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Central PA - Winter 2021/2022


Bubbler86
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39 minutes ago, TimB84 said:

My wife has a master’s degree and I guarantee you she has no idea what a NWS forecast discussion is or where to find one. Probably also didn’t know prior to seeing me looking at weather models that there was a place where peons like you or I could see the GFS run every 6 hours, or even what the GFS is.

It is probably her masters degree that helps her make the decision to not waste time here like we do. (Joke) 

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51 minutes ago, KEITH L.I said:

From Elizabethtown to Carlisle at 430 tomorrow morning, I'm wondering  should I stay at a hotel in Carlisle or try to make it to work?

I don’t think roads down here will have any issues. CTP says MDT will have less than .1” zr - that won’t cause road problems. The later snow - if not does - won’t stick either they say. 

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1 hour ago, Itstrainingtime said:

I'll just add this - does anyone have any idea how many times CTP has hoisted Winter Storm Warnings, Advisories, etc. only for them to end up not verifying?

Me either. But I'll tell you it has happened a lot. People complain about why no advisory, why no warning, why no this or that...they've issued a ton of warnings over the years that failed. Remember that piece, too. 

A couple of years ago CTP had a Winter Storm Warning for Harrisburg for 8-10" of snow the morning of the storm. I thought they were ludicrous, but everyone else in here was happy. That afternoon they dropped it to an advisory for 2-4". People started blasting them. Then the snow started and some here were demanding that the warning got reissued. It didn't. MDT finished with 2.9" of snow. Advisory verified. Warning fell far short. Point is - with some people, they were wrong either way. 

They do their best. Personally, I think the criticism is often unfair and unwarranted. 

Go ahead. Tell me how wrong I am.  

 

I don't think CTP sucks per se, but when I look at the output of LWX, PHI and BGM, they all are superior in terms of discussion, explanations and timeliness.  Now who is most accurate?  Beats me and of course that's where the rubber hits the road for Joe Public.  And as Atomic stated earlier, it's only us weenies would be having this type of discussion.

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10 minutes ago, Festus said:

I don't think CTP sucks per se, but when I look at the output of LWX, PHI and BGM, they all are superior in terms of discussion, explanations and timeliness.  Now who is most accurate?  Beats me and of course that's where the rubber hits the road for Joe Public.  And as Atomic stated earlier, it's only us weenies would be having this type of discussion.

Read a few discussions from PBZ and then complain about anything CTP does.

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Quote
Snow totals continue to drop off farther to the south toward
I-80 with 0.5-1.5" of mainly sleet (counted as snow) expected
along this corridor. The primary fzra/icing zone continues to
be focused between US-6 and US-22 or over the interior 2/3 of
the CWA. We were keen to temper top-down derived ice totals due
to the expectation of more sleet in the transition zone and
relatively mild/above freezing sfc and road temps prior to the
changeover from rain to icy mix. In other words, we think fzra
accretion will be limited by preceding mild temps and moderate
intensity rates. We are still concerned about a rain to heavy
sleet scenario which could be just as or even more impactful
than warning level snow.
.

That was out of part of CTP’s morning discussion. I agree to a point, you have to be careful with modeled freezing rain as actual observed ice accrual is very sensitive to drop size, rain intensity, surface temps, etc etc. 0.75” of conditional freezing rain QPF on x model doesn’t often translate to 0.75” thick ice on the trees. With all that said, my big thing about this particular event the last couple days is I feel there has been sufficient support to reach 0.25” ice in a good portion of this swath of the CWA mentioned above on that AFD snippet. I honestly expected watches to be issued yesterday on all the counties at least down to I-80 given that support plus this being a multi-faceted potential high impact event between the combo of near warning to warning level ice plus sleet and snow..And they’re still worried about this rain to heavy sleet thing too.

As far as surface and road temps, I agree with that in the Sus Valley but most of the interior 2/3rd of the CWA between US 6 and US 22 has a snowpack and frozen ground from the long stretch of cold weather. Some of the secondary roads around here froze up early this morning despite temps above 32 since about mid day yesterday. Plus if sleet does in fact mix in sooner, that’s just going to cool surfaces faster anyways. And further down in the Sus Valley I was surprised first thing this morning that it initially wasn’t included when advisories finally did get issued. I guess I don’t understand why it took so long. A T of ice warrants an advisory, and that has looked likely even in the further reaches of the LSV for awhile. 

Just my thoughts, I’m not hating on the NWS by any means. Moral of the story is this type of event is very difficult and frustrating to forecast. 

 

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