March 11-12 Storm - Model Discussion STORM MODE

[clskinsfan]

As a consolation prize the GFS just crushes Boston. They are in the perfect spot for the heaviest banding as well.

[Bob Chill]

25 minutes ago, Ian said:

This one had plenty of red flags just like everything else this winter. I thought the pattern was working things out.. it seemed to in other places. This is bad luck for us as much as anything else esp if we get through this pattern with almost nothing. But at the same time Ninas generally blow. Silly interests we have. 

I have a rule of thumb that we need 4 legit chances to score 1 event. That seems consistent in almost all years except for lottery years like 13-14. We went 3 out of 4 start to finish. 

Nearly every single one of our events has flags and flaws. Plenty of then have worked out even with flaws and flags. This year was unique. I've been active on the forums since 2006 and no year has performed like this one. Sure, we get terrible years but they are well advertised week in week out. This year was basically loaded door to door except for a couple weeks here and there. The sheer amount of chances should have put all of us to 50-75% of climo. Uncanny bad luck. It's the antithesis of 13-14.

[clskinsfan]

Just now, Bob Chill said:

I have a rule of thumb that we need 4 legit chances to score 1 event. That seems consistent in almost all years except for lottery years like 13-14. We went 3 out of 4 start to finish. 

Nearly every single one of our events has flags and flaws. Plenty of then have worked out even with flaws and flags. This year was unique. I've been active on the forums since 2006 and no year has performed like this one. Sure, we get terrible years but they are well advertised week in week out. This year was basically loaded door to door except for a couple weeks here and there. The sheer amount of chances should have put all of us over 50% climo. Uncanny bad luck. It's the antithesis of 13-14.

And to make it worse we had the cold for long enough stretches to just luck into a couple of events. You guys did actually. We never did out here. Just a very frustrating winter all around.

[Ian]

2 minutes ago, Bob Chill said:

I have a rule of thumb that we need 4 legit chances to score 1 event. That seems consistent in almost all years except for lottery years like 13-14. We went 3 out of 4 start to finish. 

Nearly every single one of our events has flags and flaws. Plenty of then have worked out even with flaws and flags. This year was unique. I've been active on the forums since 2006 and no year has performed like this one. Sure, we get terrible years but they are well advertised week in week out. This year was basically loaded door to door except for a couple weeks here and there. The sheer amount of chances should have put all of us over 50% climo. Uncanny bad luck. It's the antithesis of 13-14.

Yeah it's been a rough one all around. Pretty rare to go through such a lengthy cold pattern with very little to show. And it seemed we were off to a good start early.  My outlook was actually not bad on temps and progression but I for some reason also thought we'd finish near/slightly above avg snow. Derp derp. 

[HighStakes]

1 minute ago, clskinsfan said:

And to make it worse we had the cold for long enough stretches to just luck into a couple of events. You guys did actually. We never did out here. Just a very frustrating winter all around.

It's really hard to believe especially out your way. It's worse than bad luck for snow lovers. For your location it's simply improbable.

[Bob Chill]

6 minutes ago, Ian said:

Yeah it's been a rough one all around. Pretty rare to go through such a lengthy cold pattern with very little to show. And it seemed we were off to a good start early.  My outlook was actually not bad on temps and progression but I for some reason also thought we'd finish near/slightly above avg snow. Derp derp. 

Is what it is but I'll quick try and forget this year once warmth starts moving in. The really hard part is places really close did pretty well. Cambridge and Ches Beach for example. They lucked in no problem. We had a literal atmospheric snow shield. It almost feels like it was engineered and not random. If it was it was definitely somehow related to Ji. 

Maybe we do well with storms this spring. I'm already looking forward to your posts about good storm setups. 

[87storms]

18 minutes ago, Bob Chill said:

I have a rule of thumb that we need 4 legit chances to score 1 event. That seems consistent in almost all years except for lottery years like 13-14. We went 3 out of 4 start to finish. 

Nearly every single one of our events has flags and flaws. Plenty of then have worked out even with flaws and flags. This year was unique. I've been active on the forums since 2006 and no year has performed like this one. Sure, we get terrible years but they are well advertised week in week out. This year was basically loaded door to door except for a couple weeks here and there. The sheer amount of chances should have put all of us to 50-75% of climo. Uncanny bad luck. It's the antithesis of 13-14.

i still think we had a bit of a crappy southern stream, though you would have thought we could have scored on a few of these clippers.  it also feels like we had a split flow going.  it would get cold, then we'd get a clipper traveling to our north lol.  that's what makes this event a little frustrating in that we have a vort going under us this time, but that southern stream just wants to take these systems too far east.  kinda similar to the one that va beach cashed in on.  i think it was bad luck, but also kinda just the way the pattern was this year for reasons beyond my skillset.

[psuhoffman]

24 minutes ago, BTRWx's Thanks Giving said:

The NAO is almost positive now.  It barely dropped past -1 all month.

eta: ~-1.5 min

This is right now. 

that's a good Rex block. Maybe a bit south of ideal and maybe that's why the upper low dives under is before booking back in. Maybe if the block wasn't so extreme it would track over us. But that's another debate. 

Your using a meaningless number based on an index that isn't all that relevant to our snow chances. Surface derived nao calculations are based on sea level pressure differences between Iceland and the azores. First that measures the wrong level as h5 is way more important to our pattern. Second that measures an east based nao way more then a west based which is better for us. 

You have to look at the pattern and where the ridging is and his strong it is to determine if the blocking is good for us or not. Your citing an irrelevant number to the point your trying to make. 

[BTRWx's Thanks Giving]

1 minute ago, 87storms said:

i still think we had a bit of a crappy southern stream, though you would have thought we could have scored on a few of these clippers.  it also feels like we had a split flow going.  it would get cold, then we'd get a clipper traveling to our north lol.  that's what makes this event a little frustrating in that we have a vort going under us this time, but that southern stream just wants to take these systems toofar east.  kinda similar to the one that va beach cashed in on.  i think it was bad luck, but also kinda just the way the pattern was this year for reasons beyond my skillset.

There's no luck about physical processes.

[ers-wxman1]

It wouldn’t be so painful if pretty much every state surrounding us didn’t do so well. I echo Bob’s sentiment.

[psuhoffman]

2 minutes ago, WeathermanB said:

How can the NAM not give Delaware any snow but south and northeast it DOES? This storm is pathetic. This winter is sh*t.

Just like your posts 

[poolz1]

I feel like every winter puts another notch on the belt....Different ways to fail go into the memory bank.  We knew the big picture was not looking positive coming into this season but it still doesnt take away the sting from missing discrete events.  Fortunately, this hobby usually bleeds into different interests during the warm season...hiking, fishing, camping, gardening....Lick our wounds and return next fall to do it all over again. 

[BristowWx]

1 minute ago, WeathermanB said:

How can the NAM not give Delaware any snow but south and northeast it DOES? This storm is pathetic. This winter is sh*t.

Yeah I’m starting to think this storm won’t materilaze for the MA but I thought Delaware would have a chance.  Now I feel even worse.  

[87storms]

2 minutes ago, BTRWx's Thanks Giving said:

There's no luck about physical processes.

i think we got unlucky with those clippers (those may require some luck), but the southern stream was weak.  no miller a's to speak of that i recall.  crappy atlantic playing a role to keep the gulf from being open longer?  who knows.

[Cobalt]

Just now, WeathermanB said:

I'm done for the winter, now looking forward to lovely summer heat.

You're one to complain. How much snow have you gotten this winter anyways?

[WeathermanB]

 

1 minute ago, Cobalt said:

You're one to complain. How much snow have you gotten this winter anyways

I'm gonna take this to banter.

[WEATHER53]

It's another stringy Nina mess trying to lift north and wait out the afternoon to see if that is happening 

[psuhoffman]

2 minutes ago, BTRWx's Thanks Giving said:

There's no luck about physical processes.

Ugh. We know the weather is a result of physics. It's not actually luck. But it is chaos to a degree and that's what we mean. We were always likely to end up with less snow then some other places due to the issues with a Nina. But typically with cold Nina years we find a way to get some hits. A flush clipper hit. A southern wave. A caboose frontal wave. Something. We don't typically beat average but to get a total fail in a year where systems were flying all around us with cold much of the time is rare. So no it wasn't luck. The storms did what they did because of physical processes. But with very minor perturbations we could have done much better. It was bad luck for us that every storm managed to barely miss us. Or bad luck we happen to live where the epic snow hole is.

It's not always us. We just had an epic run where we were among the leaders nationally in above climo snow for a 3 year period. Now we've been on the other end for 2 years. 

But the frustration is this wasn't some awful pattern year like 2002, 2008, 2012 where we were doomed to fail. Things just didn't work on a micro level this year. When storms miss by 500 miles the pattern sucks. When they keep missing by 50 miles then we just sucked at the minor closing details. 

[psuhoffman]

33 minutes ago, clskinsfan said:

As a consolation prize the GFS just crushes Boston. They are in the perfect spot for the heaviest banding as well.

Who cares. We don't obsess when bufallo gets snow. 

[WEATHER53]

3 hours ago, pazzo83 said:

yep - some of us learned to pretty much disregard JB as a credible forecaster years ago

There are a few on here  who are great discussers of weather but bad predictors of it. They can run circles around almost all of us discussing and showing what is needed for a good snow around here but they cannot accurately forecast an upcoming potential, or not, event .

[WeathermanB]

Doesn't an El Nino mean more snow, like events in early 2010?

[psuhoffman]

1 minute ago, Tenman Johnson said:

There are a few on here  who are great discussers of weather but bad predictors of it. They can run circles around almost all of us discussing and showing what is needed for a good snow around here but they cannot accurately forecast an upcoming potential, or not, event .

You confuse discussion for forecast. We don't waste time with a forecast 10 days out. That's stupid. We all know no one has the ability to make accurate detailed forecasts at that range. General pattern guidance is all. Then once inside range several on here give excellent forecasts but I feel like we're honest enough with ourselves that we know those forecasts can and will bust often so we continue to track and discuss the options even if we think it's going to fail.

I said many days ago I was at 40% on my confidence. And that was when things looked way better with support from all guidance. I never got above that. Then around 3 days ago I said I doubted this would happen. That's a forecast. But I still tracked and discussed because it's fun and maybe I'm wrong.  Just because people discuss a storm threat doesn't mean they think it will hit. 

You did think this would hit so what are you going on about anyways?  You bust just as much as anyone else. And there is nothing wrong with that. We all do. But get off your high horse and stop acting like a pompous arse who knows better when your just giving an educated guess like the rest of us. You just use differently methodology. 

[frd]

1 hour ago, BTRWx's Thanks Giving said:

The NAO never was historic.  It was only modeled to do so.

It still formed in a ideal location and that's just as important, if not more so than an East based NAO. We also had a very negative AO. Just bad luck as expected in a La Nina background state.  

[psuhoffman]

7 minutes ago, WeathermanB said:

Doesn't an El Nino mean more snow, like events in early 2010?

For D.C. yes. But I heard the type of Nino developing typically screws over Delaware. It's cutting edge research. They call it the "Modoki do your HW" Nino. 

[psuhoffman]

18 minutes ago, WeathermanB said:

 

I'm gonna take this to banter.

You finally figured out where you belong 

[WEATHER53]

8 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

You confuse discussion for forecast. We don't waste time with a forecast 10 days out. That's stupid. We all know no one has the ability to make accurate detailed forecasts at that range. General pattern guidance is all. Then once inside range several on here give excellent forecasts but I feel like we're honest enough with ourselves that we know those forecasts can and will bust often so we continue to track and discuss the options even if we think it's going to fail.

I said many days ago I was at 40% on my confidence. And that was when things looked way better with support from all guidance. I never got above that. Then around 3 days ago I said I doubted this would happen. That's a forecast. But I still tracked and discussed because it's fun and maybe I'm wrong.  Just because people discuss a storm threat doesn't mean they think it will hit. 

You did think this would hit so what are you going on about anyways?  You bust just as much as anyone else. And there is nothing wrong with that. We all do. But get off your high horse and stop acting like a pompous arse who knows better when your just giving an educated guess like the rest of us. You just use differently methodology. 

Easy tiger. You are a good discusser and predictor and I  did  not reference  you, more like JB. But since you got attacking and pissy you may wish to reign in the length of your discussions and realize that  no one appointed you King  monitor.

[psuhoffman]

4 minutes ago, Tenman Johnson said:

Easy tiger. You are a good discusser and predictor and I  did  not reference  you, more like JB. But since you got attacking and pissy you may wish to reign in the length of your discussions and realize that  no one appointed you King  monitor.

Shut up I'm ranting 

[RichmondTarHeel]

Everyone needs to just calm down.  We all suck at winter.

[psuhoffman]

6 minutes ago, Tenman Johnson said:

Easy tiger. You are a good discusser and predictor and I  did  not reference  you, more like JB. But since you got attacking and pissy you may wish to reign in the length of your discussions and realize that  no one appointed you King  monitor.

Joking aside and  for the record I don't want to moderate but I do have the right to give my opinion of the things others say. That's not moderating that's just disagreeing. You have every right to say what you said. But others have the right to push back. 

[packfan98]

So, how about that 2:00 Euro???