OBS/DISCO - The Historic James Blizzard of 2022

[Henry's Weather]

https://photos.app.goo.gl/ea7Xfb1zkK7pYZT79

 

On Mass Ave Bridge during the high of the storm.  

[Cold Miser]

Why does this one storm have multiple names, and who names them?
 

[JC-CT]

8 hours ago, Ginx snewx said:

Your off base dude. 

The numbers seemed inconsistent to me at the time with the observations coming, I called it like I see it. I still can't fully reconcile what he reported throughout the day with other obs that ended up like his, but it's clear that his area did significantly better than mine and his final total has support. It was a very difficult storm to measure, and it was a frustrating storm for me.

@Damage In TollandI apologize, it doesnt matter if I was wrong or right, it was unnecessary regardless.

[Damage In Tolland]

28 minutes ago, JC-CT said:

The numbers seemed inconsistent to me at the time with the observations coming, I called it like I see it. I still can't fully reconcile what he reported throughout the day with other obs that ended up like his, but it's clear that his area did significantly better than mine and his final total has support. It was a very difficult storm to measure, and it was a frustrating storm for me.

@Damage In TollandI apologize, it doesnt matter if I was wrong or right, it was unnecessary regardless.

No worries . We are all in this together 

[TalcottWx]

13 hours ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

https://easternmassweather.blogspot.com/2022/01/blizzard-of-22-verification.html

 

Blizzard of '22 Verification

Solid Effort with Mixed Results

In the lead up to the Blizzard of '22, the primary question pertaining to the evolution of the storm was the degree to which the descent of arctic air into the region would cause the storm to deflect to the east and chase convection over the ocean.

 Thus it was this crucial question that represented the focus of Friday's Final Call. 

 

Eastern Mass Weather postulated that the heaviest snows would fall in two primary bands.

 

The first being associated with the mid level deformation over east central Mass down into Eastern Connecticut:

 

This area of very heavy snowfall was the result of mid level convergence due to both the changing of wind direction and speed:

 

 

 

And a steep temperature differential:

 

 

As evidenced by the relative humidity fields (moisture) in the mid levels of the atmosphere:

 

 

This culmination of factors in the mid levels of the atmosphere  was forecast to result in the intense lift necessary to produce excessive snowfall rates of up to 2 to even as much as 6" per hour an isolated areas:

 

 

While this idea worked out for the most part, the area of intense lift transferred to the coast, instead of extending into north central and interior NE Mass, as forecast. Thus the heaviest snows materialized over eastern CT:

 

 

 Before relocating to southeastern Mass and coastal eastern Mass.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This caused the heaviest snows, from about 24-30", to shift from the forecast primary area of focus for heavy banding, across the interior,  to the secondary area along the coast:

 

 

This subsequently became the primary focus for the heaviest mesoscale banding that was originally forecast to translate across Worcester county and interior NE Mass.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ultimately, towards the latter stage of the storm on Saturday evening, the forecast area of deformation banding across the interior did materialize, producing a secondary somewhat lesser maxima of up to about 18". 

 

 

 

However, this was too late to reach the forecast amounts of 18-30" in this area, which ended up occurring over southeast Mass in association with the coastal area of deformation.

 

Final Snowfall Accumulations:

 

vs Final Call: 

 

 

& First Call:

 

 

Final Grade: B-

 

Great job Ray! 

[40/70 Benchmark]

I have a depth of 12-15" here at work in Chelsea...figure 14" average....down about 4" due to compaction......18" peak depth....probably about a 21" snowfall would be my guess here.

[CoastalWx]

44 minutes ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

I have a depth of 12-15" here at work in Chelsea...figure 14" average....down about 4" due to compaction......18" peak depth....probably about a 21" snowfall would be my guess here.

It has settled quite a bit. But sort of expected. That sounds about right with those numbers.

[tim123]

So what model was best euro of gfs. Nam cmc rgem? Just as a casual observer i think euro did better. Short range models not sure?

[tamarack]

Nice 9.5" event with 15:1 ratio to bring the pack up to 21".  Also dropped my standing of Kev/MA's snow table from 7th to 14th.  

[BostonWX]

Took a ride around town today, solid pack and some epic parking lot weenie piles

 

[DavisStraight]

10 hours ago, Cold Miser said:

Why does this one storm have multiple names, and who names them?
 

The NWS gives storms names but in memory of James from the Cape we named it the James blizzard.

[WinterWolf]

46 minutes ago, DavisStraight said:

The NWS gives storms names but in memory of James from the Cape we named it the James blizzard.

I don’t think they name them..it’s the TWC that names them. 

[Ginx snewx]

PNSBOX
CTZ002>004-MAZ002>024-026-RIZ001>008-012245-

PUBLIC INFORMATION STATEMENT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE BOSTON/NORTON MA
150 PM EST MON JAN 31 2022

...BLIZZARD OF 2022 - FINAL DETERMINATIONS...

BLIZZARD CONDITIONS WERE REACHED AT SEVERAL LOCATIONS ACROSS
RHODE ISLAND AND EASTERN MASSACHUSETTS ON SATURDAY, JANUARY 29,
2022. LIGHT SNOW BEGAN LATE AT NIGHT ON FRIDAY, JANUARY 28. SNOWFALL 
TOTALS OF 12 TO 24 INCHES WERE COMMON ACROSS THOSE REGIONS, WITH 
LOCAL AMOUNTS UP TO 30 INCHES REPORTED SOUTH OF BOSTON. WIND GUSTS 
REACHED HURRICANE FORCE ON CAPE ANN, CAPE COD, AND NANTUCKET DURING 
THE STORM.

THE DEFINITION OF A BLIZZARD IS THAT FALLING AND/OR BLOWING SNOW
REDUCES VISIBILITY TO BELOW 1/4 MILE ALONG WITH WINDS THAT
FREQUENTLY GUST TO 35 MPH OR MORE. THESE BLIZZARD CONDITIONS MUST
BE THE PREDOMINANT REPORTED CONDITION FOR AT LEAST 3 CONSECUTIVE 
HOURS.

WHEN REVIEWING WHETHER A PARTICULAR OBSERVATION LOCATION HAD
BLIZZARD CONDITIONS, WE CONSIDERED VISIBILITIES EQUAL TO 1/4 MILE
BECAUSE THAT IS QUITE LOW FOR AN AUTOMATED SENSOR TO BE ABLE TO
DETECT IN SNOW OR BLOWING SNOW. 

THE FOLLOWING STATIONS RECORDED BLIZZARD CONDITIONS...

IN RHODE ISLAND...

PROVIDENCE (KPVD)...5 HOURS 18 MINUTES, FROM 921 AM TO 158 PM AND 
FROM 210 PM TO 251 PM. 

WESTERLY (KWST)...6 HOURS 16 MINUTES. CRITERIA WERE MET FROM 911 AM 
TO 1146 AM, FROM 1153 AM TO 301 PM, AND FROM 420 TO 453 PM.

NEWPORT (KUUU)...9 HOURS 28 MINUTES CONTINUOUSLY, FROM 
725 AM TO 453 PM. 

BLOCK ISLAND (KBID)...6 HOURS 37 MINUTES CONTINUOUSLY, FROM 
705 AM TO 142 PM.

IN MASSACHUSETTS...

BOSTON (KBOS)...7 HOURS 39 MINUTES CONTINUOUSLY, FROM 
815 AM TO 354 PM.  

WORCESTER (KORH)...8 HOURS 27 MINUTES. IT WAS CONTINUOUS FOR 8 HOURS 
16 MINUTES FROM 749 AM TO 405 PM. CONDITIONS ALSO WERE MET FROM 432 
PM TO 443 PM.

BEVERLY (KBVY)...6 HOURS 9 MINUTES. CONDITIONS WERE MET FROM 853 TO 
1153 AM, 1225 PM TO 201 PM, 253 PM TO 353 PM, AND FROM 453 PM TO 526 
PM. 

LAWRENCE (KLWM)...5 HOURS 14 MINUTES. BLIZZARD CONDITIONS OCCURRED 
FROM 1254 PM TO 245 PM AND FROM 331 PM TO 654 PM.  

HYANNIS (KHYA)...AT LEAST 6 HOURS 33 MINUTES. BLIZZARD CONDITIONS 
WERE CONTINUOUS FROM 704 AM TO 1232 PM, BUT THEN REPORTING WAS 
INTERRUPTED UNTIL LATER IN THE AFTERNOON. BLIZZARD CONDITIONS 
RESUMED FROM 505 PM TO 539 PM AND FROM 548 PM TO 619 PM.   

MARSHFIELD (KGHG)...12 HOURS 0 MINUTES. BLIZZARD CONDITIONS WERE 
CONTINUOUS FOR 10 HOURS 40 MINUTES FROM 435 AM TO 315 PM. THEY WERE 
AGAIN MET FROM 335 PM TO 355 PM AND FROM 415 PM TO 515 PM.

MARTHA'S VINEYARD (KMVY)...9 HOURS 17 MINUTES CONTINUOUSLY, FROM 
743 AM TO 500 PM.

THE FOLLOWING STATIONS EITHER CAME CLOSE OR WERE UNABLE TO 
BE DETERMINED...

NANTUCKET (KACK) CAME CLOSE, WITH BLIZZARD CONDITIONS FOR A TOTAL 
OF 4 HOURS 32 MINUTES, BUT THERE WAS NOT A 3-HOUR CONSECUTIVE PERIOD.

NEW BEDFORD (KEWB) MET CRITERIA FOR A TOTAL OF 2 HOURS 30 MINUTES, 
BUT THERE WAS NEARLY A 3 HOUR GAP IN THE CONDITIONS.

CHATHAM (KCQX) MET CRITERIA FROM 816 AM THROUGH 852 AM, BUT AT THAT 
TIME, THE POWER WAS LOST AND NO DATA WERE RECEIVED.

FALMOUTH (KFMH) MET CRITERIA BEGINNING AT 650 AM, BUT VISIBILITY 
READINGS CEASED AT 746 AM. SO, ALTHOUGH WINDS WERE GUSTING ABOVE 35 
MPH CONTINUOUSLY INTO THE AFTERNOON, A BLIZZARD WAS UNABLE TO BE 
DETERMINED WITHOUT THE VISIBILITY READINGS.  

SMITHFIELD (KSFZ) MET CRITERIA FROM 806 AM TO 827 AM AND FROM 853 AM 
TO 956 AM, BUT THEN ALL WIND DATA WERE LOST AND THUS A BLIZZARD WAS 
UNABLE TO BE DETERMINED WITHOUT THE WIND READINGS.

PROVINCETOWN (KPVC) HAD NO DATA AFTER 556 AM AND THUS NO 
DETERMINATION COULD BE MADE.

[TheSnowman]

On 1/29/2022 at 4:49 PM, Greg said:

38" was the official report just east of downtown Woonsocket "Eastern Woonsocket." Think of Diamond Hill at 633'. However, the true unofficial report of 40" may actually go to South Wrentham 40" with 44.0" on ground.

This is why I'm So sure My town of Cumberland actually jackpotted with 50", and was an Omen for why I live there lol.  If Woonsocket Surely got ~38"-40" as everyone believes, I can tell you that 99/100 Times, Cumberland Beats Woonsocket.  It's all Woods vs. City, Closer to the storm, and is 200 Feet higher.  AND the kicker - Tbose measurements were done WITHOUT the 6 Hour rule.  In THAT STORM?  You definitely lose 15% of compaction.  If Woonsocket got 38-41, Cumberland gets 42/43..... which in how we measure?  That's 50".  

[TheSnowman]

HOW has NO ONE ever talked about THIS Data??  We need this at the End of EVERY storm.... and During!  It SO shows how people got screwed.  It is clear and obvious in this WHY I am not mad I didn't fly in for this storm, and WHY I got 18 when people left and right of me got the golden numbers of 20+/24+/30+.  

 

Can we please ALWAYS bring this data up?  Fantastic Stuff.  

[TheSnowman]

On 1/30/2022 at 5:34 AM, RUNNAWAYICEBERG said:

You have issues. 

To My:  

 

Sharon - 30"  

Foxboro - 24" (As Always it seems)  

Boston - 24"!  

Flipping Attleboro next town over had a Report of - 22"!  

Burrillville which is All WEST of me - 21"  

And ALL I get it seems 17" Total??  Don't get to mark off a 20" Storm?  Don't get only the 9th Ever recited 24" storm? I mean NO town in the bottom 2/3 of the State had Less than me! What a Screw Hole.  

Thank.  God.  I didn't come home.   I would have been Losing my crap.  And for the 1ST TIME EVER in a Major Event, Freaking Hell on Earth Itself, the PVD Airport Measurement, beat me!!  19"!  

Will end up as my 13th Biggest storm since the 1992-1993 Great Snow Era Began.  Not bad.   But Not that big of a deal.  

 

I continue to not understand why 1/3 of the board, and our text thread, loves to say things like this when I state Facts, and instead of Debating my facts, it's just a non answer like "You have Issues" that everyone jumps on.  

[George001]

1 minute ago, TheSnowman said:

To My:  

 

Sharon - 30"  

Foxboro - 24" (As Always it seems)  

Boston - 24"!  

Flipping Attleboro next town over had a Report of - 22"!  

Burrillville which is All WEST of me - 21"  

And ALL I get it seems 17" Total??  Don't get to mark off a 20" Storm?  Don't get only the 9th Ever recited 24" storm? I mean NO town in the bottom 2/3 of the State had Less than me! What a Screw Hole.  

Thank.  God.  I didn't come home.   I would have been Losing my crap.  And for the 1ST TIME EVER in a Major Event, Freaking Hell on Earth Itself, the PVD Airport Measurement, beat me!!  19"!  

Will end up as my 13th Biggest storm since the 1992-1993 Great Snow Era Began.  Not bad.   But Not that big of a deal.  

 

I continue to not understand why 1/3 of the board, and our text thread, loves to say things like this when I state Facts, and instead of Debating my facts, it's just a non answer like "You have Issues" that everyone jumps on.  

Subby zone? I know it’s nice being the jackpot but 17 inches is still alot of snow, even if others got more. It’s not like you only got half a foot or nothing while areas 10-20 miles away got 2 feet. Idk if this will work but it does for me. Every storm I get my 12 inch ruler and measure the snow. If the ruler isn’t enough to measure the snow, I’m very happy with the storm. Any storm that is over a foot is a big storm in my eyes, some years we don’t even get a single storm that drops over a foot of snow.

[Cold Miser]

15 hours ago, DavisStraight said:

The NWS gives storms names but in memory of James from the Cape we named it the James blizzard.

Yeah...I definitely understand that with our group.  But, I saw 3 different news stations with 3 different names throughout the region.

[The 4 Seasons]

Totals took a while to compile. I want to thank everyone for their reports and speaking with me in the DMs. It's always tough when there is a sharp gradient in CT compounded by very high winds that cause blowing and drifting snow. 

I felt overall our forecast was very good, especially with the division between major snowfall totals (i.e. 1 foot+) and more pedestrian totals in the 6-12" range. We verified extremely well across a good portion of the state and population distribution. The gradient was even tighter than we forecast with less than 6-12" in the NW hills (3-6" there) and an area above the 20" threshold in far eastern and southeast CT (20-25" there). 

Overall CT Grade: B+

Final Call:

First Call:

Overall Tri-state Grade: B+

Final call:

New Haven & Fairfield County totals:

Town by town snowfall totals in CT

 

This is the first time i created a liquid totals map to derive a snowfall ratio map as well. These numbers are (mostly) from CoCorahs, but take them with a grain of salt. There was a lot of smoothing and numbers that were completely thrown out due to being completely out of reality. This includes, the official totals from BDR and BDL! BDLs official snowfall was recorded as 6.8" with a liquid total of .21. This gives them an average ratio of 32:1. Obviously this was not used, as well as BDR. I did the best with the data i had to work with for these maps. Please use this as a GENERAL reference to liquid/ratios for this storm.

A few times Jan 2015 was brought up in regards to this storm. There were many runs of the GFS and NAM that this showed up in the top 15 on CIPS and even a couple times it was #1 on the NAM. The surface low from Jan 2015 swung out wide and took a near due north track over the 40/70 benchmark, while slowing down signficantly and nearly stalling around the cape. This track and evolution were very similar to the 1/28-29/22 snowstorm. This, along with the H7 mid-level FGEN confined to eastern CT/RI and SE MA. In terms of sensible weather, snowfall and gradient of snowfall was also very similar. Jan 28-28/22 was like a Jan 26-27th lite. Lop about 3-6" over most of CT and the totals were pretty darn close. Not to mention the extreme gradient west of the river to about the 91-corridor. 

[WxWatcher007]

This is awesome. Great stuff.

[The 4 Seasons]

1 minute ago, WxWatcher007 said:

This is awesome. Great stuff.

thanks man. did you guys put out a map for this one? i don't think i saw one 

[WxWatcher007]

9 minutes ago, The 4 Seasons said:

thanks man. did you guys put out a map for this one? i don't think i saw one 

Yeah, we did. 6-12 west, 12-18 central  and 18-24 east. Actually not terrible outside of the central zone. An exhausting storm to track. 

[The 4 Seasons]

Just one comment i wanted to make, this was the first time trying to do a liquid equivalent map and ratios. If i didn't use your total it was most likely because i needed to use a report that had both and snowfall total and liquid total to derive a ratio. It wouldn't make sense to use a snowfall report from one person, a melted liquid report from another and ratio combining the two.

[The 4 Seasons]

1 minute ago, WxWatcher007 said:

Yeah, we did. 6-12 west, 12-18 central  and 18-24 east. Actually not terrible outside of the central zone. An exhausting storm to track. 

tell me about it. It was on the lower end of the spectrum in terms of confidence and consistency.

[WxWatcher007]

37 minutes ago, The 4 Seasons said:

Just one comment i wanted to make, this was the first time trying to do a liquid equivalent map and ratios. If i didn't use your total it was most likely because i needed to use a report that had both and snowfall total and liquid total to derive a ratio. It wouldn't make sense to use a snowfall report from one person, a melted liquid report from another and ratio combining the two.

All good. I had very little faith in my report which is why I didn’t report to the NWS. One day I’d like to be able to collect more data including LE during snow events.

[JC-CT]

6 hours ago, The 4 Seasons said:

Just one comment i wanted to make, this was the first time trying to do a liquid equivalent map and ratios. If i didn't use your total it was most likely because i needed to use a report that had both and snowfall total and liquid total to derive a ratio. It wouldn't make sense to use a snowfall report from one person, a melted liquid report from another and ratio combining the two.

I wish I had been able to get you a le in time...pretty sure I had ratios under 10 which was the main culprit of my low total. I've never seen such shitty snow growth for an entire storm before.

[JC-CT]

6 hours ago, WxWatcher007 said:

All good. I had very little faith in my report which is why I didn’t report to the NWS. One day I’d like to be able to collect more data including LE during snow events.

I just bought a stratus just for that purpose. It was $40 on amazon

[EastonSN+]

9 hours ago, The 4 Seasons said:

Totals took a while to compile. I want to thank everyone for their reports and speaking with me in the DMs. It's always tough when there is a sharp gradient in CT compounded by very high winds that cause blowing and drifting snow. 

I felt overall our forecast was very good, especially with the division between major snowfall totals (i.e. 1 foot+) and more pedestrian totals in the 6-12" range. We verified extremely well across a good portion of the state and population distribution. The gradient was even tighter than we forecast with less than 6-12" in the NW hills (3-6" there) and an area above the 20" threshold in far eastern and southeast CT (20-25" there). 

Overall CT Grade: B+

Final Call:

First Call:

Overall Tri-state Grade: B+

Final call:

New Haven & Fairfield County totals:

Town by town snowfall totals in CT

 

This is the first time i created a liquid totals map to derive a snowfall ratio map as well. These numbers are (mostly) from CoCorahs, but take them with a grain of salt. There was a lot of smoothing and numbers that were completely thrown out due to being completely out of reality. This includes, the official totals from BDR and BDL! BDLs official snowfall was recorded as 6.8" with a liquid total of .21. This gives them an average ratio of 32:1. Obviously this was not used, as well as BDR. I did the best with the data i had to work with for these maps. Please use this as a GENERAL reference to liquid/ratios for this storm.

A few times Jan 2015 was brought up in regards to this storm. There were many runs of the GFS and NAM that this showed up in the top 15 on CIPS and even a couple times it was #1 on the NAM. The surface low from Jan 2015 swung out wide and took a near due north track over the 40/70 benchmark, while slowing down signficantly and nearly stalling around the cape. This track and evolution were very similar to the 1/28-29/22 snowstorm. This, along with the H7 mid-level FGEN confined to eastern CT/RI and SE MA. In terms of sensible weather, snowfall and gradient of snowfall was also very similar. Jan 28-28/22 was like a Jan 26-27th lite. Lop about 3-6" over most of CT and the totals were pretty darn close. Not to mention the extreme gradient west of the river to about the 91-corridor. 

This is awesome thanks!

 

[EastonSN+]

What is also amazing on a side note, historic winter for Ocean City MD up through coastal NJ.

Wow.

 

[JC-CT]

@The 4 SeasonsAppreciate you taking the time to talk to me and try to figure out my outlier report before putting together the map, and of course the fact that you took me at my word for what I reported. I took a little deeper dive into the cocorahs numbers this afternoon, and unless I'm badly misinterpreting the data, my (and @IowaStorm05's) measurements don't look that crazy after all when you account for the fact that we didn't do 6 hour clears but measured new snow depth after it was winding down. I did remeasure in the morning on 1/30 and still had 9" new plus the 1" glacier layer I went into it with. Seems all of the bigger totals in Tolland County were doing at a minimum 24 hour clears which would have caught the first 6 hours of the storm, but more likely they were mostly all 6 hour clears (one of the stations, Willington, even had 1.5" less OTG on 1/30 at 7am than they reported as new for just the previous 24 hours, which of course didn't include early AM on 1/29 - so it couldn't have even been a 24 hour clear). The Willington station does seem to be a reliable daily reporter, reporting depths of 11.0" on the mornings of both 1/30 and 1/31, then 9.0", 8.5", and 5.5" through this morning (OUCH).

So either I had an extremely low ratio 9" that was comparable in LE to whatever fell to my north/northeast, or probably more likely is that my report is understated vs had I measured and cleared the board every 6 hours. I always thought that clearing the board only made a small difference (<1") unless snowfall totals started to get way up there or in super fluffy snow, but that doesn't seem to be the case here. I also thought that NWS & cocorahs guidelines were to not clear until the end of a storm (unless you are an airport) but it seems like clearing might still be the norm.

There were, however, a cluster of measurements from the Somers area between 9"-10" that all appear to be final OTG measurements (OTG = new accumulation). The 8.0"s from Rocky Hill and East Hartford also appear to be final OTG measurements. The station that reported 13.8" in Manchester reported both 3.8" new and 3.8" OTG as of 7am on 1/29, and reported 10.0" new at 7am on 1/30 but did not include an OTG depth in that report, and they have not reported since. Point being, I'm not convinced there was quite as severe a cutoff there as was highlighted, for example between that 13.8" and the 8" in East Hartford, although there was definitely a gradient until you got into that secondary morning band over the Southington area. Seems like at least a factor in the variances in reporting may have been measuring/reporting method.

Curious to hear your (or anyone's) thoughts on this, as I'm very confident in my measurement for new snow depth as of the morning of 1/30 at approximately 9" new, 10" total depth, of dry but dense snow.

 

OTG Snow Depth 1/30: