New England snowstorm memories.

[RUNNAWAYICEBERG]

I thought 3/17 would be ‘the one’ here but the nam scored another nw trend inside 48hr. Ended with 15” I believe with most falling between 6-10am. I recall PF saying stowe had 50” over a 3 day span. 

I swear looking at those forecasts and maps above I should have a 20”  event to put on the weenie wall of fame but it just hasnt panned out. I’ve missed it left, right, up, and down within 25miles since 2011. 

[The 4 Seasons]

2 minutes ago, RUNNAWAYICEBERG said:

I thought 3/17 would be ‘the one’ here but the nam scored another nw trend inside 48hr. Ended with 15” I believe with most falling between 6-10am. I recall PF saying stowe had 50” over a 3 day span. 

I swear looking at those forecasts and maps above I should have a 20”  event to put on the weenie wall of fame but it just hasnt panned out. I’ve missed it left, right, up, and down within 25miles since 2011. 

I remember your posts vividly, people were congrating you based on runs etc. I went pretty modest with 12-20 for most of the state while the NWS had 18-24 and the news stations were 15-25/16-24/18-24 for central/W CT. I just never saw those really big amounts, turns out even i was a bit too high for S CT but nailed most of W CT and the northern 3 counties. 20.4 was the highest in the state and that spotter is questionable (often i see very high reports coming out of New Fairfield).

That was always a strange storm to me, feel like there wasn't much hype around it as i would normally expect given those all time type numbers and it was quickly forgotten. 

Noticeable gradient as you move SW to NW. Even within my town there is a spotter 3 miles SE of me who came in with 8.7 while i had 9.5 just from an extra 20 minutes or snow of snowfall. Another spotter about 1 mile to my NW in hamden picked up 9.9. 

I should do an updated map for these older big ones but it takes so long, so well see maybe.

 

[RUNNAWAYICEBERG]

1 hour ago, The 4 Seasons said:

I remember your posts vividly, people were congrating you based on runs etc. I went pretty modest with 12-20 for most of the state while the NWS had 18-24 and the news stations were 15-25/16-24/18-24 for central/W CT. I just never saw those really big amounts, turns out even i was a bit too high for S CT but nailed most of W CT and the northern 3 counties. 20.4 was the highest in the state and that spotter is questionable (often i see very high reports coming out of New Fairfield).

That was always a strange storm to me, feel like there wasn't much hype around it as i would normally expect given those all time type numbers and it was quickly forgotten. 

Noticeable gradient as you move SW to NW. Even within my town there is a spotter 3 miles SE of me who came in with 8.7 while i had 9.5 just from an extra 20 minutes or snow of snowfall. Another spotter about 1 mile to my NW in hamden picked up 9.9. 

I should do an updated map for these older big ones but it takes so long, so well see maybe.

 

That was the system where many of us debated the old rule of ‘never forecast more than a foot if the h7 low tracks above.’ So while models were spitting out 2.0” qpf of all snow in wct, h7 was always tracking over the interior....so the old rule was mostly correct. 

You’re map made the most sense. Good job.

[tamarack]

14 hours ago, ORH_wxman said:

3/14/17 was a solid event. Didn’t get the jackpot obviously (reserved for NNE and upstate NY) but that was crazy intense snow for about 5 hours. We picked up 14” here and most it fell in 5-6 hours. The sleet line barely made it here during the dryslot but it changed back to ugly snowflakes pretty quickly. Good QPF dump in that as the ratios were prob near 10 to 1. We had full snowpack until the end of the month that year and partial snowpack into the first week of April. 

Our 15.5" fell at temps upper teens to low 20s, dendrites were decent-looking considering the wind, yet the ratio was only 7.3 to one - 2.12" LE, with not a trace of anything but snow.  Had 14.0" with 1.90" LE at my 9 PM dog-traumatizing obs time and 1.5" with 0.22" LE after, with accum ending before midnight.  Wind pack?  Certainly had some deep and solid drifts.

[ORH_wxman]

1 hour ago, tamarack said:

Our 15.5" fell at temps upper teens to low 20s, dendrites were decent-looking considering the wind, yet the ratio was only 7.3 to one - 2.12" LE, with not a trace of anything but snow.  Had 14.0" with 1.90" LE at my 9 PM dog-traumatizing obs time and 1.5" with 0.22" LE after, with accum ending before midnight.  Wind pack?  Certainly had some deep and solid drifts.

Yeah if the wind is really strong, then it will just shatter the dendrites as they fall and/or pack them pretty efficiently once on the ground so the ratios struggle. I may have had worse than 10 to 1....can't quite remember what the QPF was in that 14 inches but i imagine it was around 1.5" or so...maybe it was a little more. 8 to 1 wouldn't have surprised me. That pack was very durable.

[EastonSN+]

On 3/8/2021 at 3:20 PM, The 4 Seasons said:

Marth 7-8th 2018.

Light to moderate snow began during the day here. It was mostly white rain with less than <1" by sunset. I thought we would have a hard time with this in the lower elevation areas but that changed quickly after sunset. By the time i had less than an inch of white rain glop, @Sey-Mour Snow was closing in on 8.5" just to the west of me around 550ft. Shortly after sunset radar returns started rapidly deepening and we were under S+ with heavy 1-2"/rates. NWS issued an SPS for 1-3"/hr rates and possible thunder.

 

At this point i went outside for a while and the snow was still coming down very heavily. I saw this huge white flash above my head and thought briefly it was a flood light turning on and then a second late a large summer-time convective clap follwed by even heavier rates. This was probably the most intense thunder snow ive seen since Feb 2001. As i was outside for a while i saw several more CG strikes and extemely loud thunder. The majority of the snow fell from 5-10PM and we ended up with 13.5". I imagine some of the rates reached up to 4"/hr during the period of thunder/lightning.

Forecast for this was really really good but ended up being too low in W CT where some amounts ranged from 16-28". The ranges worked out perfect and the gradient from 0-2-->8-16 SE to W did as well.

Some of the regional NWS maps. NYC was definitely spared from the big amounts along with most of LI and SE CT.

Radar

10 inches of paste and tree fell on house. SW CT lost power for days.

[CoastalWx]

I’m sure this was posted, but watch the first 5 minutes with Rosenthal and Burbank. Just pure raw weenieism and great details. Love the graphics too. Also note how underestimated the snowfall was, but who could blame them. 
 I love the comment from Rosenthal. “One moose of a storm.” 

 

[ORH_wxman]

4 hours ago, CoastalWx said:

I’m sure this was posted, but watch the first 5 minutes with Rosenthal and Burbank. Just pure raw weenieism and great details. Love the graphics too. Also note how underestimated the snowfall was, but who could blame them. 
 I love the comment from Rosenthal. “One moose of a storm.” 

 

That’s great. The storm rapidly deepened faster than they thought and the changeover was sooner. They were mostly talking about an afternoon changeover in ORH and evening/night time in BOS. But we flipped by 10am in ORH and BOS area was flipped by early/mid afternoon. 

[CoastalWx]

1 hour ago, ORH_wxman said:

That’s great. The storm rapidly deepened faster than they thought and the changeover was sooner. They were mostly talking about an afternoon changeover in ORH and evening/night time in BOS. But we flipped by 10am in ORH and BOS area was flipped by early/mid afternoon. 

They started hitting it harder that morning and afternoon. I mean by the noon cast they had to hit it harder since it flipped west of Boston already. Still not even close though lol. Hopefully the crowd on here that’s younger than 30yrs old can get something like that again. It’s just an all timer in so many ways. I don’t get bored talking about it to this day. 

[Hoth]

7 hours ago, CoastalWx said:

I’m sure this was posted, but watch the first 5 minutes with Rosenthal and Burbank. Just pure raw weenieism and great details. Love the graphics too. Also note how underestimated the snowfall was, but who could blame them. 
 I love the comment from Rosenthal. “One moose of a storm.” 

 

That satellite/radar composite at 39:20 is one of the sexiest nor'easters I've ever seen. I don't even remember this storm. Must not have done much in SCT.

[ORH_wxman]

Also classic Mark Rosenthal....he loved the 3 piece suit but often shed the jacket going straight vest look, lol. 

[H2Otown_WX]

19 hours ago, CoastalWx said:

They started hitting it harder that morning and afternoon. I mean by the noon cast they had to hit it harder since it flipped west of Boston already. Still not even close though lol. Hopefully the crowd on here that’s younger than 30yrs old can get something like that again. It’s just an all timer in so many ways. I don’t get bored talking about it to this day. 

What was the total QPF from it at BOS and ORH?

[CoastalWx]

On 3/21/2021 at 9:07 AM, H2Otown_WX said:

What was the total QPF from it at BOS and ORH?

Both are severely undermeasured. ORH wasn't even 2", but in reality it was over 3". For instance Blue hill was just over 4" total QPF. Hingham, MA near me over 4.25"

[ORH_wxman]

Just now, CoastalWx said:

Both are severely undermeasured. ORH wasn't even 2", but in reality it was over 3". For instance Blue hill was just over 4" total QPF. 

I'd be shocked if we didn't surpass 3" of QPF in ORH in reality.  We had over 30" of snow after several hours of moderate to heavy rain. 

[CoastalWx]

Just now, ORH_wxman said:

I'd be shocked if we didn't surpass 3" of QPF in ORH. We had over 30" of snow after several hours of moderate to heavy rain. 

Absolutely. That was a huge moisture bomb. 

[ORH_wxman]

Here's some old files I have of that one

 

[CoastalWx]

Ha, the old Caravan buried. Also, someone in the NE Hills of CT would not have been happy. 

[CoastalWx]

On top of that, BOS broke its 24 hr snowfall record. Amazing event.

[ORH_wxman]

3 minutes ago, CoastalWx said:

Ha, the old Caravan buried. Also, someone in the NE Hills of CT would not have been happy. 

I think they had about 20" in the highest spots in NE CT....but yeah, def not the 30+ further northeast. It was the overnight stuff they missed out on the most after about 2-3am I think....it was insane rates over eastern areas for those next 4-5 hours.

[Typhoon Tip]

On 3/20/2021 at 5:07 PM, ORH_wxman said:

Also classic Mark Rosenthal....he loved the 3 piece suit but often shed the jacket going straight vest look, lol. 

I had a buddy that toured the station back in '95 I think it was, and he told me that when he walked into the studio and Mark wheeled around in his chair, he had that look, but was wearing Hawaiian patterned shorts, and the 'cast was waste up - and while they were there...he did the report like that.  And his demeanor was otherwise like a burn-out ... 'Yo dudes, wuz up' 

lol I could see that with that mullet look.

Thing I remember about that storm ...among many aspect, is that while it was happening ...knowing that Wed had that temp recovery look to it. That was up in my UML weather lab days... I think it nudged 60 the end of the week.   It was like a cocoon storm - hiding from the inevitability of spring inside a transient winter fantasy...  I mean by then my gears are switched normally?  And I prefer not  - but I will play the hypocrisy card if the situation warrants and that one more than did, and so once inside the bubble ... knowing how short lived that would be kind of tainted that.   

But, like we've said...those diabatically assisted spring deals... I don't think you can get that in DJF? Just like we've often mused 'what might have been,' of that 1992 December legend ... I don't think Brockton Mass can get 5.5" of rain and then a foot of snow and have that been ALL snow - I dunno... If it did, that would have been 50" to 60" at/of 10::1 ...  I wonder if they'd still be without power. 

No sea level storm has ever done that and I wonder if colder profiles - it makes some physical sense to think that cold holds less water so ... you may not geophysically be able to do it.

[ORH_wxman]

7 minutes ago, Typhoon Tip said:

I had a buddy that toured the station back in '95 I think it was, and he told me that when he walked into the studio and Mark wheeled around in his chair, he had that look, but was wearing Hawaiian patterned shorts, and the 'cast was waste up - and while they were there...he did the report like that.  And his demeanor was otherwise like a burn-out ... 'Yo dudes, wuz up' 

lol I could see that with that mullet look.

Thing I remember about that storm ...among many aspect, is that while it was happening ...knowing that Wed had that temp recovery look to it. That was up in my UML weather lab days... I think it nudged 60 the end of the week.   It was like a cocoon storm - hiding from the inevitability of spring inside a transient winter fantasy...  I mean by then my gears are switched normally?  And I prefer not  - but I will play the hypocrisy card if the situation warrants and that one more than did, and so once inside the bubble ... knowing how short lived that would be kind of tainted that.   

But, like we've said...those diabatically assisted spring deals... I don't think you can get that in DJF? Just like we've often mused 'what might have been,' of that 1992 December legend ... I don't think Brockton Mass can get 5.5" of rain and then a foot of snow and have that been ALL snow - I dunno... If it did, that would have been 50" to 60" at/of 10::1 ...  I wonder if they'd still be without power. 

No sea level storm has ever done that and I wonder if colder profiles - it makes some physical sense to think that cold holds less water so ... you may not geophysically be able to do it.

Dec '92 came close....obviously right near the shore didn't get feet upon feet...but you didn't have to go too far inland to get 25+ and then parts of the ORH hills approached 40" (actually achieving 40" in Princeton, MA).

I agree you achieve a limit at some point....simple physics of the colder profile holding less water vapor. That said, we're only talking like 1C in the column here for places that got 6" of QPF, so you could certainly envision something like 50" if you get a marginally colder December 1992 storm. There's also likely some sort of asymmetry to reaction of the flow on the colder profile too....meaning,  how less likely is a big stall and cutoff when you have a colder profile? Usually a colder profile has more of the polar jet involved which will inherently try to make the flow more progressive.

Either way, the theoretical discussion is interesting. My personal educated guess on it is that our upper bound is somewhere in the 50" range. Maybe slightly higher for orographic assisted locations. We've seen amounts near 50" in the 1888 storm back west of here down at low elevation and of course some areas likely exceeded 40" in the '78 storm. You can imagine scenarios where a little more was squeezed out.

[tamarack]

27 minutes ago, ORH_wxman said:

Dec '92 came close....obviously right near the shore didn't get feet upon feet...but you didn't have to go too far inland to get 25+ and then parts of the ORH hills approached 40" (actually achieving 40" in Princeton, MA).

I agree you achieve a limit at some point....simple physics of the colder profile holding less water vapor. That said, we're only talking like 1C in the column here for places that got 6" of QPF, so you could certainly envision something like 50" if you get a marginally colder December 1992 storm. There's also likely some sort of asymmetry to reaction of the flow on the colder profile too....meaning,  how less likely is a big stall and cutoff when you have a colder profile? Usually a colder profile has more of the polar jet involved which will inherently try to make the flow more progressive.

Either way, the theoretical discussion is interesting. My personal educated guess on it is that our upper bound is somewhere in the 50" range. Maybe slightly higher for orographic assisted locations. We've seen amounts near 50" in the 1888 storm back west of here down at low elevation and of course some areas likely exceeded 40" in the '78 storm. You can imagine scenarios where a little more was squeezed out.

We've had 2 near misses with huge precip in the past 15 years, 4/07 and 2/10.  At lower elevations (New Sharon, Farmington) each event produced 4-6" precip with 4-5" in 4/07 and 9-12" in 2/10 plus lots of low-mid 30s RA.  Higher up (Rangeley, Long Falls Dam) measured 3-5" precip with 12-14" in 4/07 and 17-26" in 2/10.  What Sugarloaf summit had from those 2 events, I don't know but I'd guess 40-60" from each.  Looking back to 2/69 those same areas had 2.5 to 4.3" LE but temps were 5-8° cooler than 07/10 so all snow, from 23" in Rangeley (missed the best bands, I guess) to 56" at LFD.

[Typhoon Tip]

50 minutes ago, ORH_wxman said:

Dec '92 came close....obviously right near the shore didn't get feet upon feet...but you didn't have to go too far inland to get 25+ and then parts of the ORH hills approached 40" (actually achieving 40" in Princeton, MA).

I agree you achieve a limit at some point....simple physics of the colder profile holding less water vapor. That said, we're only talking like 1C in the column here for places that got 6" of QPF, so you could certainly envision something like 50" if you get a marginally colder December 1992 storm. There's also likely some sort of asymmetry to reaction of the flow on the colder profile too....meaning,  how less likely is a big stall and cutoff when you have a colder profile? Usually a colder profile has more of the polar jet involved which will inherently try to make the flow more progressive.

Either way, the theoretical discussion is interesting. My personal educated guess on it is that our upper bound is somewhere in the 50" range. Maybe slightly higher for orographic assisted locations. We've seen amounts near 50" in the 1888 storm back west of here down at low elevation and of course some areas likely exceeded 40" in the '78 storm. You can imagine scenarios where a little more was squeezed out.

1888 was a hugely spring assisted event... I've heard some 'reconstructed'/reanalysis type debates on that, that it was a typical "weak" spring cut-off, that happened to get a fluke anomaly from the polar stream dumped into...

It does sort of make sense ... the layout had that weird "apparent" N-S oriented front, as though the previous day's boundary was yanked back west as the -theoretical - polar loading over PA dumped in and veered the flow around aloft.  It was rotted polar air type snow at Worcester, while it was back N at 50mph in talcum powder down the Housatonic -

Places in lower Manhattan had icicles going sideways off of objects, owing to the "Mammoth freeze" type rates of the setting...  Something like 40 F lashing rains to 19 F choke snow inside of an hour might be extraordinarily rare say - ...

But that NW CT to Capital District snow totaling actually was powder on the west side of said N-S running boundary, so 1888 definitely had a cold/ ratio assist in that heavier zone..

I definitely agree there is some sort of asymptotic aspect ( 'asymmetric' positive returns) ...as we near the upper PWAT storage/dynamics of events.  They "need" more cold to realize, and as it nears the threshold where that is requiring a polar direct assist,  creates a kind of catch-22... That means we induce more gradient to the systems surroundings and that starts moving things along.   At which point there is a reduction in positive returns. 

But you this .. there's no like 'curbs' in free space and air... it's just matter of return rates... Like, it maybe take 10,000 or whatever years to get that coveted 5.5" liquid to be all snow at 11:1 ...then also get the 12" of 20:1 frosting ... LOL

[Ginx snewx]

4.50 w/e in North Foster RI Feb 1978 with 36 snow. 24 hr measure so probably 40 plus

[SouthCoastMA]

Which is why that saying "imagine if this was snow" when we are getting 7" of liquid in Spring on a southerly flow never quite holds up. It would never happen like that with a cold profile or setup. 

[Ginx snewx]

My long time buds on here like to bust my balls about my memories of ocean effect snow on the beach in SRI. SRI had a private little OES event on 1 /20/05 which dumped almost 8 inches of snow strictly confined to a 1/2 mile of the coast in 05 prior to the big 05 blizzard.  A clipper was headed SE into an Arctic air mass. Winds turned SE resulted in OES all along the LI CT RI shorelines. A band set up in SRI which resulted in a private snowstorm for the residents just along the Scoast. From 4 to 10 inches were recorded. Farther inland light amounts of 1 to 4 were recorded.  Cool stuff thanks to Ed  @Northshorewx for the images

[SouthCoastMA]

Found this pic at my parents house in Wareham. Date on the back says from the Feb 29th 2015 snowstorm. Honestly, can't remember that one

[tamarack]

30 minutes ago, SouthCoastMA said:

Found this pic at my parents house in Wareham. Date on the back says from the Feb 29th 2015 snowstorm. Honestly, can't remember that one

Wonder if it was the 9th, after the 3rd of the many big storms that Jan-Feb.  (Especially as there was no 29th in Feb 2015.    )

[SouthCoastMA]

Just now, tamarack said:

Wonder if it was the 9th, after the 3rd of the many big storms that Jan-Feb.  (Especially as there was no 29th in Feb 2015.    )

Hah yeah they prob just guessed once it was developed. I could also see it being just after Feb 15th..another big storm around then

[Ginx snewx]

Had a beautiful snow event on March 29th 2015. 3 to 4 inches of paste