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December 5-6, 2020 Storm Observations and Nowcast


Baroclinic Zone
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9 minutes ago, tamarack said:

4.5" at 9 PM, a bit more than I'd thought, but only a bit.  However, I discovered why the forecast busted - nothing but flakes noon on and LE (without the 0.10" RA at the start) was 1.19" for a lovely ratio of 3.8.  Even a wet 8:1 would've put me up near that Will measured.  I think maybe that the flakes were so moist when they landed that they played flexible Tetris and self-compacted throughout the storm. 

I think even the models that had 4:1 ratios had way too much QPF. So the end result was still a lot of snow. 
 

Couple that with DGZ sitting around 500 mb near the coast and that’s a disaster for big snow. Just west of that though, sweet spot.

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18 minutes ago, tamarack said:

4.5" at 9 PM, a bit more than I'd thought, but only a bit.  However, I discovered why the forecast busted - nothing but flakes noon on and LE (without the 0.10" RA at the start) was 1.19" for a lovely ratio of 3.8.  Even a wet 8:1 would've put me up near that Will measured.  I think maybe that the flakes were so moist when they landed that they played flexible Tetris and self-compacted throughout the storm. 

That’s incredible, almost in a novel way.  Those can be sleet ratios.  No wonder there are a lot of power outages in that swath.

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1 minute ago, rgwp96 said:

Wow ,  that’s insane 

How much I wished as an undergrad that Penn State was in Somerset County PA where parts average that much or more vs. State College's mid 40s less than 100 miles away (which we only made one year I was there). Want to get into insane gradients, head to lake effect/snowbelt country. 

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43 minutes ago, DotRat_Wx said:

You'll get your fair share of torches in a normal winter even there. What town again?

From numerous spring ski trips up there, once you get north of the crest of the Presidential range and running NE in Maine...places with some elevation hold their snowpack pretty good all winter. They’re shielded a bit from the warmth there.  

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2 minutes ago, jm1220 said:

How much I wished as an undergrad that Penn State was in Somerset County PA where parts average that much or more vs. State College's mid 40s less than 100 miles away (which we only made one year I was there). Want to get into insane gradients, head to lake effect/snowbelt country. 

I always imagined living near the lakes and not to have to worry about the rain snow line. Averaging around 100 must be great even though they dont get the big coastal storms like we get once in a while.

I would love to experience lake effect

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Just now, psuhoffman said:

From numerous spring ski trips up there, once you get north of the crest of the Presidential range and running NE in Maine...places with some elevation hold their snowpack pretty good all winter. They’re shielded a bit from the warmth there.  

Yeah that is snowpack country there eastward into Maine because of the big CAD they get. The torches they get are usually brief, even in most cutters. 

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Just now, MJO812 said:

I always imagined living near the lakes and not to have to worry about the rain snow line. Averaging around 100 must be great even though they dont get the big coastal storms like we get once in a while.

I would love to experience lake effect

Thing is yes they do when the storms set themselves up. State College had the best outcome from the Mar 1993 superstorm and also Mar 1994 from how those evolved (over 24"), and in the early 2000s they did really well. Flip side is when a storm like 1/22/05 happens where I was dryslotted there after 2 hours of heavy snow but Long Island had 12"+. Literally seemed like a huge evolution towards big coastal storms happened as soon as I moved there. 2/14/07 was a particular kick in the gonads, for days models had us getting 18"+ but the mid level warming surged past us when we had about 6" and a ton of sleet after. Central PA can be a gold mine in the right setup but otherwise crap particularly east of where the upslope/lake effect dead stops which State College is about 20 miles east of. 

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14 minutes ago, jm1220 said:

How much I wished as an undergrad that Penn State was in Somerset County PA where parts average that much or more vs. State College's mid 40s less than 100 miles away (which we only made one year I was there). Want to get into insane gradients, head to lake effect/snowbelt country. 

I just want to reach average , 4 out of the last 5 years were below average for me snowfall wise . Last year was lowest I can ever remember  (14 inches  total , average about 42) The only above average year was a great year at 75 inches in 2018

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13 minutes ago, PhineasC said:

Except that cutter last Monday. I freaking torched hugely in that one. Any snow pack I would have had would have been obliterated.

We’ve been in about as bad a pattern as possible all November and so the North American temp profile was torched. That’s not something that will happen often where you are, and especially not mid winter.

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I got stuck in Alex's driveway at 930pm. They got me unstuck. A cop stopped to chat and then followed me back to my place. I drive a Corolla...I didn't stand a chance. Im surprised at how wet the snow is. Hubbdave had posted way earlier in the day about hitting 5 inches, and we were still rain/white rain up here. It was 32/31 most of the day and maybe we had an inch by 5pm. The wind was a non factor until about 1.5hrs ago. It's gusting good and temp dropped immediately to 31/30. I expect the snow to dry out as the night goes on. It was pure white out once I was unstuck and on the road home. I couldn't see more than 10feet in front of my car. This is only the 2nd time in my life that I was almost terrified while driving. So happy to be off the road and inside. This will probably be the only time I dont get pulled over by a cop because I was driving in the middle of the road. I honestly had no idea where anything was. It was just a white blanket, no depth perception

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