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Snow bomb obs March 21


Damage In Tolland

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A friend of mine just called me ranting and raving about how bad the forecast was and how an important meeting they had this morning was canceled last evening and complaining how many other friends changed plans yada yada yada because of the winter storm that never was.  It got me thinking.  When big business gets things wrong they put out a statement explaining what happened.  Should the National Weather Service ever put out such a statement or just moves on forgetting the big bust that just happened?  I understand how hard weather forecasting is but maybe an explanation to Joe public would be prudent?  Thinking about this case, however, there really isn't an easy explanation for the public to understand.  It wasn't like there was a server crash that prevented models for running.  Just a complex set of circumstances.  This post is just food for thought!

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Just now, CoastalWx said:

 That’s awesome. And what a storm for Long Island. I don’t mind missing out on a 6 inch event, but being so close to 20 inches?. Oof.  

More than doubled my previous personal high of 7" of snow after March 15th it was epic for March in this region and gut wrenching to track made our winter

 

 

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8 minutes ago, wxeyeNH said:

A friend of mine just called me ranting and raving about how bad the forecast was and how an important meeting they had this morning was canceled last evening and complaining how many other friends changed plans yada yada yada because of the winter storm that never was.  It got me thinking.  When big business gets things wrong they put out a statement explaining what happened.  Should the National Weather Service ever put out such a statement or just moves on forgetting the big bust that just happened?  I understand how hard weather forecasting is but maybe an explanation to Joe public would be prudent?  Thinking about this case, however, there really isn't an easy explanation for the public to understand.  It wasn't like there was a server crash that prevented models for running.  Just a complex set of circumstances.  This post is just food for thought!

There aren't many good avenues to do that for us unfortunately. I don't hate the idea of explaining why snow didn't happen in a social media post of something like that.

That does get a little close to the line of people trying to hold us liable for cancelling an event (like a music recital ;)), and that's not really how it works. We don't make decisions on when to close, we just provide a set of conditions and let people make the calls for themselves.

The only time we tell people to shelter is for SVR/TOR/FFWs, short fused events. Otherwise, we only recommend avoiding travel in a blizzard or winter storm warning.

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Just now, Baroclinic Zone said:

Can't wrap my head around this.  My brain doesn't function like this.

As a meteorologist, you appreciate the big and historical events. It's why I make fun of Kevin for saying he is happy with 1-3" events. I live for those. So yeah..happy for LI...but this late in the season...to miss a large event being so close is disappointing to me. However, if I lives on cstl CT...I would swan dive into LI Sound.

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3 hours ago, Baroclinic Zone said:

You're missing the point.  The 10:1 maps are not taken verbatim.  Areas in SE MA are barely seeing any accumulation, let alone 6, 8, 10"+ as some models were showing using whatever ratios you choose.

Ok but you know how those snow maps work.  The precipitation forecast isn't that bad, it just didn't accumulate.  The snow maps are just going with a snow column and QPF...they aren't doing the warm ground or light rates or whatever else impedes snowfall this time of year.

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14 minutes ago, OceanStWx said:

There aren't many good avenues to do that for us unfortunately. I don't hate the idea of explaining why snow didn't happen in a social media post of something like that.

That does get a little close to the line of people trying to hold us liable for cancelling an event (like a music recital ;)), and that's not really how it works. We don't make decisions on when to close, we just provide a set of conditions and let people make the calls for themselves.

The only time we tell people to shelter is for SVR/TOR/FFWs, short fused events. Otherwise, we only recommend avoiding travel in a blizzard or winter storm warning.

Thankfully your job is easier than an on-air Met.  No one knows you by face or even name.  On-air personalities get ribbing by everyone, everywhere they go.  Have to go in front of the cameras and explain to hundreds of thousands of people.  

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8 minutes ago, codfishsnowman said:

this month was above avg but nothing special here, truly horrific comparatively speaking in this part of death valley

the 93 superstorm produced more in one even

it really was great though just about everywhere else except parts of the outer cape

Winter here overall was fine, White Christmas and two ice storms. Im really not interested in late March snowfall.

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22 minutes ago, OceanStWx said:

There aren't many good avenues to do that for us unfortunately. I don't hate the idea of explaining why snow didn't happen in a social media post of something like that.

That does get a little close to the line of people trying to hold us liable for cancelling an event (like a music recital ;)), and that's not really how it works. We don't make decisions on when to close, we just provide a set of conditions and let people make the calls for themselves.

The only time we tell people to shelter is for SVR/TOR/FFWs, short fused events. Otherwise, we only recommend avoiding travel in a blizzard or winter storm warning.

IIRC, some official(s) in NJ tried to sue forecasters (NWS?) to recover prep costs, that turned out to be unnecessary after the 2001 early March storm shifted north.  Would not want to do anything that would encourage such actions.
 

Ok but you know how those snow maps work.  The precipitation forecast isn't that bad, it just didn't accumulate.  The snow maps are just going with a snow column and QPF...they aren't doing the warm ground or light rates or whatever else impedes snowfall this time of year.

Even when qpf, temps, and p-type are nailed, snowfall can be tough to pin down.  Best examples of my experience are the 2 storms of early Dec 2003.  Each came with temps +/-20, strong winds (the 1st storm gusted near 40, 2nd near 30), and had no taint.  Storm #1 dropped 24" with 1.63" LE, ratio 14.7.  2nd one was 13" from 1.53" LE, ratio only 8.5 even with less wind.  Must've been some serious differences in conditions up around H7.

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12 minutes ago, CoastalWx said:

Did you have no snow at all? I saw Plymouth 3.5" on the PNS.

Nothing ever accumulated on pavement. I never got lower than 34 degrees. The grass in my shaded areas has a slushy dusting, but nothing accumulated on the grass areas that get full sun.

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Plymouth is the largest town in MA. The coast is a different climate than inland. I can believe that maybe out by the airport it accumulated. The airport is north and further inland. My friend does snow removal at Colony Plaza at exit 7 which is 6mi north of me, and they usually accumulate way better than I do. 

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3 minutes ago, #NoPoles said:

Plymouth is the largest town in MA. The coast is a different climate than inland. I can believe that maybe out by the airport it accumulated. The airport is north and further inland. My friend does snow removal at Colony Plaza at exit 7 which is 6mi north of me, and they usually accumulate way better than I do. 

If the report comes in as just "Plymouth" the software will take the center of downtown vs. the center of the city limits. That's why we try and get spotter lat/lon to make sure we know exactly where they are.

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2 minutes ago, Thunderblizzard said:

3" here.

I like how there's 3 Southingtons on the PNS.

One of the biggest busts i can remember in my life. Thanks for the report. I'm going with 2.2 here when i went to bed it was still snowing and when i got up there was nothing, so impossible to measure unless i stayed up all night.

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12 minutes ago, #NoPoles said:

Plymouth is the largest town in MA. The coast is a different climate than inland. I can believe that maybe out by the airport it accumulated. The airport is north and further inland. My friend does snow removal at Colony Plaza at exit 7 which is 6mi north of me, and they usually accumulate way better than I do. 

97 sq/mi.  Take 25-30 min just to drive across it.

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2 hours ago, CoastalWx said:

As a meteorologist, you appreciate the big and historical events. It's why I make fun of Kevin for saying he is happy with 1-3" events. I live for those. So yeah..happy for LI...but this late in the season...to miss a large event being so close is disappointing to me. However, if I lives on cstl CT...I would swan dive into LI Sound.

LOL-so true-we were 20 miles away from 20 inches totals the way the crow flies. (3.5 here)  It helps that we got nailed here with 3/7 and 3/13 events and it's practically spring and I'm ready to move on...almost every time Upton has gone big here, it has been a bust...

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2 hours ago, #NoPoles said:

Plymouth is the largest town in MA. The coast is a different climate than inland. I can believe that maybe out by the airport it accumulated. The airport is north and further inland. My friend does snow removal at Colony Plaza at exit 7 which is 6mi north of me, and they usually accumulate way better than I do. 

Oh yeah I know it well. But it's always interesting the differences just 5 miles makes. Impressive.

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3 hours ago, Sugarloaf1989 said:

Winter here overall was fine, White Christmas and two ice storms. Im really not interested in late March snowfall.

I am never interested in ice storms

It was an average winter at best for both of us, the burst of snow xmas morning was cute but any other day would have been forgettable

I could even make an argument to some it was slightly below average (for those who think this area averages 50"/season)

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2 hours ago, Baroclinic Zone said:

97 sq/mi.  Take 25-30 min just to drive across it.

That's impressive.  Stowe is the second largest town in Vermont for size at 73 square miles... and when you stand at 4,000ft on one edge and look towards the 3,000ft ridge on the east side, it looks massive.  Can't imagine another 25 square miles on top of that.  You could have a massive snowfall range in annual totals at that size.

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