Spring/Summer 2021 Banter/Complaint Thread

[BuffaloWeather]

[TimB]

17 minutes ago, frostfern said:

It's written for California normies who confuse hurricanes and tornadoes.  Normies who live anywhere near tornado ally at least know tornadoes aren't things that can be predicted like that.  They only tend to believe things like their town is protected because "they always go north... follow the river... stop by the hills... etc".  I don't necessarily blame people for wanting to believe they are safe for unscientific reasons, but they'd be closer to reality just saying God protected them... as that works as a more believable fill-in for a phenomena that's fundamentally pretty damn random.

Okay so Pittsburgh isn’t exactly tornado alley by any stretch, but we get enough in this region that normies shouldn’t be saying “you can effectively ignore any tornado watch/warning issued for Allegheny County,” and yet I’ve seen and heard it said multiple times in the last few years.

[frostfern]

18 hours ago, TimB84 said:

Okay so Pittsburgh isn’t exactly tornado alley by any stretch, but we get enough in this region that normies shouldn’t be saying “you can effectively ignore any tornado watch/warning issued for Allegheny County,” and yet I’ve seen and heard it said multiple times in the last few years.

Part of the problem is the sirens go off for the entire county while a 40 yard wide EF0 makes a 0.5 mile long path that knocks a few trees over and damages one barn.  People start thinking every warning is a false alarm because their house didn't get hit when the sirens went off.  You hope if there ever is a warning for a 1/2 mile wide EF4 people will not assume it's a false alarm just because previous EF0 tornadoes affected only a tiny area.  The big ones affect significantly more area, but they just haven't happened in a long time here.

[Stebo]

8 minutes ago, frostfern said:

Part of the problem is the sirens go off for the entire county while a 40 yard wide EF0 makes a 0.5 mile wide long path that knocks a few trees over and damages one barn.  People start thinking every warning is a false alarm because their house didn't get hit when the sirens went off.  You hope if there ever is a warning for a 1/2 mile wide EF4 people will not assume it's a false alarm just because previous EF0 tornadoes affected only a tiny area.  The big ones affect significantly more area, but they just haven't happened in a long time here.

You live in one of a few counties in the country to have a F5 tornado, just because it hasn't happened in a long time doesn't mean it can't again. Complacency in this state is going to get people killed when we do actually get a real tornado outbreak again.

[cyclone77]

34 minutes ago, Stebo said:

You live in one of a few counties in the country to have a F5 tornado, just because it hasn't happened in a long time doesn't mean it can't again. Complacency in this state is going to get people killed when we do actually get a real tornado outbreak again.

That's kind of the thinking here as well.  We're only about 20 miles from Camanche Iowa where the infamous 1860 tornado blew through.  No way to know for sure but that thing was surely EF3 and above.  Haven't seen anything close to that in my lifetime in this area (luckily) but it can definitely happen.

[StormfanaticInd]

[Powerball]

So basically, from what I can tell, the biggest take aways from the 1991 - 2020 normals are:

*Winters got snowier in the Great Lakes

*Springs got cooler

*Summers and Falls got hotter

[BuffaloWeather]

7 minutes ago, Powerball said:

So basically, from what I can tell, the biggest take aways from the 1991 - 2020 normals are:

*Winters got snowier in the Great Lakes

*Springs got cooler

*Summers and Falls got hotter

I think winters got warmer too. Once the 90s go away and we get the 30 year temps from 2000-2030 the average yearly temps will skyrocket. 96 and 97 were very cold.

[TimB]

8 hours ago, BuffaloWeather said:

I think winters got warmer too. Once the 90s go away and we get the 30 year temps from 2000-2030 the average yearly temps will skyrocket. 96 and 97 were very cold.

Who knows, maybe the next 10 years will be cold. Oh wait...

[nwohweather]

10 hours ago, BuffaloWeather said:

I think winters got warmer too. Once the 90s go away and we get the 30 year temps from 2000-2030 the average yearly temps will skyrocket. 96 and 97 were very cold.

Do you remember the 2010s? Hell I think it was 2014 that was dubbed the year without a Summer. Heck Toledo had Traverse City snowfall in one of those winters

[roardog]

Weren’t the 90s a warm decade around the Great Lakes? Going off of memory, I can recall a lot of mild winters and a few hot summers mixed in. Everyone remembers previous decades as cold and snowy even when they weren’t. lol 

[TimB]

14 minutes ago, nwohweather said:

Do you remember the 2010s? Hell I think it was 2014 that was dubbed the year without a Summer. Heck Toledo had Traverse City snowfall in one of those winters

This is why it’s even more incredible that the averages went up so much. Despite incredibly cold periods in 2014 and 2015, those were entirely erased and then some by the period from 2016-2020, which I would guess was the warmest five year period in recorded history for many locations.

[roardog]

10 hours ago, BuffaloWeather said:

I think winters got warmer too. Once the 90s go away and we get the 30 year temps from 2000-2030 the average yearly temps will skyrocket. 96 and 97 were very cold.

Also going off of memory(so I could be wrong)the winter of 96-97 was very harsh in the center part of the country but mild in the east. 97-98 was the very mild super El Niño.

[BuffaloWeather]

9 minutes ago, TimB84 said:

This is why it’s even more incredible that the averages went up so much. Despite incredibly cold periods in 2014 and 2015, those were entirely erased and then some by the period from 2016-2020, which I would guess was the warmest five year period in recorded history for many locations.

https://www.weather.gov/buf/BUFtemp

96/97 were both 46.9 degrees here in Buffalo. We haven't had a 46 degree year since then. 2014 was close, but even that came short. 

2014- 47

2015- 48.5

Last year was 2nd warmest year on record at 51.5, behind 2012 52.1

There have been 11 50+ deg years in Buffalos recording history (1940) and 9 of them have come 1990-Present. 

[roardog]

3 minutes ago, TimB84 said:

This is why it’s even more incredible that the averages went up so much. Despite incredibly cold periods in 2014 and 2015, those were entirely erased and then some by the period from 2016-2020, which I would guess was the warmest five year period in recorded history for many locations.

The 2000s weren’t exactly a deep freeze and neither were the 90s so despite having some extreme cold for two consecutive winters, that’s not going to overwhelm all the other mild years. 

[TimB]

1 minute ago, BuffaloWeather said:

https://www.weather.gov/buf/BUFtemp

96/97 were both 46.9 degrees here in Buffalo. We haven't had a 46 degree year since then. 2014 was close, but even that came short. 

2014- 47

2015- 48.5

2015 had a ridiculously warm December, at least in Pittsburgh (5 degrees warmer than any other December since observations moved to the airport in 1948), so probably in Buffalo too - I would guess it was on track for low 47’s with a normal December.

[TimB]

10 minutes ago, BuffaloWeather said:

There have been 11 50+ deg years in Buffalos recording history (1940) and 9 of them have come 1990-Present. 

The story in Pittsburgh is much the same. In the 73 years of observations at the airport, the warmest average temperature for 7 of the 12 months has occurred between 2015 and now. This includes the four warmest Septembers in that 73 year period (2015, 2016, 2018, and 2019). I saw something in the Central PA thread that Harrisburg, PA (granted, a little further east than this subforum) had their September and December normals go up by two full degrees - doesn’t that indicate that the 2010s were six(!) degrees warmer than the 1980s in those months? The picture is pretty clear unless one is blatantly ignoring it.

[madwx]

38 minutes ago, nwohweather said:

Do you remember the 2010s? Hell I think it was 2014 that was dubbed the year without a Summer. Heck Toledo had Traverse City snowfall in one of those winters

the great Mount Tambora eruption of 2014

[michsnowfreak]

12 hours ago, Powerball said:

So basically, from what I can tell, the biggest take aways from the 1991 - 2020 normals are:

*Winters got snowier in the Great Lakes

*Springs got cooler

*Summers and Falls got hotter

Pretty much. 

Summarizing the changes to Detroit normals:

Annual temp went up 0.2°, annual precip went up 0.85", and annual snowfall went up 2.5".

Feb, Apr, Nov got colder, the other 9 months got warmer. May-Sept got the most warmer and especially with min temps.

 

[michsnowfreak]

1 hour ago, TimB84 said:

The story in Pittsburgh is much the same. In the 73 years of observations at the airport, the warmest average temperature for 7 of the 12 months has occurred between 2015 and now. This includes the four warmest Septembers in that 73 year period (2015, 2016, 2018, and 2019). I saw something in the Central PA thread that Harrisburg, PA (granted, a little further east than this subforum) had their September and December normals go up by two full degrees - doesn’t that indicate that the 2010s were six(!) degrees warmer than the 1980s in those months? The picture is pretty clear unless one is blatantly ignoring it.

Where were obs taken before the airport? At Pittsburgh since records began in 1875, all months alltime warmest reading was pre-1934 except Mar (2012) & Apr (2017).

 

Harrisburg Sept/Dec temps were about 3.5° warmer in the 10s than the 80s.

[michsnowfreak]

2 hours ago, roardog said:

Weren’t the 90s a warm decade around the Great Lakes? Going off of memory, I can recall a lot of mild winters and a few hot summers mixed in. Everyone remembers previous decades as cold and snowy even when they weren’t. lol 

90s had warm winters and summers but cool falls and springs locally. Very similar to the 50s. The trends locally are that November is cooling off then December warms up....Jan/Feb are staying the same temp wise but the snow is increasing...Apr is cooling down...then the heat is on May-Sept. 

 

The local jokes about how we don't have spring and fall anymore are actually given a tiny bit of credence with these trends. Though as always the general public exaggerates everything. 

 

Winters are not only snowier than they've ever been, but there have been I believe 4 or 5 decades with Warmer winters than the 2010s. Clearly summers increasing temps are the most notable and that is widely due to low temps. Heatwaves/90 degree days pale in comparison to the behemoths of the 1930s-50s. My guess is summers are getting more humid, thus temps not falling as much.

[TimB]

10 minutes ago, michsnowfreak said:

Where were obs taken before the airport? At Pittsburgh since records began in 1875, all months alltime warmest reading was pre-1934 except Mar (2012) & Apr (2017).

 

Harrisburg Sept/Dec temps were about 3.5° warmer in the 10s than the 80s.

It’s my understanding that observations were taken at a few different locations, mostly in or near the city (the airport is nearly 20 miles west). Personally, I only compare apples to apples when looking at temperature data (1948-present), because there are all sorts of variables that could influence whether or not data from the 1880s at a different location could be compared to data from the 2020s at the current location.

As for Harrisburg, it seems to me that if a 30 year weighted average went up by 2 degrees by taking and replacing 1/3 of the data, it would stand to reason that the replaced data was 6 degrees lower than the new data. For example: suppose the averages for the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s were all 70 degrees. 70+70+70 = 210 / 3 = 70. To get that average to 72, we would need the 210 to become 216, so 70+70+76 = 216 / 3 = 72. Am I missing something?

Regardless, even if the temperatures for a particular month somewhere were 3.5 degrees warmer (and not 6) than they were just 30 degrees earlier, it would and should set off major alarm bells.

[BuffaloWeather]

20 minutes ago, michsnowfreak said:

Where were obs taken before the airport? At Pittsburgh since records began in 1875, all months alltime warmest reading was pre-1934 except Mar (2012) & Apr (2017).

 

Harrisburg Sept/Dec temps were about 3.5° warmer in the 10s than the 80s.

Odd, as Buffalos top 10 warmest list is riddled with the last 30 years. 7 of the top 10 warmest years were since 1990 and the top 3 are 2012, 2020, 2016. The last time Buffalo broke a top 10 coldest year was 1943.

https://www.weather.gov/buf/BUF_top10

[TimB]

https://www.weather.gov/media/pbz/records/warmmonthave.pdf
This is Pittsburgh’s.

[frostfern]

15 minutes ago, michsnowfreak said:

Winters are not only snowier than they've ever been, but there have been I believe 4 or 5 decades with Warmer winters than the 2010s. Clearly summers increasing temps are the most notable and that is widely due to low temps. Heatwaves/90 degree days pale in comparison to the behemoths of the 1930s-50s. My guess is summers are getting more humid, thus temps not falling as much.

Summer 2018 was notable for being incredibly warm on average.  Yet there were no real heatwaves, just long stretches with temps 3-4 degrees above average.

[nwohweather]

1 hour ago, madwx said:

the great Mount Tambora eruption of 2014

Good one. I will say though some of the reports of its climatic impacts are unreal in 1815. Most crops failing in North America, large summer snows, and such a thick layer of particulates in the atmosphere that sunspots were visible to the naked eye. Last years insane wildfires and saharan dust clouds gave us a few days with that sort of tint here in Charleston, it'd be quite the spectacle to see this for a whole year. 

[michsnowfreak]

28 minutes ago, BuffaloWeather said:

Odd, as Buffalos top 10 warmest list is riddled with the last 30 years. 7 of the top 10 warmest years were since 1990 and the top 3 are 2012, 2020, 2016. The last time Buffalo broke a top 10 coldest year was 1943.

https://www.weather.gov/buf/BUF_top10

Detroits warmest:

Jan- 1932

Feb- 1882

Mar- 2012

Apr- 1955

May- 1991

Jun- 1933

Jul- 2011

Aug- 1995

Sept- 1881

Oct- 1963

Nov- 1931

Dec- 2015

[michsnowfreak]

25 minutes ago, frostfern said:

Summer 2018 was notable for being incredibly warm on average.  Yet there were no real heatwaves, just long stretches with temps 3-4 degrees above average.

 Yes while 2018 was a more extreme example I've been noticing that overall.

[TimB]

2 minutes ago, michsnowfreak said:

Detroits warmest:

Jan- 1932

Feb- 1882

Mar- 2012

Apr- 1955

May- 1991

Jun- 1933

Jul- 2011

Aug- 1995

Sept- 1881

Oct- 1963

Nov- 1931

Dec- 2015

10/150 = 7%
3/12 = 25%

[michsnowfreak]

13 hours ago, BuffaloWeather said:

I think winters got warmer too. Once the 90s go away and we get the 30 year temps from 2000-2030 the average yearly temps will skyrocket. 96 and 97 were very cold.

The 90s were the same annual avg temp as the 00s overall. So it will really matter more what the 2020s do.