Monday Feb 15 - midday Feb 16, 2021 Significant Winter Ice Event interior

[SnoSki14]

Most of the rains fell when it was in the mid 30s so a lot of it was absorbed by the pack. 

However we will see a lot more melting with temps likely climbing through the 40s. 

[HeadInTheClouds]

32 and cloudy. Have about .10 of ice. 

[Rtd208]

Picked up 0.81" of rain so far today.

Current temp 38

[gravitylover]

The lowest 2-3" of the snowpack are dark grey and slushy. All of this rain has soaked through and this stuff is gonna be here forever after it locks up tonight then gets insulated by a half foot on Thursday.

[MJO812]

Down to 40 here in south Brooklyn from being 48 early this morning.

[HVSnowLover]

Strong coastal front set up, LI in the 50s. I've been up to 39 so far while southern parts of the city reached mid to upper 40s.. 

[STORMANLI]

Commack

51° 

1/4 SM FG

Had -FZDZ until 1125pm

0.86" 

[HVSnowLover]

29 minutes ago, HeadInTheClouds said:

32 and cloudy. Have about .10 of ice. 

That's not much considering I am assuming you never went above freezing during precip

[snywx]

32f. Everything is caked in ice & we still have a solid 11” snowpack here

[SleetStormNJ]

I'm interested to watch how much we warm up west of the City.  Temps have busted a bit low by few degrees and looks like the cold air is pressing in a bit quicker behind from the Lakes to come later this afternoon and evening.

[HeadInTheClouds]

Just now, HVSnowLover said:

That's not much considering I am assuming you never went above freezing during precip

It may be a little more. A huge tree limb just broke off one of my trees and clipped my car. Ugh. I was below freezing all night. I'm now at 33. 

[lee59]

Wind has switched to west here and the temperature has gone from the low 50s to 40s.

[dWave]

breaks of sun through the fog, haze. temp shot up to 45.

big piles remain but a lot of snow melt, almost got the full width of the street back in spots.  I wouldn't mind having semi normal parking again.

[Blizzwalker]

Substantial glaze over everything  and I see trees branches and shrubs weighted down with ice.  Relatively little loss of snowpack so far. Looks like at least .2 ice but just guessing.  I'd say NOAA  forecast was correct for up here.

[Brian5671]

up to 45 here with peeks of sun.   Warmest day in quite some time....

[Cfa]

48 here with breaks of sun. High of 53 so far.

0.96” of rain. Snow is being obliterated, huge sections of grass now visible.

[gravitylover]

43° and climbing with filtered sun. Ice is gone from the critical spots which is good but the amount of water pouring down the hill that could freeze tonight is worrisome.

[CPcantmeasuresnow]

36° not to much snow pack damage here, still 14 inches otg, down 2 inches from yesterday.

[Allsnow]

Still full coverage here as this is man snow on the ground. Cloudy here currently 

[Brian5671]

Just now, Allsnow said:

Still full coverage here as this is man snow on the ground. Cloudy here currently 

yeah still have 4-6 inches OTG here even after all that rain....will be cement tonight with lows in the low 20's.

[Allsnow]

5 minutes ago, Brian5671 said:

yeah still have 4-6 inches OTG here even after all that rain....will be cement tonight with lows in the low 20's.

Yep, with snow and sleet coming Thursday this pack will go into March 

[crossbowftw3]

Most of the ice has been effectively evaporated now which is a relief but standing water could cause a freeze on my deck and driveway tomorrow morning.

 

As for the pack we still have over 1' but small grass patches are beginning to emerge at the edges

[wishcast_hater]

Still easily over a foot of snow here. I was finally able to clear my front steps. They have been locked in ice for the past 2 weeks. 

[crossbowftw3]

front on the move, looks like I will max out around 42 degrees for the high today. Onto the next

[Brian5671]

51 here mostly sunny now.

[wishcast_hater]

Drove from my house in Dutchess at 42 degrees to upper Manhattan to where it’s currently 53 at my location.  

[wdrag]

Let's review the Feb 7 initial post. The title changed enroute  (i think I had 14-18 for the event window 7+days in advance). Perspective on what our modeling was indicating follows.  

Initial post from 2/7 midday. Have included rain in the tags, because we're close to having rain ,at times, within the overall cold enough pattern for snow and Ice, mainly along and northwest of I95. QPF this 5 day period should  be in the range of a general 0.5" minimum,  to possibly a maximum ~1.5". How much falls as snow, ice, rain is unknown and debatable. Multiple ensembles offer plenty of snow in and to the west and north of our subforum.  Favorable blocking for northeast snowfall appears to remain through this period, and well beyond. Am witnessing via modeling and reality,  a balancing of the cold core from southwest Canada to the northern Plains and Great Lakes shooting off pieces into the northeast USA,  then on into the north Atlantic. These reestablish-reinforce the blocking -NAO  from northern Canada to Greenland, and, following each pulse of CAA that moves through our subforum, there is WAA ahead of the next short wave.  So far, the cold core has not broken off in total,  to change the pattern and so, the snow opportunities continue on and on.  February is already off to a special start and we may be heading for a top 10 snowiest February (see attached February Central Park ranking and year). 

Will narrow the goal posts on these possibilities for this 5 day period as we draw closer.  My most confident period of something significant-substantial is the 16th-17th, but I have to consider some of the modeling that likes Valentines Day for an event and also the 16th-17th, delayed a day til the 18th.  

 

What happened?  A little bit of junk ice/flurries here and there the 14th (better ice the day before on the 13th along and se of I95, (that was our RIC ice storm).  The primary event was the night of the 15th, morning of the 16th. It was generally ~0.4-1.25" of rain as far as I can tell, with rain and non hazardous spotty icing I95 corridor southeastward and ice northwest of that, with a busted heavy ice forecast for the northwest part of the forum.  That bust I think in part was related to twice the reality qpf forecast (please see attached), not the temperatures. So in the middle of where the ICE was supposed to be thickest, the rainfall was significantly less.  This happens. QPF modeling imperfect and I doubt if I can improve on banded qpf deviating from the models.   Power outages and downed trees/wires occurred in parts of the Poconos northward, just outside the members in the northwest part of our area (see Monroe County reports). Experimental guidance such as the HPC HREF and HRRX can be too heavy on icing and were again or are displaced.  The GFSV16 did a nice job on the FRAM ice expectation as did NAM temps and eventually RGEM temps. QPF's, not so good.   And an event is coming the 18th.   IF anyone has a better archive of RADAR qpf from DIX or OKX, please attach.  Thanks much.  

 

[LibertyBell]

8 hours ago, HVSnowLover said:

Strong coastal front set up, LI in the 50s. I've been up to 39 so far while southern parts of the city reached mid to upper 40s.. 

JFK hit 50, it was an awesome day we FINALLY had a day of sunshine.  I'm so sick and tired of all the clouds, this aint Venus lol.

 

[jm1220]

Snowpack largely intact but some areas exposed to the sun are bare. Shaded areas definitely have a good bit left and we have the huge dirt/ice piles that will get even bigger on Thu. 

[NorthShoreWx]

0.84" rain in Smithtown.

We cut the snowpack almost in half since yesterday morning. Was 12" Monday morning, 9" this morning and we lost another 2 or 3 inches under the Saharan sun this afternoon.  No bare spots here, there are some on the sides of Main Street down in town.  I was down in Islandia this afternoon (near the LIE) and there is noticeably less snow there with bare spots.The good news is that there is plenty left on the north shore to freeze into a nice solid base waiting to get covered up with Thursday's anticipated snowfall.  I'll be back out on the skis soon enough. 

The bad news is I'm supposed to be leading a completely filled group hike in the Catskills on Thursday and unless there is a cosmic shift in this evenings guidance, I'm going to have to cancel it due to expected travel conditions, especially for the downstate folks.