March 2022 Obs/Disc: In Like a Lamb, Out Like a Butterfly

[STILL N OF PIKE]

40 minutes ago, 512high said:

This is April 16 last year Hollis New Hampshire roughly 3 inches it can still happen!

That’s a very nice town in S NH 

[Cold Miser]

43 minutes ago, 512high said:

This is April 16 last year Hollis New Hampshire roughly 3 inches it can still happen!

 

[ORH_wxman]

13 minutes ago, Damage In Tolland said:

I did? My argument was that it’s been an AN month 

Lol...that was an epic IPA-infused meltdown you had. I was claiming the final week of the month looked cold and that this month would end up colder than 2021, 2020, and 2016 and you absolutely lost it. Powderfreak had a perfect breakdown of it...I'd have to go back and find it.

[HIPPYVALLEY]

1 hour ago, ORH_wxman said:

That's been signaled for a a few cycles now...as soon as I saw that westward NAO block slowly decaying on ensemble guidance, i was thinking "here comes the wheel o 'rhea".....hopefully there's enough cold to make it snow instead of 37F rain and drizzle like would happen 2+ week later in the spring.

April '96 had a similar look with that ULL spinning in place that managed to produce 2 storms out of the same trough....so you never know.

Is it just me or does the early spring blocking, seem to happen more often than not, the last 10 years or so? 

[ORH_wxman]

1 minute ago, HIPPYVALLEY said:

Is it just me or does the early spring blocking, seem to happen more often than not, the last 10 years or so? 

I think it's happened more recently....we had some pretty nice springs for a while from '08-'12 and then we kind of paid the piper back....though last year wasn't bad. But we had some horrific ones back in 2020, 2018, 2016.

[ORH_wxman]

Too bad we couldn't see one more panel on the Euro....guidance has definitely been targeting month-end to 4/2 range as winter storm potential.

[WinterWolf]

19 minutes ago, ORH_wxman said:

Too bad we couldn't see one more panel on the Euro....guidance has definitely been targeting month-end to 4/2 range as winter storm potential.

I guess we’ll be able to see it at 0z or tmrw at 6z or 12z…

[Typhoon Tip]

3 hours ago, PhineasC said:

Models are painting an extended period of sleet and ZR here. My limited history in this spot is that this will be snow or rain. We don’t seem to get a lot of sleet and ZR here. If winds are W/NW it might be wet snow. 

You likely were not around there in '98/January, but there was a big ice storm all over QUE/NNE ... I wonder how that area did in that.

 

[powderfreak]

3 hours ago, PhineasC said:

Models are painting an extended period of sleet and ZR here. My limited history in this spot is that this will be snow or rain. We don’t seem to get a lot of sleet and ZR here. If winds are W/NW it might be wet snow. 

I will say we’ve had a lack of longer mixed precipitation events since you moved up north.  The past two years have been largely devoid of sleet storms or freezing rain.  I think you’d do mixed precip pretty well with a cold wedge.

Your experience though probably lines up with a lack of those events too… I don’t remember a lot of mixed precip past two winters.  It’s either snow or rain lately, though there’s the usual minor CAD icing events south of the Whites.  But we usually get more SWFE style where it’s 23F at the surface and +2C at 750mb and getting scalped.  It’s usually after 3-60/4-8” snow though, ha.  Been a while since like a 2-3” sleet storm has hit.

[Typhoon Tip]

28 minutes ago, ORH_wxman said:

I think it's happened more recently....we had some pretty nice springs for a while from '08-'12 and then we kind of paid the piper back....though last year wasn't bad. But we had some horrific ones back in 2020, 2018, 2016.

We had flurries in early May last year ...busted virga CU in CAA type... Then that decayed into a weird 70/29 type air mass with huge diurnals for a week. 

It felt to me like last spring may not have been "as" bad as those others you listed, but it was just smaller piece of CC -caused seasonal lag shit.

Frankly, next week's -20 shot is that too - whether it happens or not. ...have that in the area in early April is part of the same mechanism.  

[dendrite]

5 minutes ago, Typhoon Tip said:

You likely were not around there in '98/January, but there was a big ice storm all over QUE/NNE ... I wonder how that area did in that.

 

I drove through Franc Notch during the middle of it and it was mostly wet on the trees from there through Littleton. I assume his area warmed enough to minimize icing as well. Plymouth to the mtns was a mess. 

[WinterWolf]

1 minute ago, dendrite said:

I drove through Franc Notch during the middle of it and it was mostly wet on the trees from there through Littleton. I assume his area warmed enough to minimize icing as well. Plymouth to the mtns was a mess. 

And into interior Maine and central Maine got demolished too. 

[ORH_wxman]

Just now, powderfreak said:

I will say we’ve had a lack of longer mixed precipitation events since you moved up north.  The past two years have been largely devoid of sleet storms or freezing rain.  I think you’d do mixed precip pretty well with a cold wedge.

Your experience though probably lines up with a lack of those events too… I don’t remember a lot of mixed precip past two winters.  It’s either snow or rain lately.

I agree....we've had relatively few "deep CAD" events....where you have strong CAD in the 850-sfc layer and it's torching higher up. It seems those types of events have trended more strung out the past couple winters so they don't end up as mixed....we had a few down here this winter, but the mix zones were relatively narrow with maybe the exception of the 2/4 event.

 

But that kind of matches the longwave pattern....we've had some crappy Pacific setups where the NAO muted the torch at times....like last January/early Feb and this past December where we had a trough digging down to Cabo but a big -NAO block that ground everything to a pulp.

[CoastalWx]

2 minutes ago, dendrite said:

I drove through Franc Notch during the middle of it and it was mostly wet on the trees from there through Littleton. I assume his area warmed enough to minimize icing as well. Plymouth to the mtns was a mess. 

That was when I first realized elevation matters. I went skiing in that. Ended up driving 400 miles only to go to Wachusett (only place open) and nearly dying on the slopes. Not kidding lol. 

In any case, I first noticed trees glazed on 93 by the Hooksett tolls where there is a little elevation. Down in Concord there was very little ice, but once I got out of Concord...it rapidly built up. Didn't even bother going to Gunstock as roads were impassable. 

[ORH_wxman]

7 minutes ago, Typhoon Tip said:

We had flurries in early May last year ...busted virga CU in CAA type... Then that decayed into a weird 70/29 type air mass with huge diurnals for a week. 

It felt to me like last spring may not have been "as" bad as those others you listed, but it was just smaller piece of CC -caused seasonal lag shit.

Frankly, next week's -20 shot is that too - whether it happens or not. ...have that in the area in early April is part of the same mechanism.  

Nothing was worse than April '95 IMHO....that was the worst. Full sun with bare ground on April 5th but a high in the mid 20s with 30-40mph CAA gusts.

http://www.meteo.psu.edu/fxg1/NARR/1995/us0405.php

 

[dryslot]

7 minutes ago, WinterWolf said:

And into interior Maine and central Maine got demolished too. 

Destroyed.

[PhineasC]

16 minutes ago, Typhoon Tip said:

You likely were not around there in '98/January, but there was a big ice storm all over QUE/NNE ... I wonder how that area did in that.

 

It was bad here I have told. Snapped the tops off every ash tree here, so the locals tell me. 

[PhineasC]

12 minutes ago, dendrite said:

I drove through Franc Notch during the middle of it and it was mostly wet on the trees from there through Littleton. I assume his area warmed enough to minimize icing as well. Plymouth to the mtns was a mess. 

There was also a bad ice storm here in 2008 I think. I might have them mixed up. One of them wrecked the trees here and you can still see the damage. 

[tamarack]

19 minutes ago, Typhoon Tip said:

You likely were not around there in '98/January, but there was a big ice storm all over QUE/NNE ... I wonder how that area did in that.

 

The 1998 event was elevational in that part of NH.  While Gorham had mostly rain and MWN had rainy 40s (at the time their mildest Jan temp), forests between 1500 and 2500 got crushed.  In Maine that 1500-2500' area got mainly IP; the real damage was in central Maine/Downeast under 1000'.  Meanwhile Aroostook had temps mostly in the teens with ~20-25" of 8:1 snow over a 5-day period.

[tamarack]

12 minutes ago, ORH_wxman said:

Nothing was worse than April '95 IMHO....that was the worst. Full sun with bare ground on April 5th but a high in the mid 20s with 30-40mph CAA gusts.

http://www.meteo.psu.edu/fxg1/NARR/1995/us0405.php

 

Mid teens here with all the wind, but milded up quickly the next day.  Places like Jackman barely made it out of the singles.

[dendrite]

11 minutes ago, PhineasC said:

There was also a bad ice storm here in 2008 I think. I might have them mixed up. One of them wrecked the trees here and you can still see the damage. 

Probably 98. 08 was bad here but I had a lot of sleet and some snow. I’m sure there was even more frozen up your way. Maybe you held the CAD much better in 98 than torchville HIE. 

[CoastalWx]

Looks like a soaker near south coast coming up. Steve getting ready to protect the people of the mighty Pawcatuck?

[dendrite]

4 minutes ago, CoastalWx said:

Looks like a soaker near south coast coming up. Steve getting ready to protect the people of the mighty Pawcatuck?

[WinterWolf]

14 minutes ago, CoastalWx said:

Looks like a soaker near south coast coming up. Steve getting ready to protect the people of the mighty Pawcatuck?

For when? Friday? 

[CoastalWx]

8 minutes ago, dendrite said:

Yep, no matter the cause.....the signal shines bright. Always there to protect the 5 people that live in srn Washington county. 

[CoastalWx]

Just now, WinterWolf said:

For when? Friday? 

Thursday into Thursday night.

[ORH_wxman]

EPS looks like a ‘rhea pattern all the way to the end of the run. 

[BrianW]

31 minutes ago, CoastalWx said:

Looks like a soaker near south coast coming up. Steve getting ready to protect the people of the mighty Pawcatuck?

Yeah. Upton has 1-2 inches here.

 Rainfall totals look to be around 3/4 of an inch well inland, to about an 1 1/2 inches across the majority of the region, with an additional quarter inch of so possible Thursday night. Thus a storm total of about 1 to 2 inches is forecast for this system over a long duration of over 30 hours.

[dendrite]

7 minutes ago, ORH_wxman said:

EPS looks like a ‘rhea pattern all the way to the end of the run. 

Looks like my norovirus symptoms since 4am today. Get through the next few weeks and let’s flip the script to when we can actually pull a string of 70s.

[WinterWolf]

10 minutes ago, ORH_wxman said:

EPS looks like a ‘rhea pattern all the way to the end of the run. 

Where’s the wintry part lol…you mean it’s not gonna deliver a wintry threat? Oh I’m totally shocked!