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Mountain West Discussion


Chinook
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1 hour ago, raindancewx said:

The airport managed a staggering 0.03" with the line of thunderstorms. I just want the damn front to be through by Midnight. I hate when Arctic air comes in at 1 am and we have a high of 45 or 50 because it was that warm for 10 minutes very early in the day. I do like some snow for the city, but I think it's really a 3-4 hour window for Albuquerque to get snow. Some spots are probably going to get 6 inches in the NE heights, Rio Rancho, and maybe the West Mesa. I went 1-4", locally under 1" or up to 6" for the city.

Around 4 PM winds at KSAF went SW -> SE and temp started plummeting which hinted the Arctic air was cresting the mountain passes, about four hours ahead of schedule by my reckoning.  And now with the latest out of KABQ I think Albuquerque is officially in the same boat.  Precip should be snow from here on out.  Weenie mode activate.

Screen Shot 2021-02-13 at 10.17.19 PM.png

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I watch the five minute observations when cold fronts come in. They've dropped from 47F at 8 pm to mid-20s by 11 pm. Some snow at the airport too. But the east wind is already pretty high at the airport. I don't think they'll get very  much at the official site. The dew points still have to crater from where they are if we're really going to drop to 0-5F or 5-10F in the city. Still pretty normal dew points (18F dew point at the moment). 

 

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Woke up to 2.5".  Pavement has 1.5"-2" so not as much lost to melting as usual.  Pixie dust still falling and radar shows several hours are likely yet.  Wind is DEAD CALM but the dull roar of the 60 mph canyon wind about a mile to my south can be heard, for which blizzard warnings were hoisted.  Eerie.

Clipper mentioned in the AFD this morning, is this ABQ or GRB?

LONG TERM...(MONDAY NIGHT THROUGH SUNDAY)...
A clipper system is soon to follow behind today`s Valentine`s storm,
beginning Monday night. Accumulating snowfall will begin across the
northwestern portion of the state late Monday evening. Precipitation
expands across central New Mexico through the day Tuesday and into
northeastern portions of the state Tuesday night. Both the 00z GFS
and ECMWF try to bring in a backdoor cold front late Tuesday night
that keeps precipitation in a convergence zone along and east of the
central mountain chain through Wednesday. The system exits late
Wednesday, with the GFS forming a closed low over the TX panhandle.
Temperatures were lowered below NBM guidance for Tuesday and
Wednesday, particularly across northeastern New Mexico, where snow
cover is likely to hang around for several days.
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No -10's in ABQ, but might get close to 0 tonight.  Forecast low 6.

Filtered sun overpowered the flurries and temps hovering around 15 this afternoon to make roads pretty good.  Now that snow showers should end soon safe to say my final total is 3" but compaction/sublimation already doing their thing.  Snowpack is widespread though, hope it's sturdy enough to reduce the risk of rain with the clipper tomorrow by holding down temps just that extra degree.

 

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We managed to get buried with 0.7" low density snow the past 24 hrs. Right now it is -10. Strange things are happening: my hand froze to the inside handle of the storm door when I went to open it, there is ice on the inside of the door threshold, and when I tossed a corn log to feed the squirrels back outside when the dog brought it in, it shattered into 4 pieces when it hit the ground. I'll try the boiling water trick tomorrow AM.

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1.5" of fluff so far this morning.  Started off with nice dendrites and good rates between 5 and 5:30 AM with a brief but intense wave of forcing that was poorly handled by models (only yesterday showed up and only on high res).  Light pixie dust continues.  Loving the midwinter feel.

 

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Yesterday, mesonet stations showed around -10 to -18 around Fort Collins/Loveland/Greeley and even -20 near Greeley. Today, it has warmed up to the upper 30's this afternoon. This is at least one extreme point in our otherwise bland winter. You might hate me for saying this, but I am kind of glad I don't have to shovel or drive around in much snow, like I did in Nov/Dec and Feb of 2019-2020. Really, the only remarkable thing since November, before this week, was a few days of 50mph or 60mph wind gusts.

Here is an interactive basin-data web site that I found a while ago. The other map that I used to post never shows the SWE for California basins. It seems like 88% is the number of the day around here. It's not highly impressive, but still, not the absolute worst winter-drought situation.

CsHQyXm.jpg

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My place just got 4" of snow (3.5" on the low end), which is more snow in the last 4 hours than I have in any 24-hour time period since October. "Fun Surprise" -- unfortunately I have to drive somewhere tomorrow, but the roads will probably be ok by then. At least it is certainly warmer than 0 degrees this time around.

 

radar from 7:44PM

Ud4T0r4.jpg

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Tuesday – Added another 1.5", totaling 3" of lower ratio stuff than the 3" on Sunday.  It accumulated until around noon so it was actually more impressive than Sunday where rates were too light during the day to combat insolation.

Wednesday – Heavy snow late afternoon driven by daytime heating and cold 700 mbar layer.  Great rates, estimated a quick 0.5".

Thursday – A "fun surprise" of my own early morning, good rates early and about 1".  "Fun" because I had to drive to work during peak rates.  Intensity let up the moment I stepped out of the car (naturally).

Add Sunday 3" and that's 7.5" over five days (Monday may have had a trace idk).  With temps generally less than 40 every day making for a decent winter-going-on-spring feel by my Midwestern standards.

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1 hour ago, raindancewx said:

How much of your total liquid equivalent precipitation would you guys say has fallen as snow up by Denver and Boulder? I was looking at the records here. For 10/1-2/20, over 70% of our precipitation has fallen as snow at the airport. That's kind of nuts since it hasn't been that cold.

Almost 100% snow since early September, though that sounds more impressive than it is, in a sense, as it has been abnormally dry and not particularly cold either, with a very few exceptions. We’re generally well below average at this point in the Front Range for seasonal snowfall.

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The GFS and Canadian have storms on Thursday and Sunday. The GFS show a concentration of snow close to Boulder with the NE upslope component on Thursday. Overall, the entire area may have directly east winds at 700mb, which would be snowy for all areas around I-25. The Euro has 0.3" to 0.6" of QPF on Thursday for the Front Range cities, but nothing after that. Some GFS ensemble members are snowy for Sunday, some are not.

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The 18z NAM and the 18z GFS are very different for Denver on this storm, but have less differences for my immediate area. I suppose the models are just having a hard time finding out the mesoscale details for the upslope snow band. A winter weather advisory has been issued for south and west of the Denver metro.

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