January Banter String

[dtk]

8 minutes ago, WxWatcher007 said:

We need snow.

Meh.  I'm rooting for another shutout.

[mappy]

Just now, T. August said:

Ahhh yes, of course, my comments can be chalked up to my age and immaturity.

I don't know, maybe. You described yourself that way a few pages ago... 

[mappy]

2 minutes ago, Bob Chill said:

That's not really the issue. The euro has been unusually inconsistent in the 72 hour window this year and even more jumpy at 96 hours. It's not just a single instance either. It's been a bit of a repetitive theme. Exact reasons can be debated. The fact that it's happening can't. 

It's not your issue, Bob. You are far more knowledgeable than most on this forum, so if you say the euro 'sucks' its because of its inconsistencies these days. Others, however, and which my comment was directed to, are simply whining because it took away the most snow that it had for their backyards. And you know that's true. 

[dtk]

2 minutes ago, Bob Chill said:

That's not really the issue. The euro has been unusually inconsistent in the 72 hour window this year and even more jumpy at 96 hours. It's not just a single instance either. It's been a bit of a repetitive theme. Exact reasons can be debated. The fact that it's happening can't. 

I don't dispute this and wish I had more time to dig into some dprog/dt diagnostics to see what can be learned.  The resolution argument is interesting, but ECMWF has been at its current resolution for almost two years now and I don't think that they have made substantive changes to the DA that would result in that kind of behavior.

[Mrs.J]

29 minutes ago, gymengineer said:

That really was the oddest closing day I’ve ever seen. A forecast of 1-2”, verifying as an inch or less, closed every single school system. I’d think the school systems go back to 1-2” being a 2-hr delay. 

I mean I get it to a point. Some of the mountain roads up here can get bad with just a dusting, but literally we saw only a dusting in my area and the roads were more than passable. I will just never get used to a countywide system. I grew up in NW Ohio with city and rural districts. When it snowed enough the cities got the stuff plowed and the rural districts could close. That and where I grew up people are taught how to drive in snow. I have grown to understand that it will never be that way here.

[SomeguyfromTakomaPark]

Just now, Mrs.J said:

I mean I get it to a point. Some of the mountain roads up here can get bad with just a dusting, but literally we saw only a dusting in my area and the roads were more than passable. I will just never get used to a countywide system. I grew up in NW Ohio with city and rural districts. When it snowed enough the cities got the stuff plowed and the rural districts could close. That and where I grew up people are taught how to drive in snow. I have grown to understand that it will never be that way here.

Yeah I grew up in the Hudson valley of ny state and our school would generally close for 4-5+ inches if it snowed near the time of arrival/dismissal.  1-3 inches wasn’t even worth checking the radio for.  It’s amazing how 1/4-1 inch of snow a couple weeks ago shut down everything for, and in some cases for multiple days.  Also, we never EVER got the “day after” delay that is standard operating procedure around here.  But as you say we had better road clearing and more people have 4WD vehicles or snow tires. 

[T. August]

7 minutes ago, mappy said:

I don't know, maybe. You described yourself that way a few pages ago... 

That was more centered around my sense of humor, but that’s fine. We’re good

[Bob Chill]

8 minutes ago, dtk said:

I don't dispute this and wish I had more time to dig into some dprog/dt diagnostics to see what can be learned.  The resolution argument is interesting, but ECMWF has been at its current resolution for almost two years now and I don't think that they have made substantive changes to the DA that would result in that kind of behavior.

When you brought up the date of the upgrade it made me think.... last year didn't really test much because we never had anything legitimate inside of 96 hours. LOL. All globals (except the UKMET) screwed up the midlevels with the march storm but other than that event there was really not much to watch transition from the mid to short range. This year has been much more active. End results aren't much different but the activity level is head and shoulders above last year. 

I can see how higher res can help multiply errors out in time. Makes complete sense. What's weird is high res with the globals is supposed to make them better in the medium range because that's one of the most important functions of a global model. You'll never hear me complain and act dumb when things go haywire on ops outside of 4 days because that's the end of their useful range for sensible wx with synoptic events. Beyond that ensemble means are the way to go. Which brings up another issue with the euro... the ensembles have been doing weird things too. Lots of "group think" in the medium range. GEFS has been really bad about that but it's acknowledged that there are issue with spread in the GEFS. But the EPS isn't much better with the "bouncing clusters" every 12 hours in the d3-7 range. 

Maybe I think too much. Maybe I look at too many weather models...well...I definitely look at too many weather models...lol. Maybe it's just a difficult pattern. That could be the root of it. Or just a combination of everything causing obvious deviations from past performance in our specific region. It's gone beyond coincidence at this point though. There's something to it. 

[Jebman]

This part of the country full scale panics over half an inch of snow.

[Mrs.J]

2 minutes ago, DCTeacherman said:

Yeah I grew up in the Hudson valley of ny state and our school would generally close for 4-5+ inches if it snowed near the time of arrival/dismissal.  1-3 inches wasn’t even worth checking the radio for.  It’s amazing how 1/4-1 inch of snow a couple weeks ago shut down everything for, and in some cases for multiple days.  Also, we never EVER got the “day after” delay that is standard operating procedure around here.  But as you say we had better road clearing and more people have 4WD vehicles or snow tires. 

Know exactly what you are saying. Parents have become accustomed to the "day after" delay. And if they don't get it they put up a stink. FCPS twitter and FB feed is full of people thinking they can do a better job. I never had a 4WD or snow tires when I learned how to drive. My dad took me to an empty parking lot taught me how to do donuts and how to get out of them. Now I have a AWD because I just want to get away from everyone else. 

[Jebman]

Dry snow is not hard to drive on. Its that WET snow that is so damn slippery.

Once dry snow gets all packed down, you are good to go.

[H2O]

dtk coming in to talk models is like Bill Cowher coming to tell us why the Pats are good every year

[SomeguyfromTakomaPark]

3 minutes ago, Mrs.J said:

Know exactly what you are saying. Parents have become accustomed to the "day after" delay. And if they don't get it they put up a stink. FCPS twitter and FB feed is full of people thinking they can do a better job. I never had a 4WD or snow tires when I learned how to drive. My dad took me to an empty parking lot taught me how to do donuts and how to get out of them. Now I have a AWD because I just want to get away from everyone else. 

I am actually one of the few people in the dc area with snow tires.  I bought a set cause I drive the whole family up to Davis 3-5 times a winter in a 2WD and I was getting sick of rooting for snow, then having white knuckle harrowing drives to get to the places we wanted to ski/snowshoe and then getting stuck on hills or in parking lots. It’s amazing what a difference they make. I drove up in a blizzard last year and my car handled great. 

[H2O]

16 minutes ago, dtk said:

I don't dispute this and wish I had more time to dig into some dprog/dt diagnostics to see what can be learned.  The resolution argument is interesting, but ECMWF has been at its current resolution for almost two years now and I don't think that they have made substantive changes to the DA that would result in that kind of behavior.

Well not to get political(but this will be) maybe there is a reason why the people running the Euro have screwed with what is shown around DC. We all know how liked the guy at 1600 Penn Ave is in Europe. 

Its just mean to make the rest of us suffer. 

[dtk]

6 minutes ago, Bob Chill said:

When you brought up the date of the upgrade it made me think.... last year didn't really test much because we never had anything legitimate inside of 96 hours. LOL. All globals (except the UKMET) screwed up the midlevels with the march storm but other than that event there was really not much to watch transition from the mid to short range. This year has been much more active. End results aren't much different but the activity level is head and shoulders above last year. 

I can see how higher res can help multiply errors out in time. Makes complete sense. What's weird is high res with the globals is supposed to make them better in the medium range because that's one of the most important functions of a global model. You'll never hear me complain and act dumb when things go haywire on ops outside of 4 days because that's the end of their useful range for sensible wx with synoptic events. Beyond that ensemble means are the way to go. Which brings up another issue with the euro... the ensembles have been doing weird things too. Lots of "group think" in the medium range. GEFS has been really bad about that but it's acknowledged that there are issue with spread in the GEFS. But the EPS isn't much better with the "bouncing clusters" every 12 hours in the d3-7 range. 

Maybe I think too much. Maybe I look at too many weather models...well...I definitely look at too many weather models...lol. Maybe it's just a difficult pattern. That could be the root of it. Or just a combination of everything causing obvious deviations from past performance in our specific region. It's gone beyond coincidence at this point though. There's something to it. 

I appreciate the insight.  To be honest, I'm often looking ahead and testing one or two upgrades ahead.  I don't get as much of a chance as I would like to pay attention to the real-time, currently operational models.  

On resolution:  Yeah, it's a bit paradoxical.  On the one hand, we absolutely need the resolution in order to better represent certain processes in the atmosphere.  Some of our biggest gains in skill have come from resolution increases along with their associated physics changes.  On the other hand, we know that error growth behavior can be different and we need to worry about errors at the higher frequencies cascading up to the large scales.

Ensemble:  With the ECMWF ensemble, are you simply saying that it appears underdispersive when you reference "group think"?  Or just that you see it bouncing from from one cycle to the next.  The GEFS does have issues, and there are some good things coming once we transition to the FV3-based global system; most notably a significantly different treatment of the representation of "model error" in the integration.

Finally, on the pattern:  this one is difficult to quantify, but the skill coming from the frozen systems seem to suggest that this current season is on par in terms of predictability for what we'd expect this time of year.  

[T. August]

1 minute ago, H2O said:

Well not to get political(but this will be) maybe there is a reason why the people running the Euro have screwed with what is shown around DC. We all know how liked the guy at 1600 Penn Ave is in Europe. 

Its just mean to make the rest of us suffer. 

Everyone loves him. I heard him say it the other day...

[dtk]

4 minutes ago, H2O said:

Well not to get political(but this will be) maybe there is a reason why the people running the Euro have screwed with what is shown around DC. We all know how liked the guy at 1600 Penn Ave is in Europe. 

Its just mean to make the rest of us suffer. 

If they took the forecasts from our model seriously, I would get to work on returning the favor.

[mitchnick]

5 minutes ago, H2O said:

Well not to get political(but this will be) maybe there is a reason why the people running the Euro have screwed with what is shown around DC. We all know how liked the guy at 1600 Penn Ave is in Europe. 

Its just mean to make the rest of us suffer. 

For those of us who own stocks, it's one big grin all the way to the bank and back. 

[T. August]

Just now, mitchnick said:

For those of us who own stocks, it's one big grin all the way to the bank and back. 

Yepper, congrats Mitch lol.

[H2O]

Enjoy no snow for 4 years then

[H2O]

Money isn’t everything 

[WxUSAF]

4 minutes ago, dtk said:

I appreciate the insight.  To be honest, I'm often looking ahead and testing one or two upgrades ahead.  I don't get as much of a chance as I would like to pay attention to the real-time, currently operational models.  

On resolution:  Yeah, it's a bit paradoxical.  On the one hand, we absolutely need the resolution in order to better represent certain processes in the atmosphere.  Some of our biggest gains in skill have come from resolution increases along with their associated physics changes.  On the other hand, we know that error growth behavior can be different and we need to worry about errors at the higher frequencies cascading up to the large scales.

Ensemble:  With the ECMWF ensemble, are you simply saying that it appears underdispersive when you reference "group think"?  Or just that you see it bouncing from from one cycle to the next.  The GEFS does have issues, and there are some good things coming once we transition to the FV3-based global system; most notably a significantly different treatment of the representation of "model error" in the integration.

Finally, on the pattern:  this one is difficult to quantify, but the skill coming from the frozen systems seem to suggest that this current season is on par in terms of predictability for what we'd expect this time of year.  

I’ll answer for Bob and say, yes, the  ensembles seem notably nondispersive. Maybe it is just anecdotal, but it seems particularly a parent with the GEFS but even happens with the EPS. Again, this is probably just anecdotal but it seems that in the past for a given system you have a true range of options in the ensembles, particularly after day 4. 

[showmethesnow]

3 minutes ago, mitchnick said:

For those of us who own stocks, it's one big grin all the way to the bank and back. 

Yeah, it has been a very good run. But the market is substantially over valued at this point and when the correction comes I think we are going to see a steep adjustment. In many ways this reminds me of the housing bubble just a few years ago.

[dtk]

2 minutes ago, WxUSAF said:

I’ll answer for Bob and say, yes, the  ensembles seem notably nondispersive. Maybe it is just anecdotal, but it seems particularly a parent with the GEFS but even happens with the EPS. Again, this is probably just anecdotal but it seems that in the past for a given system you have a true range of options in the ensembles, particularly after day 4. 

Yeah, it's a huge problem with the GEFS and we get complaints from the regions all the time.  There is lots of work ongoing to address this in the next GEFS upgrade (v12).  Interesting that it's being observed in the EPS for certain events.

[mitchnick]

1 minute ago, H2O said:

Enjoy no snow for 4 years then

 

 

1 minute ago, H2O said:

Money isn’t everything 

I think research has found for years that most people still vote their pocketbooks. 

[mitchnick]

2 minutes ago, showmethesnow said:

Yeah, it has been a very good run. But the market is substantially over valued at this point and when the correction comes I think we are going to see a steep adjustment. In many ways this reminds me of the housing bubble just a few years ago.

The over valued argument has been around for a couple years. It is a momentum market, that I'll concede.  The only way to play it is by placing your finger next to the sell button and don't worry about missing the absolute top when you sell.

[showmethesnow]

Just now, mitchnick said:

The over valued argument has been around for a couple years. It is a momentum market, that I'll concede.  The only way to play it is by placing your finger next to the sell button and don't worry about missing the absolute top when you sell.

Have the finger on the button myself. Until then I will milk it for everything I can get.

[WxUSAF]

27 minutes ago, dtk said:

Yeah, it's a huge problem with the GEFS and we get complaints from the regions all the time.  There is lots of work ongoing to address this in the next GEFS upgrade (v12).  Interesting that it's being observed in the EPS for certain events.

Been several times this year that the euro op has teased us with a D6+ storm and the EPS suddenly provides seemingly strong support for such long leads only to have it vaporize 12 hours later. 

[WhiteoutMD]

This might not even make it to WWA for most just a special Weather statement


.

[usedtobe]

18 minutes ago, WxUSAF said:

Been several times this year that the euro op has teased us with a D6+ storm and the EPS suddenly provides seemingly strong support for such long leads only to have it vaporize 12 hours later. 

The bad thing is it the Euro EPS almost did it at 72 hours and supported the Euro idea of a 500hlow closing off to our south.  I used to have faith in the euro ensembles but now not so much.