Winter 2021-2022

[uncle W]

5 hours ago, weathafella said:

2010-11 had a 7 week winter.   The 2nd half of December and January were great but winter died as February rolled.

sounds like 1960-61...

[40/70 Benchmark]

15 hours ago, George001 said:

That look decent for December but not 2010-2011 like, all that red off the west coast scares me a bit. That tells me that there is a signal for a strong pacific jet as well as a powerful and energized Hadley cell. I don’t really know a lot of Hadley cells but based on what I do know they are not good. I would like to see the Pacific Ocean as a whole cool off to keep the Hadley cell in check. Don’t get me wrong I don’t think that’s a terrible look even with the rough February but it doesn’t scream epic winter, more like an average winter like last year, with the potential being capped due to the expansive Hadley cell. We have had 6 straight winters with an expansive Hadley cell, and I’ll start getting excited for an epic winter when I see signs that the dominance of the Hadley cell this winter won’t be there like it was the last 6.

I don't think that is a sign of an active PAC jet necessarily, however, the position of the ridging may imply some west coast troughing (-PNA)....the Hadley cell expansion is more of a longer term climate shift and while it does serve to augment se ridging, the primary impetus for a se ridge here would be the west coast trough resulting from the offshore position of that ridge.

You need to be careful about about how you incorporate the Hadley Cell expansion into forecasting because it is not a stochastic feature, like the blocking, etc.

[ORH_wxman]

8 hours ago, weathafella said:

2010-11 had a 7 week winter.   The 2nd half of December and January were great but winter died as February rolled.

There were some pretty good events in late February (2/25-26 and 2/27, then icing on 2/28) but they were admittedly more interior and N of pike.

[CoastalWx]

Nothing worse than a slow bleed to end winter if February torches. I can deal with an avg month, but gah.....it's so effing painful. Let us  hope not.

[ORH_wxman]

15 minutes ago, CoastalWx said:

Nothing worse than a slow bleed to end winter if February torches. I can deal with an avg month, but gah.....it's so effing painful. Let us  hope not.

A relatively snowless Feb 15-Mar 15 period is by far the worst. Way too early to think about actually doing much non-winter activities outside (unless you golf on the Cape or something)....and the snowpack just wilts in the sun. That happened last year in the final week of February and first week of March....we had like a 20"+ pack after 2/19 that just rotted and slowly sublimated/melted. Painful and boring as hell...especially knowing that you can get some absolute monster storms during that period.

[weathafella]

1 hour ago, ORH_wxman said:

There were some pretty good events in late February (2/25-26 and 2/27, then icing on 2/28) but they were admittedly more interior and N of pike.

I was actually going to mention the late February events-I have a currier and Ives looking picture from 2/28 in my old hood.   Unc mentioned 1960-61 and it’s not a bad analogy for 2010-11 but the storms of 1960-61 were bigger and more exciting.

[Typhoon Tip]

On 9/8/2021 at 10:30 AM, J Paul Gordon said:

I'll take a front ended winter over the opposite. Its nice to have snow on the ground at night at the darkest time of year.  NDJ cold...excellent...FMA milder...OK days are getting longer so let spring be in the air!

You and me both, then ...

I don't mind snow early on, and lots of it. Although Halloween and in fact October in general, no. 

The 1995 autumn was my 'season of perfection,'  .. the equivalent of the spirit of your dreams coming back to tell you they were wrong about you, and how they regret casting you asunder, and what they would do if it meant being able to lose themselves in your arms.  Lol

October was oddly mild, but we kept getting these ultra dry air masses between the 15th and Halloween ( ~).  With long nights and still air, the UML campus yellowed broad -leafed maples would frost-load and rain leaves.  I remember stopping to observe this .. 8 am one morning as the sun cut through the steam plume from respiration. The bustle of the campus was still minimal enough that in the moment, once could distinctly hear them as they clipped from elevation, filtered down through the branches and other leaves to make contact with the Earth beneath. And you could tell it was specific to that morning's deposition because the layer upon the ground was yellow with pop, partially obscuring the previous like they were old banana peals.  It was chilly in the moment... despite the warm month, probably last of the Pinatubo winters ensuing.. But it may have been 28 F, headed for 54 that afternoon.

Early November arrives with more like hard freezes.  I cannot recall if they were more of just those super radiational cooling nocturnals, or if it was CAA...probably both. I remember there was modest -NAO ( at least ) tendencies over the western limb (NE Canada) early that year, as the Seniors were talking about it within earshot when in the Lab at some point.  I should go back and look up the EPO - though I'm not sure the monitoring of that index, if even it's domain, was really very accessible then - probably is via reanalysis. Anyway, water rivulets that squeezed around the granite blocks that were used to construct the Pawtucket canal above the Merrimack River that bifurcates North and South Campuses, was beginning to freeze - similar to the icefalls you see along escarped rock formations around regional highways.  I thought it was very early for that... One day in particular, it pm and the sun was setting, and as I was ambling back across the bridge, I noticed that some ice still cleaned to that stone fascia.  That didn't melt? I thought.

This was all before the snows came in, nice and dreamy early a week later.   And since in the years since, I'd never seen that ice occur ... it's like a hidden metric. In any case, somewhere between the 8th and 15th, we had 3-5" of snow/sleet over the Merrimack Valley.  CT missed out... In fact, I think it was N of the Pike.  But, that cold season advanced early, like an unstoppable Military advance.  Every successive event repositioned a non-retreating winter front farther S, and once on the other side ... you let go because you weren't going back. 

It just got colder... and colder ... and we got several nickle-scaled events. But a bona fide snow pack by Thanks Giving.  The modelling at that time was setting up cyclic snow threats - think more primitive web graphics and the 'MRF' and ECMWF available as the early model cinema ... Unysis was one such web site to go to.  I wonder if that source even still exists.  Despite the primitive early graphics, this was a helluva way advantage over dialing up the DIFAX charts. Oh man - you guys born since have no idea how luxurious your experience is...

December arrives ... we had like 15" as a real stratafying snow pack by the 10th, with temperatures equal to the numerical date.  I remember walking to WHDH to meet one of the on-camera greats, and having to use pedestrian cleave-through snowbanks after parking the car around the corner from Government Center in downtown Boston.  I mean that may be the last time urban Boston and perhaps eastern SNE had a cold anomaly, that early, so extreme - combing with snow no less.  The snow still on the sidewalk squealed under foot.  It only Dec 10, and we were by then almost a month into weather that by late January was anomalously winter like.  Another storm... after which, out around Acton, our snow pack was nearing 20" ...the snow in fact began to settle before melting.  I cannot recall exactly what happened between Xmas and NY that year... but the cold didn't relent, and by December 28th I specifically remember, ...what would become known as the great "Megalopolis Blizzard" was beginning to loom at the model's extended range boundary.  First that beast was supposed to be mainly S of NYC... but as the days ticked off, the models correct 50 miles N ... and eventually, it did finally clip us here.  

There was one more storm after that, and the snow total in the yard was a resting 32" deep.  I'd never seen that before... not since perhaps the "Cleveland Superbomb" of 1978, January.  And the aspect about that was that it all came from nickle-dime events.  There was the MB storm mentioned above - but that was really an outlier. The pattern was delivering a steady diet. 

I actually didn't care much for the end of that winter, that year.  We had a thaw that jaw dropped for its ability to erode back that enormous glacier I thought in my primitive environmental awareses years, was all but indestructible.  Wrong.  Two.5 Minnesota translating cyclones later and we were down to field ponds and snow banks rollin' off steam.   I would have fine with that being the final chapter and a hugely early spring that year .. But, winter obtruded back in ... I guess for the fun of getting that year's seasonal snow totals to historic numbers, did have its place.

[ORH_wxman]

46 minutes ago, Typhoon Tip said:

You and me both, then ...

I don't mind snow early on, and lots of it. Although Halloween and in fact October in general, no. 

The 1995 autumn was my 'season of perfection,'  .. the equivalent of the spirit of your dreams coming back to tell you they were wrong about you, and how they regret casting you asunder, and what they would do if it meant being able to lose themselves in your arms.  Lol

October was oddly mild, but we kept getting these ultra dry air masses between the 15th and Halloween ( ~).  With long nights and still air, the UML campus yellowed broad -leafed maples would frost-load and rain leaves.  I remember stopping to observe this .. 8 am one morning as the sun cut through the steam plume from respiration. The bustle of the campus was still minimal enough that in the moment, once could distinctly hear them as they clipped from elevation, filtered down through the branches and other leaves to make contact with the Earth beneath. And you could tell it was specific to that morning's deposition because the layer upon the ground was yellow with pop, partially obscuring the previous like they were old banana peals.  It was chilly in the moment... despite the warm month, probably last of the Pinatubo winters ensuing.. But it may have been 28 F, headed for 54 that afternoon.

Early November arrives with more like hard freezes.  I cannot recall if they were more of just those super radiational cooling nocturnals, or if it was CAA...probably both. I remember there was modest -NAO ( at least ) tendencies over the western limb (NE Canada) early that year, as the Seniors were talking about it within earshot when in the Lab at some point.  I should go back and look up the EPO - though I'm not sure the monitoring of that index, if even it's domain, was really very accessible then - probably is via reanalysis. Anyway, water rivulets that squeezed around the granite blocks that were used to construct the Pawtucket canal above the Merrimack River that bifurcates North and South Campuses, was beginning to freeze - similar to the icefalls you see along escarped rock formations around regional highways.  I thought it was very early for that... One day in particular, it pm and the sun was setting, and as I was ambling back across the bridge, I noticed that some ice still cleaned to that stone fascia.  That didn't melt? I thought.

This was all before the snows came in, nice and dreamy early a week later.   And since in the years since, I'd never seen that ice occur ... it's like a hidden metric. In any case, somewhere between the 8th and 15th, we had 3-5" of snow/sleet over the Merrimack Valley.  CT missed out... In fact, I think it was N of the Pike.  But, that cold season advanced early, like an unstoppable Military advance.  Every successive event repositioned a non-retreating winter front farther S, and once on the other side ... you let go because you weren't going back. 

It just got colder... and colder ... and we got several nickle-scaled events. But a bona fide snow pack by Thanks Giving.  The modelling at that time was setting up cyclic snow threats - think more primitive web graphics and the 'MRF' and ECMWF available as the early model cinema ... Unysis was one such web site to go to.  I wonder if that source even still exists.  Despite the primitive early graphics, this was a helluva way advantage over dialing up the DIFAX charts. Oh man - you guys born since have no idea how luxurious your experience is...

December arrives ... we had like 15" as a real stratafying snow pack by the 10th, with temperatures equal to the numerical date.  I remember walking to WHDH to meet one of the on-camera greats, and having to use pedestrian cleave-through snowbanks after parking the car around the corner from Government Center in downtown Boston.  I mean that may be the last time urban Boston and perhaps eastern SNE had a cold anomaly, that early, so extreme - combing with snow no less.  The snow still on the sidewalk squealed under foot.  It only Dec 10, and we were by then almost a month into weather that by late January was anomalously winter like.  Another storm... after which, out around Acton, our snow pack was nearing 20" ...the snow in fact began to settle before melting.  I cannot recall exactly what happened between Xmas and NY that year... but the cold didn't relent, and by December 28th I specifically remember, ...what would become known as the great "Megalopolis Blizzard" was beginning to loom at the model's extended range boundary.  First that beast was supposed to be mainly S of NYC... but as the days ticked off, the models correct 50 miles N ... and eventually, it did finally clip us here.  

There was one more storm after that, and the snow total in the yard was a resting 32" deep.  I'd never seen that before... not since perhaps the "Cleveland Superbomb" of 1978, January.  And the aspect about that was that it all came from nickle-dime events.  There was the MB storm mentioned above - but that was really an outlier. The pattern was delivering a steady diet. 

I actually didn't care much for the end of that winter, that year.  We had a thaw that jaw dropped for its ability to erode back that enormous glacier I thought in my primitive environmental awareses years, was all but indestructible.  Wrong.  Two.5 Minnesota translating cyclones later and we were down to field ponds and snow banks rollin' off steam.   I would have fine with that being the final chapter and a hugely early spring that year .. But, winter obtruded back in ... I guess for the fun of getting that year's seasonal snow totals to historic numbers, did have its place.

1995-1996 without the epic 2-3 week meltdown in 2nd half of January would be an amazing spectacle.

 

The warmth in October 1995 abruptly flipping to very cold late that month was eerily prophetic. It never flipped back until the thaw in mid/late January.

[Typhoon Tip]

37 minutes ago, ORH_wxman said:

1995-1996 without the epic 2-3 week meltdown in 2nd half of January would be an amazing spectacle.

 

The warmth in October 1995 abruptly flipping to very cold late that month was eerily prophetic. It never flipped back until the thaw in mid/late January.

good summary statement there ...especially 'eerily prophetic'

I was attempting to create that haunt by describing the weird way in which the ice on the shade side of the canal/water duct ( which is 60' high at the hydro) was somehow resistent to melt in late Octoer/early November...despite being 50 F afternoons.  Rivulets froze by night into icicles and glaze in the 22 F mornings. 

I think it was the dry air ...really.  Those air masses set up spectacular radiation overnights, and as we knows ... 50/low dp is not as destructive to frozen water as 50/50 ... probably allowed the ice to hold on...

See, what people don't understand is the shear scale and degree of dork that is me.  I notice shit like that...  and you're right really - some my look at it and 'feel' ominous in the settting, "why am I looking ice there at this time of year" -

boom

[ORH_wxman]

2 minutes ago, Typhoon Tip said:

good summary statement there ...especially 'eerily prophetic'

I was attempting to create that haunt by describing the weird way in which the ice on the shade side of the canal/water duct ( which is 60' high at the hydro) was somehow resistent to melt in late Octoer/early November...despite being 50 F afternoons.  Rivulets froze by nice into icicles and glaze in the 22 F mornings. 

I think it was the dry air ...really.  Those air masses set up spectacular radiation overnights, and as we knows ... 50/low dp is not as destructive to frozen water as 50/50 ... probably allowed the ice to hold on...

See, what people don't understand is the shear scale and degree of dork that is me.  I notice shit like that...  and you're right really - some my look at it and 'feel' ominous in the settting, "why am I looking ice there at this time of year" -

boom

I do remember how early people were skating on ponds that season. It was like right after T-day in early December you would see people all over the ice. Typically you wouldn't see that until at least closer to Xmas and often later.

 

But I can see why in looking at the F6 data....ORH hit 61 on November 12th....then would only see 50F one more rtime (on 11/28 but with a low below freezing). They then hit 42F on December 4th....they wouldn't sniff 40F again until January 17th which began the meltdown. It's very hard to go that long in December without hitting 40F but that year did it.

[tamarack]

5 hours ago, uncle W said:

sounds like 1960-61...

While I lamented that the record pack following Feb. 3-4 was gone by late that month, we had 16" in March - 12" wet surprise on the 23rd- and 6" in April, a messy 4" mix on 13-14.  And a few IP during the cold rain on May 27 that year.  Of course, NYC had only 2" after 2/4/61.

[DavisStraight]

12 minutes ago, ORH_wxman said:

I do remember how early people were skating on ponds that season. It was like right after T-day in early December you would see people all over the ice. Typically you wouldn't see that until at least closer to Xmas and often later.

 

But I can see why in looking at the F6 data....ORH hit 61 on November 12th....then would only see 50F one more rtime (on 11/28 but with a low below freezing). They then hit 42F on December 4th....they wouldn't sniff 40F again until January 17th which began the meltdown. It's very hard to go that long in December without hitting 40F but that year did it.

I think I had my deepest pack that year, too bad we had the melt but my driveway piles would have made Kevin envious.

[40/70 Benchmark]

8 minutes ago, DavisStraight said:

I think I had my deepest pack that year, too bad we had the melt but my driveway piles would have made Kevin envious.

Feb 2015 beat that season as far as pack goes in Wilmington...I think Jan 2011 was about on par with Jan 1996.

[CoastalWx]

16 minutes ago, DavisStraight said:

I think I had my deepest pack that year, too bad we had the melt but my driveway piles would have made Kevin envious.

The pack after the fluff job which occurred a couple of days after the Jan 96 blizz was surreal to me at the time. I've never anything like it up to that point. We had a deep pack in Feb '94 where I lived, but I did not get the CJ that areas in ern pym county got.  It was also when I really started to understand cstl fronts. Where I was in Brockton, it oscillated a bit in the December '95 storms. In the first event (I believe 12/14-12/15) I did spend time on the other side. We didn't get rain, but I noticed it was getting wet...the tree bark started getting that dark look.....a terrible feeling to any weenie who notices that stuff. I was outside when it flipped back to NW and immediately started seeing the snow blow off the roofs, and the snow that was stuck to the trees, begin to ice up. The next event on 12/19-12/20 was sort of a CJ. I believe I had over a foot in that as the CF was just to my east. In fact, I think it was like 14-15" maybe. I believe I had around a foot otg for Christmas. 

[DavisStraight]

7 minutes ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

Feb 2015 beat that season as far as pack goes in Wilmington...I think Jan 2011 was about on par with Jan 1996.

You're more east so you head the higher amounts, I was always getting a little less than you guys, the office in Westborough had a really deep pack.

[Typhoon Tip]

32 minutes ago, ORH_wxman said:

I do remember how early people were skating on ponds that season. It was like right after T-day in early December you would see people all over the ice. Typically you wouldn't see that until at least closer to Xmas and often later.

 

But I can see why in looking at the F6 data....ORH hit 61 on November 12th....then would only see 50F one more rtime (on 11/28 but with a low below freezing). They then hit 42F on December 4th....they wouldn't sniff 40F again until January 17th which began the meltdown. It's very hard to go that long in December without hitting 40F but that year did it.

That actually is surprising there ... I'm going to go to the NCEP Library site and see what was happening synoptically that day. I really am strained to recall a day that mild toward mid Novie that year, between Acton and UML where I was boppin' around back in those days.

I wonder if that some some bootleg deal where their elevation might have got above a dammed layer... I mean, ORH is actually pretty far S in the state so it may have been cooler along Rt 2 that/NE Mass ...  Interesting -

I am definitely sure that once we got snow on the ground at school, we did not see bare ground again until that thaw later on at the end of January, '96.  Maybe the snow/sleet 3-5" deal was on the 13th lol

[ORH_wxman]

7 minutes ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

Feb 2015 beat that season as far as pack goes in Wilmington...I think Jan 2011 was about on par with Jan 1996.

Jan 1996 slightly exceeded 2011 in ORH....mostly because we jackpotted in the Jan 12th storm while the CP had mixing issues. I think we had about 43" at the peak in 1996 while 2011 had 39-40". Feb 2015 slightly beat that at 44". But both fell just a bit short of March 2001.

[ORH_wxman]

4 minutes ago, Typhoon Tip said:

That actually is surprising there ... I'm going to go to the NCEP Library site and see what was happening synoptically that day. I really am strained to recall a day that mild toward mid Novie that year, between Acton and UML where I was boppin' around back in those days.

I wonder if that some some bootleg deal where their elevation might have got above a dammed layer... I mean, ORH is actually pretty far S in the state so it may have been cooler along Rt 2 that/NE Mass ...  Interesting -

I am definitely sure that one we got snow on the ground at school, we did not see bear ground again until that thaw later on at the end of January, '96.  Maybe the snow/sleet 3-5" deal was on the 13th lol

It looks like Nov 12, 1995 was a cheap midnight high...here is the 06z map....

 

[CoastalWx]

I had pictures of the winters of 93-94 and 95-96, but unfortunately cannot find them. So angry...lol. 

[Typhoon Tip]

11 minutes ago, ORH_wxman said:

It looks like Nov 12, 1995 was a cheap midnight high...here is the 06z map....

 

LOL   ... right... like, no way in that set up, 18z later on was anything but down like an easy date with a look like that -

[Typhoon Tip]

Wow - that's exactly what happened, Will

Check out this:  https://library.oarcloud.noaa.gov/docs.lib/htdocs/rescue/dwm/1995/19951113-19951119.pdf

 

Note the 14th... That overnight whiplash fropa event on the 12th heralded in the big pattern change, and there was no wasting time.  That 5-3" snow/mix deal I'm remembering was most likely that event late on the 14th ...and then looking ahead the rest of that week ( download from the Library ) the pattern was like just not going anywhere with nicely sequenced wave spaced events.  

 

[Typhoon Tip]

Here's the modest but important west-biased -NAO nearing after the 20th November 1995

[40/70 Benchmark]

2 hours ago, Typhoon Tip said:

You and me both, then ...

I don't mind snow early on, and lots of it. Although Halloween and in fact October in general, no. 

The 1995 autumn was my 'season of perfection,'  .. the equivalent of the spirit of your dreams coming back to tell you they were wrong about you, and how they regret casting you asunder, and what they would do if it meant being able to lose themselves in your arms.  Lol

October was oddly mild, but we kept getting these ultra dry air masses between the 15th and Halloween ( ~).  With long nights and still air, the UML campus yellowed broad -leafed maples would frost-load and rain leaves.  I remember stopping to observe this .. 8 am one morning as the sun cut through the steam plume from respiration. The bustle of the campus was still minimal enough that in the moment, once could distinctly hear them as they clipped from elevation, filtered down through the branches and other leaves to make contact with the Earth beneath. And you could tell it was specific to that morning's deposition because the layer upon the ground was yellow with pop, partially obscuring the previous like they were old banana peals.  It was chilly in the moment... despite the warm month, probably last of the Pinatubo winters ensuing.. But it may have been 28 F, headed for 54 that afternoon.

Early November arrives with more like hard freezes.  I cannot recall if they were more of just those super radiational cooling nocturnals, or if it was CAA...probably both. I remember there was modest -NAO ( at least ) tendencies over the western limb (NE Canada) early that year, as the Seniors were talking about it within earshot when in the Lab at some point.  I should go back and look up the EPO - though I'm not sure the monitoring of that index, if even it's domain, was really very accessible then - probably is via reanalysis. Anyway, water rivulets that squeezed around the granite blocks that were used to construct the Pawtucket canal above the Merrimack River that bifurcates North and South Campuses, was beginning to freeze - similar to the icefalls you see along escarped rock formations around regional highways.  I thought it was very early for that... One day in particular, it pm and the sun was setting, and as I was ambling back across the bridge, I noticed that some ice still cleaned to that stone fascia.  That didn't melt? I thought.

This was all before the snows came in, nice and dreamy early a week later.   And since in the years since, I'd never seen that ice occur ... it's like a hidden metric. In any case, somewhere between the 8th and 15th, we had 3-5" of snow/sleet over the Merrimack Valley.  CT missed out... In fact, I think it was N of the Pike.  But, that cold season advanced early, like an unstoppable Military advance.  Every successive event repositioned a non-retreating winter front farther S, and once on the other side ... you let go because you weren't going back. 

It just got colder... and colder ... and we got several nickle-scaled events. But a bona fide snow pack by Thanks Giving.  The modelling at that time was setting up cyclic snow threats - think more primitive web graphics and the 'MRF' and ECMWF available as the early model cinema ... Unysis was one such web site to go to.  I wonder if that source even still exists.  Despite the primitive early graphics, this was a helluva way advantage over dialing up the DIFAX charts. Oh man - you guys born since have no idea how luxurious your experience is...

December arrives ... we had like 15" as a real stratafying snow pack by the 10th, with temperatures equal to the numerical date.  I remember walking to WHDH to meet one of the on-camera greats, and having to use pedestrian cleave-through snowbanks after parking the car around the corner from Government Center in downtown Boston.  I mean that may be the last time urban Boston and perhaps eastern SNE had a cold anomaly, that early, so extreme - combing with snow no less.  The snow still on the sidewalk squealed under foot.  It only Dec 10, and we were by then almost a month into weather that by late January was anomalously winter like.  Another storm... after which, out around Acton, our snow pack was nearing 20" ...the snow in fact began to settle before melting.  I cannot recall exactly what happened between Xmas and NY that year... but the cold didn't relent, and by December 28th I specifically remember, ...what would become known as the great "Megalopolis Blizzard" was beginning to loom at the model's extended range boundary.  First that beast was supposed to be mainly S of NYC... but as the days ticked off, the models correct 50 miles N ... and eventually, it did finally clip us here.  

There was one more storm after that, and the snow total in the yard was a resting 32" deep.  I'd never seen that before... not since perhaps the "Cleveland Superbomb" of 1978, January.  And the aspect about that was that it all came from nickle-dime events.  There was the MB storm mentioned above - but that was really an outlier. The pattern was delivering a steady diet. 

I actually didn't care much for the end of that winter, that year.  We had a thaw that jaw dropped for its ability to erode back that enormous glacier I thought in my primitive environmental awareses years, was all but indestructible.  Wrong.  Two.5 Minnesota translating cyclones later and we were down to field ponds and snow banks rollin' off steam.   I would have fine with that being the final chapter and a hugely early spring that year .. But, winter obtruded back in ... I guess for the fun of getting that year's seasonal snow totals to historic numbers, did have its place.

Another inconspicuous Harv reference!

Love those-

[ORH_wxman]

2 minutes ago, Typhoon Tip said:

Here's the modest but important west-biased -NAO nearing after the 20th November 1995

The NAO was a huge player in December...it migrated northward toward Greenland at times some but was very potent. It helped both the 12/14 clipper and the 12/19-20 storm stay cold/snowy. If you look at both of those setups, you'd see how they would be rainers without the -NAO. The 12/19 event had the block extending back down toward Hudson bay.

[Typhoon Tip]

46 minutes ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

Another inconspicuous Harv reference!

Love those-

Meh... I interned with him - ... look, he's an earth-toned guy.  One of the boys off camera and genuine.  No arrogance.  No 'celebrity pretense' of any kind. In fact, he doesn't give a shit about that stuff. He doesn't - or didn't back then. 

I used to hang charts and observe the media process - that was it.   You know a kind of funny "Fordism"  ( what my buddies call it when my loquacity gets the better of me as an ass-hat  ) .    The first day I was in the station, he finished what's referred to as 'the teaser' then said, "C'mon, let's go get slice at the Hall, we can talk about it on the way"  Faneuil Hall.   He was commiserating en route about what a pain in the ass it was to broadcast winter events in our specific market. How people "...Have to hear inches. That's all they want to hear."  I'm nodding along "mm hm. Right. Right."  "You know?  Inches inches inches!"   Just then, in my usual proclivity as a Gen-x irreverent dipshit - to which I'm not sure I've even outgrown frankly, I had the temerity to cut him off and add, "...Especially the women..."  (omg)

He stopped to bend over laughing for moment, "Yeah ha-ha, right!"  I told my buddies back that lab they were like you a-haha-hassole. 

anyway I said I was going to see a camera guy before because I wanted to give some context but never got back to it. I was going to get into it that he and I debated whether that big storm would get this far N. At the time, it was still walled off with the deform axis about to to L.I.     I won btw

This was also back in the day that we could almost count on the heights/ridging out over the west Atlantic as being just insufficiently enough materialized that storms tended to correct up.

[Typhoon Tip]

That 20th nor'easter, Dec 20 '95 was an amazing set up really.   I wonder what the snow totals were on this thing...

Here's the set up; note the 19th:  https://library.oarcloud.noaa.gov/docs.lib/htdocs/rescue/dwm/1995/19951218-19951224.pdf

[CoastalWx]

26 minutes ago, Typhoon Tip said:

That 20th nor'easter, Dec 20 '95 was an amazing set up really.   I wonder what the snow totals were on this thing...

Here's the set up; note the 19th:  https://library.oarcloud.noaa.gov/docs.lib/htdocs/rescue/dwm/1995/19951218-19951224.pdf

Haha The Schwoegler backlash storm. That guy loved him some backlash. A weenie note...look at the conditions in Revere vs Scituate. Can tell Revere was on the cold side of the CF. 

 

 

[Typhoon Tip]

Ha  ...aw man.

You know, that's not the first time I heard that fellow beware the back lash.  

I don't know if it was in fact this particular system above, but I do remember around that time ...wondering after he said that, well when is this happening, re the re-intensification. I don't think it ever did?

How did that verify ?  

Anyway, I was geeking out over at the Library and went several weeks of charts and was just gawking at storms in that incredible stretch, and noted that giant high over a decent S/W amid deep cold look on the 20th.    It just like the stuff of legends.   It's one of those deals where no one worries.

By the way, there was also a sneaking decent even there nn January 3rd ... in between that one and the latte 'Megalopolis' storm - kind of gets lost in the shuffle there.

[ORH_wxman]

1 minute ago, Typhoon Tip said:

Ha  ...aw man.

You know, that's not the first time I heard that fellow beware the back lash.  

I don't know if it was in fact this particular system above, but I do remember around that time ...wondering when the re-intensification would happen and it never did?

How did that verify ?  

Anyway, I was geeking out over at the Library and went several weeks of charts and was just gawking at storms in that incredible stretch, and noted that giant high over a decent S/W amid deep cold look.    It just like the stuff of legends. 

By the way, there was also a sneaking decent even there nn January 3rd ... in between that one and the latte 'Megalopolis' storm - kind of gets lost in the shuffle there.

It was kind of a bust but still a big storm. We had about 9-10 inches back in ORH. About 6" from the initial storm and then another 3" from the vortmax "backlash" the next day....then another inch or so from the wrap-around ULL snowshowers that lasted like 3 days after it got stalled up in the Maritimes.

I think the phase of the PV lobe was a little bit sloppy.

 

Loop these two:

http://www.meteo.psu.edu/fxg1/NARR/1995/us1219.php

http://www.meteo.psu.edu/fxg1/NARR/1995/us1220.php

 

You can see how the sfc low kind of escapes northeast a bit before that really good vortmax in the 2nd link catches up with it. It was originally forecasted to stall or at least slow down further southwest.

 

The south shore did very well though because they were getting great OES contribution during the whole event with NE winds over the December still-mild waters. I think South Weymouth had like 20"+. But outside of the OES spots, it was a mild disappointment even though it was still a good storm in an absolute sense. It was the expectations that sort of ruined it. We had the rare "Blizzard Watch" about 36-48 hours before the storm....but never got converted to blizzard warning.

[tamarack]

1 hour ago, Typhoon Tip said:

That 20th nor'easter, Dec 20 '95 was an amazing set up really.   I wonder what the snow totals were on this thing...

Here's the set up; note the 19th:  https://library.oarcloud.noaa.gov/docs.lib/htdocs/rescue/dwm/1995/19951218-19951224.pdf

Had 17.5" of 16:1 fluff here, biggest snowfall of my 13 winters in Gardiner.  Had a forestry meeting in Lovell the evening of 12/20, followed by the 70-mile drive home in the Olds version of the Chevy Citation.  Only about 1" when I started home (Lovell was west of the best stuff) but closer to 10" when I got back to Gardiner 2+ hours later, almost all on not-yet-plowed roads.  The fluff occasionally kicked up over the hood for a quick white-out, but otherwise wasn't a problem.  Next afternoon when the sun came out the Kennebec between Augusta and home was filled with snow rollers, 1st I'd ever seen.