Central PA Autumn 2023

[Bubbler86]

17 minutes ago, Itstrainingtime said:

It depends on which definition you personally like - I was going to use the term in a post yesterday but stopped myself for the same reason you alluded to; however,

Weather historian William R. Deedler wrote that "Indian summer" can be defined as "any spell of warm, quiet, hazy weather that may occur in October or November,"

Agreed, it's all over the place. I remember the farmer's almanac saying it had to be mid Nov.   

[Jns2183]

And there it is. October 3rd and nothing even close to a frost having been observed yet, the term “Indian summer” gets thrown out there. 

Is it normally defined as heat after frost? Generally curious if it's definition is very regional and/or temporal?

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[pasnownut]

1 minute ago, Jns2183 said:

Is it normally defined as heat after frost? Generally curious if it's definition is very regional and/or temporal?

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as I suggested, Google it and pick the def that fits best for ya. 

 

oh and.....lol

[WmsptWx]

I actually did not know there was a standardized definition of what constitutes "Indian Summer." I always just ass/u/me'd it:

1) Was warm after the Autumnal equinox or

2)Was a thousand degrees with a hundred million people and it smelled like absolute shit.

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[pasnownut]

Just now, Atomixwx said:

I actually did not know there was a standardized definition of what constitutes "Indian Summer." I always just ass/u/me'd it:

1) Was warm after the Autumnal equinox or

2)Was a thousand degrees with a hundred million people and it smelled like absolute shit.

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#2 sounds more appropriate of late.

[TheClimateChanger]

19 minutes ago, TimB said:

And there it is. October 3rd and nothing even close to a frost having been observed yet, the term “Indian summer” gets thrown out there. 

This is a good point, Tim. 

Here are the years with the warmest minimum temperature from July 1 to October 3, in the threaded Pittsburgh area record. All poorly-exposed, lower elevation, downtown readings with several recent years at the airport. The minimum so far in 2023 has been 48F. The only warmer year was 1881, with a minimum of 51F. And I know there are some questionable records from that era, but it is what it is. September 1881, while probably not 77.3F or whatever the official number is, was certainly a very warm month. Incredible, we've had records at the airports dating to 1935, and it took until 2016 for any year to make this list and compete with the downtown lows. And now it's occurred 4 times just in 8 years.

[ChescoWx]

19 hours ago, TheClimateChanger said:

Community Notes: The official, first-order NWS sites nearest western Chester County all show September 2023 as well above the long-term median.

Hagerstown, MD (27th warmest out of 125 years)

Harrisburg, PA (24th warmest out of 136 years)

 

Reading, PA (27th warmest out of 128 years)

Baltimore, MD (21st warmest out of 152 years)

Philadelphia, PA (23rd warmest out of 150 years)

Wilmington, DE (31st warmest out of 110 years)

But of course not in Chester County!! Plus strangely...you seem to have left off a below normal month at Allentown and also at Hamburg in Berks County - at Hamburg it was the 55th chilliest September with 130 years of record....

[TimB]

I had no idea Hamburg was an official first-order climate site. You learn new things every day.

[Jns2183]

Most of us knew what you were doing.  No worries.  
Blizz wasnt discounting the overnight "mins" either.  We're better than that.

I think an extremely difficult concept in this day and age is scientific definition versus vernacular definition. From a average mean standpoint over the last 130 years I'm sure this summer was in the top 1/3rd warmest. Try telling that to people on the street they are going to think you are gaslighting them. You have recency bias with people comparing this summer to those in recent memory, let alone 30 years ago. You also have the lack of 90's, 100's and extended days of, which people use as a true/false test regarding if it was a hot summer. It's a well known fact that our warm records have come mostly at the expense of high mins. Those high mins are almost always due to high humidity, thus mugginess. This summer was doubly weird because of how humid it was for extended periods of time, yet still dry. Usually you could say it was a very muggy summer and it communicate the same message. This summer there really isn't a good way of communicating it.

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[TimB]

3 minutes ago, TheClimateChanger said:

This is a good point, Tim. 

Here are the years with the warmest minimum temperature from July 1 to October 3, in the threaded Pittsburgh area record. All poorly-exposed, lower elevation, downtown readings with several recent years at the airport. The minimum so far in 2023 has been 48F. The only warmer year was 1881, with a minimum of 51F. And I know there are some questionable records from that era, but it is what it is. September 1881, while probably not 77.3F or whatever the official number is, was certainly a very warm month. Incredible, we've had records at the airports dating to 1935, and it took until 2016 for any year to make this list and compete with the downtown lows. And now it's occurred 4 times just in 8 years.

I see 1898 in there. That October includes a denier special at many mid-latitude eastern US sites.

[Itstrainingtime]

11 minutes ago, Bubbler86 said:

Agreed, it's all over the place. i remember the farmers almanac saying it had to be mid Nov.   

I actually think that I "was taught" at some point many, many years ago that it was the first warm stretch of weather that followed the first frost of the season. I was surprised by how many interpretations there are of the "phenomena". LOL

[TheClimateChanger]

4 minutes ago, ChescoWx said:

But of course not in Chester County!! Plus strangely...you seem to have left off a below normal month at Allentown and also at Hamburg in Berks County - at Hamburg it was the 55th chilliest September with 130 years of record....

We'll see what NCEI says in the monthly report, which is usually released around the 11th. They don't use raw co-op data in the rankings, because of time of observation and equipment bias. Oh, I forgot, the adjustments cause the warming!

[WmsptWx]

I'm glad these discussions are civil because I'd hate to see the a bunch of nerds get violent and the science lab turns into Tombstone.

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[Itstrainingtime]

@Mount Joy Snowman - you were a little shaky in completing the assigned mission, but ultimately you got the job done. Welcome back! 

[Bubbler86]

3 minutes ago, Itstrainingtime said:

@Mount Joy Snowman - you were a little shaky in completing the assigned mission, but ultimately you got the job done. Welcome back! 

[ChescoWx]

7 minutes ago, TheClimateChanger said:

We'll see what NCEI says in the monthly report, which is usually released around the 11th. They don't use raw co-op data in the rankings, because of time of observation and equipment bias. Oh, I forgot, the adjustments cause the warming!

So how do they pull together the data for the county if not through the NWS observer data? That said it will of course show warming....Could those "official" sites have a warm bias??

By the way in New Holland NWS COOP site also a below normal September - 13th chilliest September with 32 years of record....

[TimB]

Oh, now we’re digging deep into the bag of tricks, using a co-op site barely below the median of a small sample size. 

[pasnownut]

1 minute ago, TimB said:

Oh, now we’re digging deep into the bag of tricks, using a co-op site barely below the median of a small sample size. 

are you a paid troll.....

or just here for the lol's

[TheClimateChanger]

7 minutes ago, ChescoWx said:

So how do they pull together the data for the county if not through the NWS observer data? That said it will of course show warming....Could those "official" sites have a warm bias??

By the way in New Holland NWS COOP site also a below normal September - 13th chilliest September with 32 years of record....

Well, part of that is the fact that the site has a very short POR, and many of the warm Septembers have occurred in recent years - precisely, because the climate is, in fact, warming. Of the sites, I listed all were between 12th and 14th warmest of the most recent 32 years (since 1992), except for BWI which was 5th warmest and a warm outlier. ABE was 15th warmest of the last 32 years. So, yes, the rankings are not nearly as impressive looking at the most recent 32 years. Although all of the nearby, first-order sites still were in the upper 50th percentile.

[Jns2183]

I see 1898 in there. That October includes a denier special at many mid-latitude eastern US sites.

Both sides seem to be great at ignoring people like me. Who believe the earth is warming, but have severe misgivings about future model predictions as well being extremely against solutions offered due to the cost/benefit tradeoff for my family, yet wishing there were more strict regulations regarding local pollution. We may be quiet but there are more of us than one assumes

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[TimB]

2 minutes ago, pasnownut said:

are you a paid troll.....

or just here for the lol's

Wait, there’s a way to make money off of this?!

[Mount Joy Snowman]

Made it back from Chicago in one piece.  What a great trip.  Evanston was a snoozer, have never seen a town so dead on the night before a home game in the middle of good weather season.  But hey, they do calculus better than they do football at Northwestern so I guess that's to be expected.  I didn't think Penn State looked good at all but perhaps my view was distorted, and at least the final score looked suitable ha.

Chicago, however, did not disappoint.  We had a beautiful drive down the Lakeshore highway on Saturday afternoon and then went down to the Riverwalk (only a block from our hotel in the River North District), which was absolutely stunning.  Followed that up with a wallet-emptying dinner at the infamous Gene & Georgetti Italian Steakhouse, which was phenomenal.  Then hit the bar scene around our hotel for a bit before calling it a night.  On Sunday we hit the Riverwalk one last time and snagged some hotdogs and Italian beef from a Portillo's before embarking on the long drive home.  Weather was perfect the whole time.  The part of Chicago we were in really was beautiful, would highly recommend for a weekend getaway.  I think MDT still does those nice easy flights to ORD for anyone interested?  Anyway, a great trip with great people.  Will definitely not be my last.

Oh yeah, a low of 56 last night and no rain while I was gone other than the .03" drizzle fest from last Thursday.  National high of 101 at Falcon Lake, TX and low of 21 at Berthoud Pass, CO.  Carry on.  

[canderson]

I looooove Chicago. So much good food. 

Also the only reason October 3 should be noteworthy is due to Mean Girls. It's October 3!

[pasnownut]

4 minutes ago, Jns2183 said:

Both sides seem to be great at ignoring people like me. Who believe the earth is warming, but have severe misgivings about future model predictions as well being extremely against solutions offered due to the cost/benefit tradeoff for my family, yet wishing there were more strict regulations regarding local pollution. We may be quiet but there are more of us than one assumes

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Nah, there are far more of us than this site will ever acknowledge.  In many regards, I feel much the same as you pal.

In our forum, you just happen to be in the midst of some semi intelligent weenies that are like me and doing electrical projects....just know enough to be dangerous.  

[ChescoWx]

8 minutes ago, Jns2183 said:

Both sides seem to be great at ignoring people like me. Who believe the earth is warming, but have severe misgivings about future model predictions as well being extremely against solutions offered due to the cost/benefit tradeoff for my family, yet wishing there were more strict regulations regarding local pollution. We may be quiet but there are more of us than one assumes

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Jns2183 this too is my belief... the earth is absolutely warming that is a fact!! I too am all about doing good things for our planet. What is not clear is was there similar warming between 1345 and 1545 on the planet? What was the normal high during that period? How many degrees above or below normal was it? 1c??  Answer...we really truly do not know....

[Mount Joy Snowman]

2 minutes ago, canderson said:

I looooove Chicago. So much good food. 

Also the only reason October 3 should be noteworthy is due to Mean Girls. It's October 3!

There really is.  So many hidden gems down random side streets.  Just a never-ending supply of good food options.  Our neighbors were life-long residents of Chicago who just moved to Lancaster last year.  They were a great resource for figuring out where to stay and what to do.  They specifically mentioned Gene & Georgetti's and boy did that hit the spot.  Just one of those old-time small Italian venues that has almost a mob feel.  Doesn't look like much on the outside either but man, the food is out of this world.  It will cost you a small used vehicle but for a once-a-year type place, it's worth every penny.  The type of place where even the busboy was a 50-year-old man, ya know.  

[ChescoWx]

15 minutes ago, TimB said:

Oh, now we’re digging deep into the bag of tricks, using a co-op site barely below the median of a small sample size. 

All I do is post the actual available climate data for all of the sites in my area. Clearly most of the COOP and AWOS sites around me had a below normal September. Yet we all know when the NCEI numbers come out it will of course be warm!! They will make the necessary "adjustments" to get the data "right"

[WmsptWx]

Wait, there’s a way to make money off of this?!

There's not. I've been trolling at the Collegiate and Amateur levels since sliding out in 1985. Even with the NIL in place, the only money being made is going to that Indian dude from the memes, and we all know he doesn't need the money with his family owning every call center on earth.

There's no professional circuit. And by the time one is established, Trolls will begin to unionize and the owners will simply jack up the price of Internet and nobody will get on until a pitch count is ordered.

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[WmsptWx]

The Player Hater's Ball is the closest thing to Major League Trolling and half those dudes are dead.

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[Jns2183]

I should also state that whether global warming is 100% due to humans or not, it has no bearing on my cost benefit analysis for my family nor my issues with future model predictions. I want to remove that flash point from what I said above.

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