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E PA/NJ/ DE Winter 2021-22 OBS Thread


JTA66
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29 minutes ago, JTA66 said:

We had one in 2014 I believe. Friends in Chester County were without power for nearly a week.

But yes, we really need a CAD set up for ice around here which this isn’t. As Forky pointed out in the NYC forum, in our current set up, the Apps are acting like a dam slowing down the CAA into our region.

There are still guardrails here and there with giant dents in them from all the trees that fell during that storm. That was wild.

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17 minutes ago, CoolHandMike said:

There are still guardrails here and there with giant dents in them from all the trees that fell during that storm. That was wild.

That was a bad storm, its the only ice storm I remember really packing the heat around here. There was one when I was up in Vermont but it was nothing for them to handle. 

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I am glad this threat is now a non event for me.  I don't do ice.  

In 1994 I worked for a heating oil company.  It was weeks of insanity.  The phone rang off the hook, so much so a couple of times the West Chester Police Dept came to the office to say customers were calling them since they could not get through.  The owner was buying pick up trucks right off the lot and putting 100 gallon tanks in the bed so we could get oil to the underground tank customers.  School kids were helping getting to other tanks carrying 5 gallon cans with spikes on their shoes.  A lot of customers homes were just not able to handle the big truck getting in and out safely.  I had 2 pages of legal pad customers waiting for us to thaw their homes when their power was restored.  People lost a lot that year due to burst pipes.

In 2014 my father died suddenly and I left work to stay with Mom at my childhood home.  I shoveled the driveway and sidewalks plenty of times that winter.  My brother texted me one morning to see how we were in the ice that started coming down, and sure as ish, the power went out.  Had to take Mom to my house where the generator was.  She did pretty good.  Taking a demented person out of their environment can be challenging.  We had the TV running so it seemed normal.  It was an adventure.  Thankfully her outage was short lived, just one night.  My brother was out for a week.

Now that I'm much older and at high risk for fracture, whew!!!  Is all I can say.

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RIP snowpack :( fog really did a number on it overnight and I expect the rain and high temps to finish it off tonight besides the plow piles. Next couple weeks look uneventful, rain, snow, or otherwise. But at least it won't be stupid cold after this weekend. Looks seasonable next week, maybe slightly below normal but then 2nd half of the month is looking above normal as the SE ridge amps up. I think barring a surprise event in the next week, the rest of the month looks to be a punt. Hopefully we can get something in March with the shorter wavelengths to get some of us to around average snowfall(and get the N and W folks at least one decent event) but way too early to tell. Overall we could of done worse in a Nina down here. Feel for you Lehigh Valley/N and W guys though, this was the winter from hell up there. 

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My Philly forum friends: Memphis Tn and eastern Arkansas is currently taking the brunt of this ice storm. Honestly, this maybe the worst ice storm they ever experienced since 1994 and maybe even worse than that.  Here are some traffic cams from the link below.  Its really bad already and the storm has just started. MLGW has had over 15,000 people without power in the past hour and if I was betting man, more than half of the city and metro area will be without power for days if not weeks. IMHO, this will be a catastrophic storm event for them the way it is panning out. There maybe a million people out of power for weeks down there.  My sister in law still lives down there and two transformers just blew within the hour near her house.  The media should be concentrating on this situation right now.

 

https://www.localmemphis.com/gallery/weather/severe-weather/ice-storm-memphis-mid-south-1994-greenville-mississippi/522-aeadd648-43b4-425e-a9e7-856dfc8f17c9

https://buzzcam.net/MI40.html

 

 

 

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3 hours ago, CoolHandMike said:

There are still guardrails here and there with giant dents in them from all the trees that fell during that storm. That was wild.

That 2014 ice storm that ended up on top of some of the snowpack that we got that season, was enough to take out my mom's 60-some year old aluminum back patio cover (it had been there when we moved there and was supported by wrought iron supports that were carefully maintained and periodically painted with Rust-Oleum over the years).  The freeze/thaw/freeze of the snow that collected on it coupled with the ice was too much and the thing collapsed in the center (it was difficult to even try to get a ladder against it to remove some of the glacial snow/ice pack on it). :axe:    That cover was great because so many Memorial Days we would end up with rain and we would just roll the BBQ grill onto the patio (which had that cover but was open-air) and grill up some good eats.  The storm also took out many white pines in the area and was pretty rough for those who had rows of them planted as a "privacy fence" (particularly a friend of mine whose backyard was adjacent to a school field).  I am sure the arborists and other tree removal people had a record year.

As an obs, I had a low of 39 this morning and am currently up to 44 with dp the same, intermittent light rain, and 0.13" in the bucket.

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1 hour ago, JTA66 said:

12z GFS with another coastal scrapper for Tuesday :lol:

Either need that northern vort to speed up so we can get it to phase or slow down to allow the southern stream to move further northwest via the SE ridge. It's all timing. Some blocking definitely would help in this situation but if the ridge out west can sharpen a bit, that can also do the trick. Still some time for things to improve on it, but I do think it's a long shot as a flush hit.

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5 minutes ago, Hurricane Agnes said:

That 2014 ice storm that ended up on top of some of the snowpack that we got that season, was enough to take out my mom's 60-some year old aluminum back patio cover (it had been there when we moved there and was supported by wrought iron supports that were carefully maintained and periodically painted with Rust-Oleum over the years).  The freeze/thaw/freeze of the snow that collected on it coupled with the ice was too much and the thing collapsed in the center (it was difficult to even try to get a ladder against it to remove some of the glacial snow/ice pack on it). :axe:    That cover was great because so many Memorial Days we would end up with rain and we would just roll the BBQ grill onto the patio (which had that cover but was open-air) and grill up some good eats.  The storm also took out many white pines in the area and was pretty rough for those who had rows of them planted as a "privacy fence" (particularly a friend of mine whose backyard was adjacent to a school field).  I am sure the arborists and other tree removal people had a record year.

As an obs, I had a low of 39 this morning and am currently up to 44 with dp the same, intermittent light rain, and 0.13" in the bucket.

For some reason I just have very little memory of that storm. 13-14 was one of my favorite winters in my lifetime too, there were so many events to track and we seemed to get lucky every time with them working out. But looking at the storm reports, we had a .25" of ice on top of likely a 6-10" snowpack, I can see how there were some issues. 

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2 hours ago, The Iceman said:

RIP snowpack :( fog really did a number on it overnight and I expect the rain and high temps to finish it off tonight besides the plow piles. Next couple weeks look uneventful, rain, snow, or otherwise. But at least it won't be stupid cold after this weekend. Looks seasonable next week, maybe slightly below normal but then 2nd half of the month is looking above normal as the SE ridge amps up. I think barring a surprise event in the next week, the rest of the month looks to be a punt. Hopefully we can get something in March with the shorter wavelengths to get some of us to around average snowfall(and get the N and W folks at least one decent event) but way too early to tell. Overall we could of done worse in a Nina down here. Feel for you Lehigh Valley/N and W guys though, this was the winter from hell up there. 

I think the geese already punted winter and headed back. A little pond near me had a flock of geese  pecking at the ground this morning.  

Good thing about this rain/fog is the car is receiving a decent rinse off. Thinking about watching the radar and in between heavier bands.....go outside w/a bucket of soapy water and do a quick wash then let the rain wash it off.

I have zero concern about icing and hope the township does as well so they don't lay down anymore salt/brine or whatever...

41F/Fog and the snowpack is patchy

 

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22 minutes ago, Birds~69 said:

I think the geese already punted winter and headed back. A little pond near me had a flock of geese  pecking at the ground this morning.  

Good thing about this rain/fog is the car is receiving a decent rinse off. Thinking about watching the radar and in between heavier bands.....go outside w/a bucket of soapy water and do a quick wash then let the rain wash it off.

I have zero concern about icing and hope the township does as well so they don't lay down anymore salt/brine or whatever...

41F/Fog and the snowpack is patchy

 

I dunno, I've seen at least three large flocks at altitude trucking north since around Christmas. It struck me as weird, but whatever triggers their return must have happened. I'm thinking it has to be temperature down south wherever they winter over. Global weirding and all that.

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41 minutes ago, Birds~69 said:

I think the geese already punted winter and headed back. A little pond near me had a flock of geese  pecking at the ground this morning.  

Good thing about this rain/fog is the car is receiving a decent rinse off. Thinking about watching the radar and in between heavier bands.....go outside w/a bucket of soapy water and do a quick wash then let the rain wash it off.

I have zero concern about icing and hope the township does as well so they don't lay down anymore salt/brine or whatever...

41F/Fog and the snowpack is patchy

 

The Northern Cardinals are singing too :D

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13 minutes ago, CoolHandMike said:

I dunno, I've seen at least three large flocks at altitude trucking north since around Christmas. It struck me as weird, but whatever triggers their return must have happened. I'm thinking it has to be temperature down south wherever they winter over. Global weirding and all that.

I always thought their instinct was to start heading N due to length of day (longer). I guess temp has something to due w/it as well. Our days are getting longer but I wouldn't think "start heading N" longer quite yet.

41F/Fog

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1 hour ago, The Iceman said:

For some reason I just have very little memory of that storm. 13-14 was one of my favorite winters in my lifetime too, there were so many events to track and we seemed to get lucky every time with them working out. But looking at the storm reports, we had a .25" of ice on top of likely a 6-10" snowpack, I can see how there were some issues. 

The old threads are still around in this forum.

For example, one in early January (my birthday..lol) where an Advisory was lofted for the CWA -

Another featuring a sleet-fest -

VD storm with 2 rounds including sleet -

If you go back to pgs 18 and 19 all the glory of that is there. :lol:

 

32 minutes ago, CoolHandMike said:

BTW, sometimes the threads created in the MA forum crack me up. "Feb 4 2022 Stupid Ice Threat" indeed. :lol:

The sitch in N. Reading, currently:

image.png.ea6a35392120acc6882b88aaa3af2d73.png

My temp shot up to 46 and now the fog is back and getting worse.  Am also getting some occasional light rain.

 

18 minutes ago, Violentweatherfan said:

The Northern Cardinals are singing too :D

When I was clearing the snow off my car from the last storm, I saw some robins running along my walk and hopping over a few shoveled show chunks in their way.  I know some have started staying year round but growing up, they used to pretty much migrate and when you saw them again, they were "the harbinger of spring".  :lol:

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Winter 2013-14 doesn't get the respect 1995-96 or 2009-10 do, maybe because we didn't have a true HECS. But man, it just wanted to snow that year! Like Iceman, I really can't remember a specific storm. All I recall is we were tracking non-stop that season.

Drizzle, 44F with a dense fog advisory.

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25 minutes ago, JTA66 said:

Winter 2013-14 doesn't get the respect 1995-96 or 2009-10 do, maybe because we didn't have a true HECS. But man, it just wanted to snow that year! Like Iceman, I really can't remember a specific storm. All I recall is we were tracking non-stop that season.

Drizzle, 44F with a dense fog advisory.

February 13 was pretty big for interior areas that year.

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uh... Temp has been steady at 42-43°F since about noon, and is now starting to trend downward:

image.png.cc892525ea2f6205de7b557aab2408c7.png

That's a 2° difference from current forecast. Wind looks like it has also shifted from southerly to NE. This doesn't seem to jive with us hitting near a forecasted high of 52° by midnight. Keeping an eye on this.

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4 hours ago, Birds~69 said:

I think the geese already punted winter and headed back. A little pond near me had a flock of geese  pecking at the ground this morning.  

Good thing about this rain/fog is the car is receiving a decent rinse off. Thinking about watching the radar and in between heavier bands.....go outside w/a bucket of soapy water and do a quick wash then let the rain wash it off.

I have zero concern about icing and hope the township does as well so they don't lay down anymore salt/brine or whatever...

41F/Fog and the snowpack is patchy

 

I've seen more geese, robins, and finches the past few days in my yard than any other early Feb I ever recall. Also must have been a hatch of ladybugs...not sure where they live/breed in winter....but 5 live ones in the house today flying around. Must have them in the walls or something, not a bad thing tbh. 

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7 hours ago, The Iceman said:

RIP snowpack :( fog really did a number on it overnight and I expect the rain and high temps to finish it off tonight besides the plow piles. Next couple weeks look uneventful, rain, snow, or otherwise. But at least it won't be stupid cold after this weekend. Looks seasonable next week, maybe slightly below normal but then 2nd half of the month is looking above normal as the SE ridge amps up. I think barring a surprise event in the next week, the rest of the month looks to be a punt. Hopefully we can get something in March with the shorter wavelengths to get some of us to around average snowfall(and get the N and W folks at least one decent event) but way too early to tell. Overall we could of done worse in a Nina down here. Feel for you Lehigh Valley/N and W guys though, this was the winter from hell up there. 

You are punting our peak climo and snowiest month on Feb 3? Gutsy call. Good luck with that.

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14 minutes ago, Ralph Wiggum said:

You are punting our peak climo and snowiest month on Feb 3? Gutsy call. Good luck with that.

February IS the shortest month! :P

I was just looking at what the Great Lakes ice coverage has been considering the recent arctic intrusions and some significant double digit below 0 lows in the upper MW this morning and found that it looks like Lake Erie is mostly frozen over (but not so much the bigger lakes), so at least for PA, that would pretty much shut off the lake effect machine.

Am currently still holding at 46 with dp 46 and periodic light rain (now up to 0.35").

noaa-greatakes-icecover-glsea_cur-02032022.png

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20 minutes ago, Ralph Wiggum said:

You are punting our peak climo and snowiest month on Feb 3? Gutsy call. Good luck with that.

I agree with Iceman. This has been the mother of donut holes for the LV.  The LV has been screwed every way it can in this pattern, north south east and west and every model today continued to show the continuation of that  fricking donut hole in  s central pa in the 10-15 day models.  I will hope for a Presidents day storm event because that is all I see right now.  Humanoid History on Twitter: "Cars exit the Donut Hole drive-through in La  Puente, California, 1983. #NationalDonutDay #DonutDay  http://t.co/y6MfQlXzV8" / Twitter

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