Countdown to Winter 2018 -2019

[LibertyBell]

On 11/6/2018 at 10:07 AM, weathafella said:

I actually prefer the ground not be frozen.  Then a long snow cover can protect the soil underneath making for a possibly lush spring although I’m not sure it matters.

Whatever gets me the least allergies is preferred lol- last spring's allergy season was absolutely horrible.

[LibertyBell]

10 hours ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

Yea, all set with 2003-04....and 2013-14 for that matter. That season reminds me of 93-94 in that its overrated for this area.

the joy of 1993-94 (even down here) was that after all the years of suckage, we finally had a decent winter.  That was our first winter with more than 30 inches of snow since 1977-78 lol. It's also the last time that it got below zero here.

[LibertyBell]

15 hours ago, tamarack said:

We lived in the Jersey Highlands in the town of Kinnelon (named for Albert Kinney, whose Sweet Caporal cigarettes made him a fortune during the latter decades of the 19th century.)  Our place was at about 700' elevation, at Lat. 40.9766, Lon. 74.3702.  Below are the logs of 60-61 and 66-67 for our home (based on memory) and for Oak Ridge Reservoir (co-op records), about 9 miles west and 150' higher elev.

1960-61         Home      Oak Ridge                
12/11-12         18.0         14.0          Temps low-mid teens, nice for NJ deer season opener.  Giants-'Skins in DC trying to play on 8" powder. briefly lost fumble in snow piles.
12/17               2.0           2.0
12/20-21          2.0           3.0
12/29-30          3.0           4.0
1/1                  0.0           1.0
1/16-17            6.0           5.0         0.3" ZR Sunday afternoon, 6" on top that night.  Very surprised that school wasn't closed Monday.  They knew something?
1/19-20          20.0          24.0         The JFK inaugural storm.  1st time I saw accumulating snow at temps below 10°.
1/24                 1.0           2.0 
1/27                4.0            0.0         Fringed by major storm to east.  I think co-op missed reporting, as sites all around all had 2-4".
2/3-4              24.0          27.0        My 2' may be conservative, given 50 mph gusts.  Co-op reported 50" pack on 2/5 and site 10 mi. NW 52", probably near 45" at home.  NYC sub-32 1/19-2/3.
2/13                 1.0           0.0
2/16                1.0            2.0
3/1-2               1.5            1.5
3/9                  1.0            1.5
3/14                1.0            1.0
3/23                6.0           12.0      Surprised by paste bomb, most fell 8A-noon, had to walk the 5 miles from school.   Co-op probably didn't measure until its 7A obs time on 3/24, #settle/melt.
 4/1                 1.0            1.0
4/10                2.0            2.0
4/13-14           4.0            4.0      SN+ to rain overnight.
Total             104.5        101.0     With the apparent missed obs on 1/27, co-op would be about the same.

1966-67
12/14              7.0            7.0      Fluffy and moist, great for snowmen
12/21              7.0            6.0
12/24-25        15.0           13.0     Thundersnow, during SN+ mid-aft 24th.
12/29              2.0             1.0
1/6                  1.0            1.0
1/28-29           1.0            2.5
2/3                  1.0            1.5
2/6                  4.0            3.5     SN+ 5-9A with plunging temps.  Then 16-18 hours until the big dog.
2/7                 15.0          11.0     Snow at 6°, would not pack under dad's 4000 lb Pontiac "boat", so we couldn't push it up the hill from driveway.  Probably tallest pack of winter @ 18" +/-
2/10                1.0            1.0
2/18                1.5            1.0
2/21-22           3.0            4.0
2/23-24           5.0            5.5
2/28                1.5            0.5
3/5                  3.0            3.0
3/6-7               5.0            5.0     SN to ZR, 0.2"-0.3" accretion (rained too hard to accrete.)  Big snow BOS.
3/15-16           7.0            8.0     Any memory of this storm was obscured by the next 2 plus record cold.
3/17                6.0            4.5     1-3" clipper grew muscles.  Temp fell from 13 to 8 during 5 hours when most snow fell.   Barely got to 10° on 3/18, low of -3 (NYC 8) on 19th.
3/23               10.0           9.5     Started just after midnight, snowed thru the day.  Even NYC got 9.8".
4/24                1.5            2.0     Back end of cold coastal.
4/27                3.0            0.0     I think the co-op missed this one, too, as it fell 2-7A and other nearby sites had 1-3".
Total              100.5        90.5     I may have been too generous on the Christmas Eve and Feb. 7 storms, both windblown powder.
 

Tamarack- the Feb 1961 storm and the Feb 1969 storm were both undermeasured at Central Park.  They were both 2 foot events.... the Feb 1961 storm was measured at 24.1" at JFK even though it mixed over to sleet and freezing rain for a time.  There was just so much total precipitation (almost 3" LE) that the snowfall total was over 2 feet!

I understand what you mean by 1960-61 being better but that Christmas Eve 1966 snowstorms are what dreams are made of lol.

[CoastalWx]

15 hours ago, tamarack said:

We lived in the Jersey Highlands in the town of Kinnelon (named for Albert Kinney, whose Sweet Caporal cigarettes made him a fortune during the latter decades of the 19th century.)  Our place was at about 700' elevation, at Lat. 40.9766, Lon. 74.3702.  Below are the logs of 60-61 and 66-67 for our home (based on memory) and for Oak Ridge Reservoir (co-op records), about 9 miles west and 150' higher elev.

1960-61         Home      Oak Ridge                
12/11-12         18.0         14.0          Temps low-mid teens, nice for NJ deer season opener.  Giants-'Skins in DC trying to play on 8" powder. briefly lost fumble in snow piles.
12/17               2.0           2.0
12/20-21          2.0           3.0
12/29-30          3.0           4.0
1/1                  0.0           1.0
1/16-17            6.0           5.0         0.3" ZR Sunday afternoon, 6" on top that night.  Very surprised that school wasn't closed Monday.  They knew something?
1/19-20          20.0          24.0         The JFK inaugural storm.  1st time I saw accumulating snow at temps below 10°.
1/24                 1.0           2.0 
1/27                4.0            0.0         Fringed by major storm to east.  I think co-op missed reporting, as sites all around all had 2-4".
2/3-4              24.0          27.0        My 2' may be conservative, given 50 mph gusts.  Co-op reported 50" pack on 2/5 and site 10 mi. NW 52", probably near 45" at home.  NYC sub-32 1/19-2/3.
2/13                 1.0           0.0
2/16                1.0            2.0
3/1-2               1.5            1.5
3/9                  1.0            1.5
3/14                1.0            1.0
3/23                6.0           12.0      Surprised by paste bomb, most fell 8A-noon, had to walk the 5 miles from school.   Co-op probably didn't measure until its 7A obs time on 3/24, #settle/melt.
 4/1                 1.0            1.0
4/10                2.0            2.0
4/13-14           4.0            4.0      SN+ to rain overnight.
Total             104.5        101.0     With the apparent missed obs on 1/27, co-op would be about the same.

1966-67
12/14              7.0            7.0      Fluffy and moist, great for snowmen
12/21              7.0            6.0
12/24-25        15.0           13.0     Thundersnow, during SN+ mid-aft 24th.
12/29              2.0             1.0
1/6                  1.0            1.0
1/28-29           1.0            2.5
2/3                  1.0            1.5
2/6                  4.0            3.5     SN+ 5-9A with plunging temps.  Then 16-18 hours until the big dog.
2/7                 15.0          11.0     Snow at 6°, would not pack under dad's 4000 lb Pontiac "boat", so we couldn't push it up the hill from driveway.  Probably tallest pack of winter @ 18" +/-
2/10                1.0            1.0
2/18                1.5            1.0
2/21-22           3.0            4.0
2/23-24           5.0            5.5
2/28                1.5            0.5
3/5                  3.0            3.0
3/6-7               5.0            5.0     SN to ZR, 0.2"-0.3" accretion (rained too hard to accrete.)  Big snow BOS.
3/15-16           7.0            8.0     Any memory of this storm was obscured by the next 2 plus record cold.
3/17                6.0            4.5     1-3" clipper grew muscles.  Temp fell from 13 to 8 during 5 hours when most snow fell.   Barely got to 10° on 3/18, low of -3 (NYC 8) on 19th.
3/23               10.0           9.5     Started just after midnight, snowed thru the day.  Even NYC got 9.8".
4/24                1.5            2.0     Back end of cold coastal.
4/27                3.0            0.0     I think the co-op missed this one, too, as it fell 2-7A and other nearby sites had 1-3".
Total              100.5        90.5     I may have been too generous on the Christmas Eve and Feb. 7 storms, both windblown powder.
 

  Impressive logs from a young weenie. Good stuff. 

[LibertyBell]

On 11/8/2018 at 12:58 AM, CoastalWx said:

That's incredible for NNJ. What town was that in? I have seen pics of the drought here in 65-67ish timeframe. I know the local coop nearby only had 27" and change for precip in '67.

26 inches of total precip for all of 1966 for Central Park (JFK might have been even lower) and a stunning day when Central Park reached a high of 103, JFK hit 104 (hottest day ever there) and LGA hit 107 (hottest day ever there).  Four days with a high temp of 100 or higher, with 1 in June and 3 in July at JFK.

[LibertyBell]

18 hours ago, weathafella said:

I can vouch for the 1960-61 numbers.   Deep cover for 2 months straight.  We started with the 12/11-12/1960 blizzard. The JFK inaugural storm and the 2/3-4/61 mega dump bookended a stretch that is only surpassed in my lifetime by the 1/22/15-2/20/15 stretch in the Boston area.

2010-11 might have surpassed it in NYC as they had a 20" snowstorm on Boxing Day, a 19" snowstorm almost exactly a month later, and a 10" snowstorm in between, with no melting at all lol.  Long Island did even better with the inbetween storm, they had 20" with that, but only around a foot or a bit more with the first and last of the trio.

In 2010-11, like 1960-61, winter ended early, both in early February.

[LibertyBell]

10 hours ago, tamarack said:

60-61:  54.7"   66-67:  51.5"  In the 3 big storms (12/11-12, 1/19-20, 2/3-4) EWR totaled 56.7" while NYC got 42.5".

Across the river at EWR they did better:  72.6" in 60-61 and 57.3" in 66-67.

JFK also greater than 60 inches (I think 64) in 1960-61, not sure about 1966-67.

[LibertyBell]

2 hours ago, CoastalWx said:

March was cold, but again....lost potential. Just missed the big blizzard at the end of the month.  The winter as a whole was good from a total snow point of view, but too many cutters. As Powderfreak how January was. 

All Marches have been that way until March 2015 and especially March 2018 came along.  Even March 2003 was cold and dry.  I was starting to like early April better for snow here lol.  In 2003 January and March were cold and dry and December, February and April delivered the goods lol.  Last winter, it was January, March and April delivering the goods.  

[CoastalWx]

3 minutes ago, LibertyBell said:

All Marches have been that way until March 2015 and especially March 2018 came along.  Even March 2003 was cold and dry.  I was starting to like early April better for snow here lol.  In 2003 January and March were cold and dry and December, February and April delivered the goods lol.  Last year, it was January, March and April delivering the goods.  

March 2003 had a nice 9-12" storm to start the month. Our snow was basically Feb and Mar along the coast in 2002-2003, but some sprinkled in during Nov, Dec, Jan, and Apr.

[40/70 Benchmark]

6 hours ago, LibertyBell said:

the joy of 1993-94 (even down here) was that after all the years of suckage, we finally had a decent winter.  That was our first winter with more than 30 inches of snow since 1977-78 lol. It's also the last time that it got below zero here.

Yea, it was a nice winter....but my spot was a local minimum bc of the mixture of Ocean enhanced events and interior events that was uniquely engineered by ma nature to minimize snowfall in my locale.

My normal was like 62" and I had like 78" with no huge events.

Meh...was bitter cold, though.

[40/70 Benchmark]

6 hours ago, CoastalWx said:

  Impressive logs from a young weenie. Good stuff. 

Tamarack has a sneaky Will type recall of winter events.

[40/70 Benchmark]

16 hours ago, CoastalWx said:

Agree. 13-14 was fun, but snow was always torched away.

That is another season like 93-94 for me....yea, it looks okay on one of Will and Tamarack's spreadsheets...but left something to be desired for me....kind of a local minimum here with no huge events. And yes, I know huge events are rare for a reason....but if I'm going to hand out a grade A for a given season, it needs one.

[tamarack]

8 hours ago, LibertyBell said:

26 inches of total precip for all of 1966 for Central Park (JFK might have been even lower) and a stunning day when Central Park reached a high of 103, JFK hit 104 (hottest day ever there) and LGA hit 107 (hottest day ever there).  Four days with a high temp of 100 or higher, with 1 in June and 3 in July at JFK.

July 2-4, 1966 at NYC - 100, 103, 98.  Until 2010 came in a bit hotter, met summer 1966 was both hottest and driest on record there.  After the record shatteringly dry 1965 - more than 6" less than 2nd driest year - 1966 was on track to challenge for #1, only 0.72" wetter thru August.  Then a 5-year drought essentially ended on a single day (5.54" on 9/21) though we didn't realize it at the time.

[michsnowfreak]

18 hours ago, LibertyBell said:

I've seen that too, crazy thing is everything is either like 1-3" or 10"+ lmao, a midrange snow event is about as rare as a midrange jump shot in an NBA game.  Which brings up an interesting question, would most snowlovers like frequent moderate sized events or two or three total events for the entire winter of double digit totals?  If it's two I might just go for the more frequent moderate sized events, but if we're talking about three double digit events spaced nicely across the whole winter (like 1960-61 for us) I would go for that.

We get lots of midrange size snow events.  As someone who enjoys the length of Winter and all that encompasses the season, not to mention it's the climate I am used to, I have to go with frequent moderate sized events. I'm always jealous when a massive nor'easte slams the northeast, but  I would be lost without the frequency of snowfall we get in the Great Lakes lol.  The Winter of 2013-14 was the most severe Winter this area had ever seen, it was just a constant assault of one snowstorm after another, constant brutal cold, and never ending deep snowpack. Yet the biggest single storm that Winter was around a foot.

[LibertyBell]

4 hours ago, michsnowfreak said:

We get lots of midrange size snow events.  As someone who enjoys the length of Winter and all that encompasses the season, not to mention it's the climate I am used to, I have to go with frequent moderate sized events. I'm always jealous when a massive nor'easte slams the northeast, but  I would be lost without the frequency of snowfall we get in the Great Lakes lol.  The Winter of 2013-14 was the most severe Winter this area had ever seen, it was just a constant assault of one snowstorm after another, constant brutal cold, and never ending deep snowpack. Yet the biggest single storm that Winter was around a foot.

I wouldn't mind that either.  I did like 2014-15 better around here because although the winter got off to a late start it was super snowy from Jan 20 - Mar 20.  2013-14 for us was frequent events with thaws in between while February 2015 was wall to wall snow and arctic cold.

[LibertyBell]

14 hours ago, tamarack said:

July 2-4, 1966 at NYC - 100, 103, 98.  Until 2010 came in a bit hotter, met summer 1966 was both hottest and driest on record there.  After the record shatteringly dry 1965 - more than 6" less than 2nd driest year - 1966 was on track to challenge for #1, only 0.72" wetter thru August.  Then a 5-year drought essentially ended on a single day (5.54" on 9/21) though we didn't realize it at the time.

Yes that 2010 summer was my all time favorite, actually the period from 2009-2016 was amazing here with hurricanes, earthquakes, tornadoes, blizzards, record setting heat and record setting cold, and record setting precip.  2010-11 going from an amazingly hot summer to an extremely cold and snowy winter was particularly great.  And then we had an earthquake and a hurricane the following summer after another record setting heat spell in July 2011 when we hit 104 degrees.  Newark hit a Desert SW like 108 degrees (their all time record by 3 degrees)!  I think it hit 105 in Baltimore for the weather conference which was timed perfectly for that heatwave lol.

Yes oops that was 1965 with the 26" inches of rain for the whole year!  Funny thing is 1965-66 was an el nino year- you'd expect 1966 to be wetter, but it wasn't until very late.

[LibertyBell]

16 hours ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

Yea, it was a nice winter....but my spot was a local minimum bc of the mixture of Ocean enhanced events and interior events that was uniquely engineered by ma nature to minimize snowfall in my locale.

My normal was like 62" and I had like 78" with no huge events.

Meh...was bitter cold, though.

Yeah that was rather bothersome it was much more of an interior winter.  There were no huge historic type events either, there were just regular twice a week snow/ice events.  I'll never forget that 2" ice storm in early January.  Never saw anything like that before or since.  When the sun came out on a quiet Saturday morning after it was over it looked like a world made of crystal lol.  All night it had been raining with temps in the teens.  That was 2 inches of ice on top of 2 inches of sleet on top of 2 inches of snow from previous events.  An axe couldn't make a dent through that glacier- you just had to wait for it to melt.  And you could easily walk on it without making any footprints.  That was another one of those extreme heat summers to extreme cold/snowy winters....it hit 100-102 three days in a row here the previous July and even 80 degrees as late as November 15 (latest ever) the day after the marathon.  A nice foreshadowing for 1995-96 when we had the same kind of extreme heat summer (with forest fires in August) to snowy/cold winter- but much more in the way of snow that time and not ice.

 

[LibertyBell]

23 hours ago, CoastalWx said:

March 2003 had a nice 9-12" storm to start the month. Our snow was basically Feb and Mar along the coast in 2002-2003, but some sprinkled in during Nov, Dec, Jan, and Apr.

Yes that was one of our longest winters.  I put that up there with 1995-96 as two of my favorite winters for being wall to wall snow (plus both had historic events to boot)!

[LibertyBell]

16 hours ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

That is another season like 93-94 for me....yea, it looks okay on one of Will and Tamarack's spreadsheets...but left something to be desired for me....kind of a local minimum here with no huge events. And yes, I know huge events are rare for a reason....but if I'm going to hand out a grade A for a given season, it needs one.

Ironic thing was both were followed by Grade A historic seasons (though one was two winters later lol).... 1993-94 to 1995-96 and 2013-14 to 2014-15

[michsnowfreak]

4 hours ago, LibertyBell said:

I wouldn't mind that either.  I did like 2014-15 better around here because although the winter got off to a late start it was super snowy from Jan 20 - Mar 20.  2013-14 for us was frequent events with thaws in between while February 2015 was wall to wall snow and arctic cold.

2013-14 was a severe winter everywhere in the midwest and lakes but Detroit was ground zero. Snowiest winter on record, dethroning 1880-81, and one of the coldest on record as well. Wall to wall. A cold november with several light snows, but once the ground got covered in early December we would not go bare again till the end of March, snowbank's lasted in places till the beginning of May (ice up north on Lake superior did not melt until well into June). 2014-15 actually had a bigger storm (16.7" on February 1st), and a colder month (February which was either the coldest or 2nd coldest February on record at every Midwest climate station, the only one to challenge that was 1875), but winter as a whole was not nearly as severe as the year before. Other than that big storm, the snows were frequent but light. Not the parade seen on the east coast.

 

Extremes aside, while 6-12" storms are common, to get a storm over a foot here everything, and i mean EVERYTHING, has to go right. Perfect track and an unusual amount of moisture from the gulf. On the flip side, it snows in pretty much any pattern, so theres rarely a snowless pattern in place for more than a week in any winter. First measursble snowfall of the season yesterday, so now im in full winter mode. ❄❄❄

[weathafella]

On 11/9/2018 at 1:27 AM, LibertyBell said:

the joy of 1993-94 (even down here) was that after all the years of suckage, we finally had a decent winter.  That was our first winter with more than 30 inches of snow since 1977-78 lol. It's also the last time that it got below zero here.

Wow!  How did NYC do in 1992-93?   BOS had 83.9.  

[EastonSN+]

2 hours ago, weathafella said:

Wow!  How did NYC do in 1992-93?   BOS had 83.9.  

24.5.

Attached is the historic NYC table. 80s were brutal down there.

monthlyseasonalsnowfall (1).pdf

[Go Kart Mozart]

40 minutes ago, EastonSN+ said:

24.5.

Attached is the historic NYC table. 80s were brutal down there.

monthlyseasonalsnowfall (1).pdf

Interesting.  Single digit dead ratters have existed since the records began.

[Snowstorms]

4 hours ago, weathafella said:

Wow!  How did NYC do in 1992-93?   BOS had 83.9.  

That winter, albeit I was born one-two years later, per historic records was also great up here. Toronto recorded 64.1". How much did BOS get in the historic March storm? 

[40/70 Benchmark]

Did we ever get precise numbers for the SAI and SCE?

[weathafella]

On 11/10/2018 at 12:03 PM, Snowstorms said:

That winter, albeit I was born one-two years later, per historic records was also great up here. Toronto recorded 64.1". How much did BOS get in the historic March storm? 

BOS got about a foot due to a changeover.  Inland got buried.  And there was about another 15 inches to go for the season.  If you looked at the indicators it’s a miracle we had above normal snow let alone a top 10 season.

[LibertyBell]

12 hours ago, weathafella said:

BOS got about a foot due to a changeover.  Inland got buried.  And there was about another 15 inches to go for the season.  If you looked at the indicators it’s a miracle we had above normal snow let alone a top 10 season.

1992-93 was notable for the most severe and longest duration noreaster I've ever experienced (Dec 1992) that was worse than any hurricane I've seen around here pre Sandy, but we only got  a bit of snow at the tail end from it, March 1993 was a foot of snow before the changeover.  All in all, if you go by total snowfall, it was an average winter, but the coastal storms were really extreme-but nothing that was all snow.

[LibertyBell]

12 hours ago, weathafella said:

BOS got about a foot due to a changeover.  Inland got buried.  And there was about another 15 inches to go for the season.  If you looked at the indicators it’s a miracle we had above normal snow let alone a top 10 season.

Wow that was the last accumulating snow for us that I remember.

[LibertyBell]

On 11/10/2018 at 6:08 AM, michsnowfreak said:

2013-14 was a severe winter everywhere in the midwest and lakes but Detroit was ground zero. Snowiest winter on record, dethroning 1880-81, and one of the coldest on record as well. Wall to wall. A cold november with several light snows, but once the ground got covered in early December we would not go bare again till the end of March, snowbank's lasted in places till the beginning of May (ice up north on Lake superior did not melt until well into June). 2014-15 actually had a bigger storm (16.7" on February 1st), and a colder month (February which was either the coldest or 2nd coldest February on record at every Midwest climate station, the only one to challenge that was 1875), but winter as a whole was not nearly as severe as the year before. Other than that big storm, the snows were frequent but light. Not the parade seen on the east coast.

 

Extremes aside, while 6-12" storms are common, to get a storm over a foot here everything, and i mean EVERYTHING, has to go right. Perfect track and an unusual amount of moisture from the gulf. On the flip side, it snows in pretty much any pattern, so theres rarely a snowless pattern in place for more than a week in any winter. First measursble snowfall of the season yesterday, so now im in full winter mode. ❄❄❄

I'm in the mountains of NE PA for the weekend and my pond froze over (only at the top though) and we had our first snowflakes of the season Friday and Saturday with snow squalls that coated everything with the sky only partly cloudy lol.

Wow 2013-14 for you was like 1995-96 for us and February 2015 was one of the coldest months on record for pretty much all of us.  Similar to February 1934 for here, except no -15 lows lol.

[LibertyBell]

On 11/10/2018 at 10:27 AM, Go Kart Mozart said:

Interesting.  Single digit dead ratters have existed since the records began.

Crazy thing is looking at Long Island snowfall over the past 10 years, there's only been one below average and 9 out of 10 had 36" or more and besides the one three foot snowfall winter, all the other ones are well over 40"+