April Mid/Long Range & Disco

[Fozz]

9 minutes ago, EastCoast NPZ said:

Let's just say I'll take the "under" from the nearly 2" shown by the GFS.

How much precip do you think you average in a year? You always talk about how your area is so dry, so I wonder how much worse it is than everywhere else.

[showmethesnow]

5 minutes ago, EastCoast NPZ said:

Let's just say I'll take the "under" from the nearly 2" shown by the GFS.

It's not a bad setup on both the overnight GFS and the Euro for some heavy rain. Euro is even wetter through the DC/Balt region. In fact I would not be surprised if they are a little underdone with the totals as the eastward push of the cold air clearing out the region is slow to occur. Would probably see some training (SW to NE) of the heavier cells of precip which could mean some localized areas could pick up substantially more. But all this is on the premise that the GFS and the Euro are right for 4 days out. If the CMC is more right then we won't get close to these totals. So pick your poison.

[psuhoffman]

1 hour ago, Fozz said:

How much precip do you think you average in a year? You always talk about how your area is so dry, so I wonder how much worse it is than everywhere else.

https://wmblogs.wm.edu/cmbail/let-it-rain/

[showmethesnow]

12Z GFS is coming in a little juicier for Sun night/Mon morning with 2-2.5" totals now showing up in the general DC/Balt region.

[mattie g]

25 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

https://wmblogs.wm.edu/cmbail/let-it-rain/

I now have Clapton’s Let It Rain in my head.

And that’s not really a bad thing.

[smokeybandit]

30 minutes ago, showmethesnow said:

12Z GFS is coming in a little juicier for Sun night/Mon morning with 2-2.5" totals now showing up in the general DC/Balt region.

Will it stick to pavement?

Oh, wait, gotta reset my units for spring now.

[EastCoast NPZ]

3 hours ago, Fozz said:

How much precip do you think you average in a year? You always talk about how your area is so dry, so I wonder how much worse it is than everywhere else.

I don't know about IMBY.  Like the maps PSU posted, I've always heard we averaged in the mid 30s annually.  But, there is no way Stephens City is near that.  I'd have to average 3" per month, and could probably count all the months that's happened on 2-hands (max) since I've lived here.  I've stated this many times in the past, yes I'm in a rain shadow, as is the whole Valley, but it seems significantly worse locally.... for some reason I can't figure.  The worst part is that it's usually the summer where this is most pronounced.  

[North Balti Zen]

1 minute ago, EastCoast NPZ said:

I don't know about IMBY.  Like the maps PSU posted, I've always heard we averaged in the mid 30s annually.  But, there is no way Stephens City is near that.  I'd have to average 3" per month, and could probably count all the months that's happened on 2-hands (max) since I've lived here.  I've stated this many times in the past, yes I'm in a rain shadow, as is the whole Valley, but it seems significantly worse locally.... for some reason I can't figure.  The worst part is that it's usually the summer where this is most pronounced.  

I have long since decided you are the anti-Rob McKenna...*

(*Hitchhiker's Guide reference)

[Cobalt]

4 minutes ago, EastCoast NPZ said:

I don't know about IMBY.  Like the maps PSU posted, I've always heard we averaged in the mid 30s annually.  But, there is no way Stephens City is near that.  I'd have to average 3" per month, and could probably count all the months that's happened on 2-hands (max) since I've lived here.  I've stated this many times in the past, yes I'm in a rain shadow, as is the whole Valley, but it seems significantly worse locally.... for some reason I can't figure.  The worst part is that it's usually the summer where this is most pronounced.  

You're still paying for the 3 feet of snow you got in The Blizzard of 96?

[nj2va]

Good riddance winter. GTFO.

[Cobalt]

17 minutes ago, nj2va said:

Good riddance winter. GTFO.

Never too early to look at next year

 

[Rtd208]

1 minute ago, Cobalt said:

Never too early to look at next year

 

October will be here before you know it and things will start kicking into high gear for winter 2018-2019.

[BristowWx]

21 minutes ago, losetoa6 said:

Euro and nam backdoor my yard Sunday and Gfs says no..curious to see who caves.

Looks like it backdoors a lot of us...NAM at least.  That’s a hell of a gradient.  

[Fozz]

49 minutes ago, losetoa6 said:

Euro doesn't quite make it to DC but Nam goes backdoor bonkers ..a ..la snow close by LOL 

Most of that stuff in upstate NY isn't snow... but yeah, a lot of people ITT will be very unhappy on Sunday if the NAM is correct about our temps.

[Fozz]

5 hours ago, EastCoast NPZ said:

I don't know about IMBY.  Like the maps PSU posted, I've always heard we averaged in the mid 30s annually.  But, there is no way Stephens City is near that.  I'd have to average 3" per month, and could probably count all the months that's happened on 2-hands (max) since I've lived here.  I've stated this many times in the past, yes I'm in a rain shadow, as is the whole Valley, but it seems significantly worse locally.... for some reason I can't figure.  The worst part is that it's usually the summer where this is most pronounced.  

I think by this region's standards, an average precip near 30" is practically a desert.

[mattie g]

1 hour ago, Rtd208 said:

October will be here before you know it and things will start kicking into high gear for winter 2018-2019.

Meanwhile, the more sane folks around here will enjoy the warmth as it arrives and revel in the life that spring finally reveals. That’s more exciting than looking forward to our so-called snowy season.

Next fall can F off right now.

[RodneyS]

On 4/10/2018 at 12:03 PM, RodneyS said:

However, 1874 might well be the champion for two April snows and the latest April snow ever, if official DC snow records had been kept at that time. April 1, 1874 had a temperature range of just 29 to 35, with 0.09 inches of precipitation; and April 29, 1874, had a temperature range of only 30 (latest DC freeze ever) to 45, with 0.84 inches of precipitation.  So, I would guess that snow fell on both of those days, and perhaps the latter day even saw an inch or two.  Maybe an old newspaper might mention snow on that day. 

I just found this, from the April 30, 1874 Reading (PA) Times: "BALTIMORE, April 29. -- A brisk snow storm prevailed here this morning from about 4 o'clock until after ten, falling to the depth of 3 or 4 inches."

The temperature range in Baltimore that day was 33 to 46, with 0.49 inches of precipitation.  So, DC was colder, with more precipitation, which makes me wonder if it did not receive even more snow.  Of course, if so, I would have thought that would have made the Reading Times account. 

[Maestrobjwa]

2 hours ago, Cobalt said:

Never too early to look at next year

 

PLEASE!!! I am TIRED of La Niña--get her outta here!!! She has caused enough heartbreak, lol Boo La Niña!! Bring on Niño!!!!!

[hstorm]

1 hour ago, RodneyS said:

I just found this, from the April 30, 1874 Reading (PA) Times: "BALTIMORE, April 29. -- A brisk snow storm prevailed here this morning from about 4 o'clock until after ten, falling to the depth of 3 or 4 inches."

The temperature range in Baltimore that day was 33 to 46, with 0.49 inches of precipitation.  So, DC was colder, with more precipitation, which makes me wonder if it did not receive even more snow.  Of course, if so, I would have thought that would have made the Reading Times account. 

DC reported light rain and 38 degrees at 11pm on April 28, 1874 (with .24 inches of precipitation in the prior six hours) and then heavy snow and 31 degrees at 7:35am on April 29 (with .84 inches of precipitation in the prior 6 hours).  So it is quite possible that DC received quite a bit of snow that morning.

I found this in the War Department Daily Bulletin of Weather Reports for April 1874, which (as I just discovered) can be downloaded for free from Google Books.  Sometimes the internet is fascinating!

[nj2va]

2 hours ago, mattie g said:

Meanwhile, the more sane folks around here will enjoy the warmth as it arrives and revel in the life that spring finally reveals. That’s more exciting than looking forward to our so-called snowy season.

Next fall can F off right now.

AMEN

[Fozz]

2 hours ago, mattie g said:

Meanwhile, the more sane folks around here will enjoy the warmth as it arrives and revel in the life that spring finally reveals. That’s more exciting than looking forward to our so-called snowy season.

Next fall can F off right now.

April and May are usually the time of the year when I'm least interested in snow. Once the leaves are out, I have no reason to think about it, at least for a while.

But then after enough summer heatwaves, and enough 93+ and humid days, fall starts sounding pretty good again.

[evaporativecooler]

On 4/11/2018 at 11:40 AM, 87storms said:

anyone who likes cold weather shouldn't be allowed to wear a jacket.  wear a t-shirt and then let me know how much you love cold weather.  snowstorms are fun.  cold is great...with 3 layers.  give me spring...and give me 6 months of it, if possible.

The main benefit of cold weather is being able to wear a jacket though. As soon as it's too hot for a sweatshirt I'm down to two jean pockets that can barely hold half of what I need. Just one of the many things that suck about 60+ temps. 

On a wx related note looks like the NAO stays negative for a good long time. Last time that happened in similar ENSO  (2001) it stayed slightly negative for the entire summer. Not sure how exactly that affects things in terms of warm season weather, but hopefully it at least keeps things interesting

[BlizzardNole]

8 hours ago, evaporativecooler said:

On a wx related note looks like the NAO stays negative for a good long time. Last time that happened in similar ENSO  (2001) it stayed slightly negative for the entire summer. Not sure how exactly that affects things in terms of warm season weather, but hopefully it at least keeps things interesting

I would think less long, dry, relentless heat waves and more fronts, thus good thunderstorm chances?  Of course with our luck it would mean going positive through most of the following winter.

[showmethesnow]

38 minutes ago, BlizzardNole said:

I would think less long, dry, relentless heat waves and more fronts, thus good thunderstorm chances?  Of course with our luck it would mean going positive through most of the following winter.

We have been in a +NAO regime forever now so hopefully if we see a -NAO throughout the summer that means the worm has turned and we are heading for a long term negative regime.

[psuhoffman]

9 hours ago, evaporativecooler said:

The main benefit of cold weather is being able to wear a jacket though. As soon as it's too hot for a sweatshirt I'm down to two jean pockets that can barely hold half of what I need. Just one of the many things that suck about 60+ temps. 

On a wx related note looks like the NAO stays negative for a good long time. Last time that happened in similar ENSO  (2001) it stayed slightly negative for the entire summer. Not sure how exactly that affects things in terms of warm season weather, but hopefully it at least keeps things interesting

Scary thought... from 98/99 through 00/01 we suffered through a 3 year nina.  Other then a 10 day stretch during January 2000 when aided by blocking we got some hits...it was a pretty sucky 3 year run overall.  But 2001 had a lot of similarities to this past winter.  A pretty good blocking period that did a lot more for places to our north and east then here...cold periods but without much payoff here with snow compared to all around us.  And I remember at the time some thinking "next year will be better" and of course we know how that ended...2002 lol.  It was a neutral year coming off some solid blocking...and to be fair the first half of 2001/02 had some pretty good blocking but the whole of N. Amer was warm and the blocking could't do anything about that and the winter sucked everywhere.  

Not saying we go down that road.  But I never assume next year will be better.  Every year is its own crap shoot.  And especially when this year wasn't really a bad snow year on a larger scale...only locally.  The "we're due" meter might not be as high as we think.  

[Cobalt]

3 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

Scary thought... from 98/99 through 00/01 we suffered through a 3 year nina.  Other then a 10 day stretch during January 2000 when aided by blocking we got some hits...it was a pretty sucky 3 year run overall.  But 2001 had a lot of similarities to this past winter.  A pretty good blocking period that did a lot more for places to our north and east then here...cold periods but without much payoff here with snow compared to all around us.  And I remember at the time some thinking "next year will be better" and of course we know how that ended...2002 lol.  It was a neutral year coming off some solid blocking...and to be fair the first half of 2001/02 had some pretty good blocking but the whole of N. Amer was warm and the blocking could't do anything about that and the winter sucked everywhere.  

Not saying we go down that road.  But I never assume next year will be better.  Every year is its own crap shoot.  And especially when this year wasn't really a bad snow year on a larger scale...only locally.  The "we're due" meter might not be as high as we think.  

That happened in 11/12 too. Seems like a full on continent torch is at least a once or twice per decade occurrence. 15/16 sort of counts too, and IIRC from seeing temperature stuff 05/06 (?). 

[mattie g]

9 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

Scary thought... from 98/99 through 00/01 we suffered through a 3 year nina.  Other then a 10 day stretch during January 2000 when aided by blocking we got some hits...it was a pretty sucky 3 year run overall.  But 2001 had a lot of similarities to this past winter.  A pretty good blocking period that did a lot more for places to our north and east then here...cold periods but without much payoff here with snow compared to all around us.  And I remember at the time some thinking "next year will be better" and of course we know how that ended...2002 lol.  It was a neutral year coming off some solid blocking...and to be fair the first half of 2001/02 had some pretty good blocking but the whole of N. Amer was warm and the blocking could't do anything about that and the winter sucked everywhere.  

Not saying we go down that road.  But I never assume next year will be better.  Every year is its own crap shoot.  And especially when this year wasn't really a bad snow year on a larger scale...only locally.  The "we're due" meter might not be as high as we think.  

So you’re saying that winter 2019-2020 will be rockin’?

[psuhoffman]

4 minutes ago, mattie g said:

So you’re saying that winter 2019-2020 will be rockin’?

The next time we get a weak to moderate Nino will likely be better. Have that come during this solar minimum and we stack the deck in our favor more. Get a west based Nino during a solar minimum and we're talking big potential. 

Those are the factors that are "somewhat" predictable at decent leads. Even those can shift unexpectedly but some of the other players that will have a say we have almost no chance to predict more than a month out or they have too low a correlation to worry about too much. 

[JVscotch]

Plus there’s some signs that next winter will be neutral or weak NINO at max, which could lead to a better potential for a moderate to maybe low-end strong nino for 2019-2020.  Kind of like 2015 and 2016 but I wouldn’t expect a Nino nearly as strong as 2016 with this new solar minimum state we are entering.  And if we take it a step further of a possible +QBO for 2018-2019 and -QBO for 2019-2020, I think there’s definitely big potential like PSU mentioned.  I could see next winter being a big backend winter (February-early April) and 2020 having an earlier start with big dog potential.  But obviously this is all speculation.  

[RodneyS]

13 hours ago, hstorm said:

DC reported light rain and 38 degrees at 11pm on April 28, 1874 (with .24 inches of precipitation in the prior six hours) and then heavy snow and 31 degrees at 7:35am on April 29 (with .84 inches of precipitation in the prior 6 hours).  So it is quite possible that DC received quite a bit of snow that morning.

I found this in the War Department Daily Bulletin of Weather Reports for April 1874, which (as I just discovered) can be downloaded for free from Google Books.  Sometimes the internet is fascinating!

Thanks for that information.  It is remarkable what can be found, but also interesting that snow was not recorded for so many years after official weather recordkeeping began.