long time.

2L8A2781_edited-2-2_zps0s2yrlvv.jpg

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11 minutes ago, powderfreak said:

Probably had 10 different showers move through today of the orographic popcorn cell variety.  It rains for 5 minutes then might even be some blue sky, followed by another brief rain shower, repeat all day.  Not much actual rain but enough to make it miserable.

Hoping the heat doesn't kick on tonight. 

Yesterday was the nicest day in a long time.

 

So I got a question for the mountain denizens...   

Is your green-up/leaf out more annually dictated by that year's climate, or does the vegetation seem to trigger around the same dates regardless?

I'm curious because it seems odd that we are on top of the June sun times of the year and the green-up in that image is like...half what it should be.  We are heading for winter in less than three weeks - 'course, it could just be that one image.  

Anyway it's not just all that.  There's definitely something very strange going on with the pattern this year, and I'm wondering if it's taken a toll on timing matters.  

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I can't wait to see NASA's montly press release about the state of the climate ...with their graphical anomalies product that depicts warm and cool regions. 

I bet there is going to be an impressive heat sink right over NE like no where else on the planet.   Not a tough gamble given persistence ... while not ever month, the vast majority of them going back 10 or 12 year's worth have tended to single this geographical region or near-enough by for that.  This just 'feels' like one of the more clear examples of that.  

Either that or GW just abruptly stopped - s'pose that's possible.

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I hope no one's complaining about 65 and sunny/dry weather ... Jesus. this really is just a support group/dumpster for people's baggage.  

Seriously, in the last three days I've posted some interesting meteorology and there's nothing.  Yet a steady stream of this b.s. S.A.D and -(S.A.D) crap.  Okay -

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26 minutes ago, Typhoon Tip said:

So I got a question for the mountain denizens...   

Is your green-up/leaf out more annually dictated by that year's climate, or does the vegetation seem to trigger around the same dates regardless?

I'm curious because it seems odd that we are on top of the June sun times of the year and the green-up in that image is like...half what it should be.  We are heading for winter in less than three weeks - 'course, it could just be that one image.  

Anyway it's not just all that.  There's definitely something very strange going on with the pattern this year, and I'm wondering if it's taken a toll on timing matters.  

I honestly haven't paid attention to green-up dates as much as I follow fall foliage dates but I think its pretty similar year to year in the spring, of course with some variation due to that season's weather.  I don't think it varies by more than a week or two though as like fall foliage, its mostly solar related.

Currently the green-up level is nearing 3,000ft.  Its full green below 2,500ft which is about halfway up the mountain to the 4,395ft summit and overall 4,000ft ridgeline. 

The growing season above 3,000ft is incredibly short for the most part.  There's still patches of natural snow up there (I saw a couple patches as low as 3,000ft this week at work).  I'm not sure if you saw my post earlier this week of the Mansfield COOP stake at 3,900ft which still had patchy snow around it.  That's perfectly normal this time of year as complete melt out often occurs around the first week of June on the COOP graph.

So think of it in terms of the growing season isn't going to really get going if there's snow on the ground, or at least the snow really disappeared in the upper mountain elevations just in the past couple weeks.  

Take right now, its 37F up there based on the MMNV1 reading, so its definitely going to take some time to get full-blown green-up at that high elevation areas. 

I do think its fairly normal this season though based on other climo indicators... but May being -2.5 from normal up this way certainly stunts the warm-up of the ground that allows for growing season to get going.  Soil temps are very slow to react up there, especially in a below normal regime.  I'm sure if it was +2.5 in May the green-up would be higher up on the mountain as the snow would've vacated earlier and allowed for the soil temps to start rising earlier in time.

But yeah, crazy to think those upper elevation leaves will start turning yellow in as soon as 3.5 months or so...the hardwoods right at the spruce line don't get a long growing season, that's for sure.

 

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16 minutes ago, Typhoon Tip said:

Can't totally disagree there. In fact I'm the HMT/intern/public service shift tonight even though I'm two grades above that job now. But we're down two interns and can't staff the balloon launches fully unless forecasters chip in. It's routine now to need OT shifts to fill in for vacancies. So in addition to working shift, we're also working more hours per week. With less time for the extra curricular duties like research, training, etc.

I was also one of the lucky ones in my recent promotion. Applied in June 2015, referred in early September 2015, interviewed 3 weeks later, offered the job in early October, not officially promoted until December 2015 (and I didn't even move offices!).

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50 minutes ago, powderfreak said:

Probably had 10 different showers move through today of the orographic popcorn cell variety.  It rains for 5 minutes then might even be some blue sky, followed by another brief rain shower, repeat all day.  Not much actual rain but enough to make it miserable.

For real lol

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Just now, OceanStWx said:

Can't totally disagree there. In fact I'm the HMT/intern/public service shift tonight even though I'm two grades above that job now. But we're down two interns and can't staff the balloon launches fully unless forecasters chip in. It's routine now to need OT shifts to fill in for vacancies. So in addition to working shift, we're also working more hours per week. With less time for the extra curricular duties like research, training, etc.

I was also one of the lucky ones in my recent promotion. Applied in June 2015, referred in early September 2015, interviewed 3 weeks later, offered the job in early October, not officially promoted until December 2015 (and I didn't even move offices!).

I've heard similar struggles from contacts at  BTV...stretched thin and exhausted after an active winter of forecasting.  I heard some low morale stories just because there really is no end in sight to the under-staffing.

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6 minutes ago, powderfreak said:

I've heard similar struggles from contacts at  BTV...stretched thin and exhausted after an active winter of forecasting.  I heard some low morale stories just because there really is no end in sight to the under-staffing.

They are worse off than us currently I think.

But we have a bit of an event horizon coming up. Half the office due to retire by 2019, sooner if Congress changes the retirement benefits. That's not feasible, literally we could not function 24/7. We'd be taking forecasters from neighboring WFOs or regional HQ.

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There is also a bit of smoke being blown by management officials about the hiring process. They blame WFMO, but jobs have always been hired through WFMO. Yes they have lost staff as well, but the NWS is playing just as many games by not announcing jobs for months (years?) after they become vacant.

Again myself as an example. The guy I replaced retired in September 2014. The vacancy wasn't announced until June 2015. Who did his job while he was retired? Me, for a lower salary.

I wonder why GAO found such low morale. ;)

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10 minutes ago, OceanStWx said:

2.1" for MWN so far today.

Damn.  Nice.  I knew the snow level couldn't be that much higher when it's bouncing around 37-39F and raining with even some frozen cores in the heavier cells.  Surprised not to see graupel though...had that popcorn cell look we get in October that starts dropping graupel. 

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It's tight everywhere. The private sector isn't much better.  I know for our field, we are at a unique crossroads where probability and eventually analytics may help with decision making, but this gets complicated when your customers still want deterministic outcomes. 

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1 minute ago, powderfreak said:

Damn.  Nice.  I knew the snow level couldn't be that much higher when it's bouncing around 37-39F and raining with even some frozen cores in the heavier cells.  Surprised not to see graupel though...had that popcorn cell look we get in October that starts dropping graupel. 

I thought I saw it spitting some here but it could've been big splashing drops too. MWN did report some GS and PL in addition to straight SN.

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1 minute ago, CoastalWx said:

It's tight everywhere. The private sector isn't much better.  I know for our field, we are at a unique crossroads where probability and eventually analytics may help with decision making, but this gets complicated when your customers still want deterministic outcomes. 

Every time we hit 'em with the fancy probably graphics: "So when is it going to start and stop, and how much are we going to get?"

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13 minutes ago, OceanStWx said:

Every time we hit 'em with the fancy probably graphics: "So when is it going to start and stop, and how much are we going to get?"

I know. They really want this stuff, but part of me worries about the decision making. I could go on and on about this. I like the idea if its done right and the customers are educated on this. 

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4 minutes ago, CoastalWx said:

I know. They really want this stuff, but part of me worries about the decision making. I could go on and on about this. I like the idea if its done right and the customers are educated on this. 

It's like with the SPC odds. "2% tornado risk is so low"

But when your climo is like 0.1% on any given day (I don't even know what it is around here), that's 20 times more likely.

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