Winter ‘22-23 Panic Room

[WinterWolf]

7 minutes ago, Torch Tiger said:

that is highly insensitive

I know…might have been a tad harsh. 

[WarrenCtyWx]

29 minutes ago, Torch Tiger said:

Yeah, wasn't a great winter.  great six weeks, yes.  You can't lose half of met winter basically snowless and call it great.

Which winters would you describe as great? Very few winters go wire to wire.

[dendrite]

53 minutes ago, Torch Tiger said:

Yeah, wasn't a great winter.  great six weeks, yes.  You can't lose half of met winter basically snowless and call it great.

Beer? That would be my dream winter. An entire season all condensed into 6 weeks with mid atlantic climo around it.

[Torch Tiger]

34 minutes ago, dendrite said:

Beer? That would be my dream winter. An entire season all condensed into 6 weeks with mid atlantic climo around it.

Yeah if you love a condensed winter with a horrid December, it was basically as good as we'll ever see. 

[Torch Tiger]

fwiw 2014-15 Maine

 

The meteorological winter ended with a total of 91.2 inches of
snow at Bangor, which was the 2nd most on record. At Caribou a
total of 79.5 inches was observed, which ranked as the 23rd
snowiest on record. The average temperature at Bangor of 16.8
degrees ranked as the 11th coldest on record, and the average
temperature of 11.5 degrees at Caribou ranked as the 21st coldest
on record.

[HoarfrostHubb]

I would trade 2014-2015 for just about any winter.     I know it was condensed but so so good

An analogy… 1 amazingly good meal cooked by a James Beard chef, or a weeks worth of tv dinners…

[Chris12WX]

Don’t you all realize that in the current climate regime our winter season runs from January 15 to April 15?

[WinterWolf]

1 hour ago, HoarfrostHubb said:

I would trade 2014-2015 for just about any winter.     I know it was condensed but so so good

An analogy… 1 amazingly good meal cooked by a James Beard chef, or a weeks worth of tv dinners…

I think you meant to say “Wouldn’t?”  Right? 

[LongBeachSurfFreak]

1 hour ago, Chris12WX said:

Don’t you all realize that in the current climate regime our winter season runs from January 15 to April 15?

There is definitely an element of truth to this. I believe it has to do with low arctic sea ice and the time it takes to reform the ice and truly cool the Arctic. Which is our real source region for cold. 

[ice1972]

3 hours ago, Chris12WX said:

Don’t you all realize that in the current climate regime our winter season runs from January 15 to April 15?

lol winter in April....please......wiz has already fired up the severe thread by then......give me a break

[NorEastermass128]

Starting to get that rat feeling for sure now. We’ll see how Jan pans out, but I think the AEMATT crew waits until after mid month for any legitimate threats. 

[NorEastermass128]

35 minutes ago, NorEastermass128 said:

Starting to get that rat feeling for sure now. We’ll see how Jan pans out, but I think the AEMATT crew waits until after mid month for any legitimate threats. 

Just went for a run (past sunset) in shorts and a tee. Sweating like it’s August.  There is also that distinct spring smell that comes in the first warm spell at the end of March/early April. I always associate that smell with winter’s demise. Odd out there and this is just the first day of many in a row. 

[Baroclinic Zone]

 

[Whineminster]

On 12/29/2022 at 5:03 PM, WinterWolf said:

He doesn’t even get it.  14/15 lost  pretty much all of January too. 

Yeah and it wasn't a great winter as a whole.  We're talking a whole season.  Sure we had good stretch of 5 weeks, but the rest was poo Doo.  Now bring that stretch from 12/7 to like 1/7 and we're in business cuz the pack would last until napril. 

[ORH_wxman]

32 minutes ago, Whineminster said:

Yeah and it wasn't a great winter as a whole.  We're talking a whole season.  Sure we had good stretch of 5 weeks, but the rest was poo Doo.  Now bring that stretch from 12/7 to like 1/7 and we're in business cuz the pack would last until napril. 

How many winters are great all 4 months from Dec-Mar…I have them all memorized like a weirdo, but I bet you would have a hard time naming even 3. 

[Whineminster]

19 minutes ago, ORH_wxman said:

How many winters are great all 4 months from Dec-Mar…I have them all memorized like a weirdo, but I bet you would have a hard time naming even 3. 

It wouldn't need to be until March. Just late JAN.  December is just tougher than it used to be.  Grandpa says he used to go ice fishing the day after Thanksgiving back in the day, all the time. 

[ORH_wxman]

2 minutes ago, Whineminster said:

It wouldn't need to be until March. Just late JAN.  December is just tougher than it used to be.  Grandpa says he used to go ice fishing the day after Thanksgiving back in the day, all the time. 

[dendrite]

Walked to the pond uphill both ways

[STILL N OF PIKE]

SNE isn’t the winter paradise some weenies want and hope for Or think it was even in the past . 
 

I dealt with that by chasing every storm I can , usually we have a few good periods in every winter. But wire to wire snow just ain’t happening (And really nothing resembling this happens on the CP ever) in SNE and I know most understand this and have made peace with this . 

On rare occasions we get spoiled and blitzed with month long periods of Multiple warning snow events with hardly any rainers

[ORH_wxman]

35 minutes ago, STILL N OF PIKE said:

SNE isn’t the winter paradise some weenies want and hope for Or think it was even in the past . 
 

I dealt with that by chasing every storm I can , usually we have a few good periods in every winter. But wire to wire snow just ain’t happening (And really nothing resembling this happens on the CP ever) in SNE and I know most understand this and have made peace with this . 

On rare occasions we get spoiled and blitzed with month long periods of Multiple warning snow events with hardly any rainers

You need to be in CAD land to have a realistic shot at a “wire to wire” winter for snow pack (I’ll define wire to wire as continuous pack or at least nearly continuous.) Only a small part of SNE really gets into that zone…I’d call it N ORH county mainly near and N of rt 2. My old stomping grounds on winter hill was on the edge of that zone but definitely not quite as good. The other area that is in that zone is the east slope of Berkshires and maybe including down into Hippy’s area. East slope above like 1600 feet is prob in a separate category themselves. 
 

The rest of interior SNE can sort of fake it for 3-4 week stretches outside of those truly special winters. Places like BOS maybe get something semi-close to wire to wire once per 15 years or something. 

[powderfreak]

2 hours ago, Whineminster said:

Yeah and it wasn't a great winter as a whole.  We're talking a whole season.  Sure we had good stretch of 5 weeks, but the rest was poo Doo.  Now bring that stretch from 12/7 to like 1/7 and we're in business cuz the pack would last until napril. 

So you’re ok with a 5-week winter if it happens in December but because it was February it doesn’t count?

A lot of assumptions there that even a 4 foot pack would last all winter from January onward.  Couple good cutters can do quite a number.

All of these daily discussions come back to folks wanting winter at the solar minimum.  Deep winter during deep darkness when there’s a real climo lag.  

[ORH_wxman]

8 minutes ago, powderfreak said:

So you’re ok with a 5-week winter if it happens in December but because it was February it doesn’t count?

A lot of assumptions there that even a 4 foot pack would last all winter from January onward.  Couple good cutters can do quite a number.

All of these daily discussions come back to folks wanting winter at the solar minimum.  Deep winter during deep darkness when there’s a real climo lag.  

And we live in the part of the US that probably has one of the longest lags. So many other spots have their peak climo closer to the solstice than we do. Most of them have lags too but far less than ours. 

[powderfreak]

3 minutes ago, ORH_wxman said:

And we live in the part of the US that probably has one of the longest lags. So many other spots have their peak climo closer to the solstice than we do. Most of them have lags too but far less than ours. 

Not to tell people what they can and can’t complain about but both winter and summer expectations are skewed on the forum by the sun/solar cycle.  It’s dark in Nov/Dec, it should be deep winter.

March 1st has the solar of like early October, but 3/1 is so much more likely to snow big than the darkness of 12/1.  It is what it is and folks will forever not like it, ha.

Same with how the summer solstice can be 50s and rain in June… but two months later in August it’s very difficult.  Deep summer is almost never here for the true longest days of sunlight… despite expectations that it should be HHH because it’s light until 9:30pm.

[FXWX]

31 minutes ago, ORH_wxman said:

You need to be in CAD land to have a realistic shot at a “wire to wire” winter for snow pack (I’ll define wire to wire as continuous pack or at least nearly continuous.) Only a small part of SNE really gets into that zone…I’d call it N ORH county mainly near and N of rt 2. My old stomping grounds on winter hill was on the edge of that zone but definitely not quite as good. The other area that is in that zone is the east slope of Berkshires and maybe including down into Hippy’s area. East slope above like 1600 feet is prob in a separate category themselves. 
 

The rest of interior SNE can sort of fake it for 3-4 week stretches outside of those truly special winters. Places like BOS maybe get something semi-close to wire to wire once per 15 years or something. 

While many, if most, on here try to make SNE winter climate something it never or rarely was/is, your post is spot on!!!  So many live in a fancy SNE winterland...  When one of those relatively rare long pack winters come along, it skews some brains into thinking they should be or ever were common.

[FXWX]

Just now, FXWX said:

While many, if most, on here try to make SNE winter climate something it never or rarely was/is, your post is spot on!!!  So many live in a fancy SNE winterland...  When one of those relatively rare long pack winters come along, it skews some brains into thinking they should be or ever were common.

"Fantasy"

[OceanStWx]

Me and mid shift actually just ran through PWM's history with December being a dud (less than 4 inches like this season). Surprisingly 9 of 24 seasons featured above normal snowfall.

Now the caveat being that 4 of those 9 had big Novembers to help the season total. 1957-58, 1992-93, 1931-32, 1932-33, and 1887-88 were the 5 examples of poor Nov-Dec combos that still finished above normal. 

[dendrite]

37 minutes ago, powderfreak said:

So you’re ok with a 5-week winter if it happens in December but because it was February it doesn’t count?

A lot of assumptions there that even a 4 foot pack would last all winter from January onward.  Couple good cutters can do quite a number.

All of these daily discussions come back to folks wanting winter at the solar minimum.  Deep winter during deep darkness when there’s a real climo lag.  

February sun has never exactly felt warm to my skin, but maybe it's different in Mass. Feb is always deep winter in my book if the weather cooperates.

[powderfreak]

1 minute ago, dendrite said:

February sun has never exactly felt warm to my skin, but maybe it's different in Mass. Feb is always deep winter in my book if the weather cooperates.

Yeah Feb 21st and Oct 21st are same solar and neither feels warm.

Isn’t early February like the middle of winter cold on the temp curve?

[HIPPYVALLEY]

1 minute ago, dendrite said:

February sun has never exactly felt warm to my skin, but maybe it's different in Mass. Feb is always deep winter in my book if the weather cooperates.

Yes but you need to  imagine Tip, sitting in a Chrysler Lebaron, February sun beaming through the windshield, warming those fine “Corinthian leather” seats.

[dendrite]

5 minutes ago, HIPPYVALLEY said:

Yes but you need to  imagine Tip, sitting in a Chrysler Lebaron, February sun beaming through the windshield, warming those fine “Corinthian leather” seats.

Fox hall aptly named on that first sun-kissed nape day.