Sciascia

Near O’Hare Airport right now. Quite low visibility.

Inside & warming up. Here’s a couple more pictures after I got into Elmwood Park:

Update: Other people got on the bus. But can you see out the bus’ windshield? Because I can’t!

I’m currently alone on a Harlem bus at 1:20 in the afternoon. Snow is heavy, visibility is terrible. My mask was frozen, as was the front of the hoodie beneath my open coat. The combo of low temps & heavy snow make this the worst conditions I’ve ever personally encountered.

Harwood Heights, 12:57pm

That’s been the most unbelievable thing to me. Normally, we get the big storm & the cold follows. Or we get the stretch of bitter cold temps that moderate to the 20s/30s ahead of a big storm. Having this level of cold & storms simultaneously is a life I’m not used to.

Just realized that the tweet says “by Tuesday AM” and not “storm total.” Holy smokes.

9z RAP thru noon Tuesday:

That RAP run didn’t just come in hot. That was like NBA Jam level stuff. It’s ON FIRE!

7pm Tuesday, per RAP.

That’s a sizeable lake-enhanced area. Damn near the entire county of Cook (minus N/S fringes) and some counties SW.

It’s got 13.2 inches of snow down by midnight tomorrow. Oh my goodness, oh my damn.

LOT’s most recent images highlighting the storm: It won’t happen, but it would be insane to have an 18hr period of 1-2 inches-per-hour as somewhat depicted on that pictograph.

Nearly half of the total pages of this thread have come over the last 17 hours. Shows you how fast things can change.

First & final predictions: ORD: 10.4” Lake Shore Drive: 19.7” Go big or stay home.

WeenieBell map, but nevertheless: Inject this into my veins & call it a vaccine.

Dumb question(s): Is ORD looking to be too far NW to get in on the LES? If it is, and ORD is the standard for reporting “Chicago” snow, does the downtown snow get counted separately?

15z RAP with 14-18” around Chicago metro by 12pm Tuesday (with LES still falling at IL lakeshore at 51hrs)

15z RAP going hard on LES

I do not support defunding the agency that has to try forecasting something as variable as the weather. Weather is fickle, weather is emotionless. Weather does whatever it wants to do, and that can change on a dime. As a general point: I couldn’t do the job that RC & Purdue do; and we should be even more thankful to have them around to give their expertise. It’s like if you were on the Reddit page for Game of Thrones/your favorite TV show & one of the actors was a regular contributor. Can’t take it for granted.

I thought that 10.8” storm counted for February. My mistake on that.

You are a gentleman and a scholar. Much appreciated.

What’s a good site, if any, that keeps track of seasonal/monthly snowfall totals at airports? I’d rather be able to track things myself than have to ask everyone here all the time.

STAT TIME: Chicago’s snowiest month on record is January 1918 with 42.5”. If this storm/lake effect pans out, February 2021 is gonna be hot on its heels.