Brasiluvsnow

24 minutes ago, psv88 said:

Hate to say this…but I assembled and started up the snowblower. Had to do it just in case 

no worries as I am heading to my garage in 5 minutes to start up my blower and check the air in the tires ,,,,,,,BRING IT

4 minutes ago, vegan_edible said:

quickly realizing that i dont own a shovel and my complex will have the lot plowed... welp where tf do you buy a shovel at the end of february?

Home Depot still has em in fact most places should have them probably overstocked as I am fairly certain that not many shovels were sold this year 

2 minutes ago, Winterweatherlover said:

Imo thats way overdone, I could be wrong but I’d lean toss. 

You might be right but which model has it correct right now ? Probably none of them but we will find out soon enough

Local Weather has my area with "MODERATE" snow accumulation Monday night,,,,, they are not posting any numbers YET

I grew up in Brooklyn and I have been to both Central Park and ( I saw Simon and Garfunkel and quite a few others there but I stray ) Prospect park many times and here is my advice if you plan on visiting either one of these beautiful, cultural, historical, lovely places = Do NOT Go to either one at Night and do NOT walk barefoot as you might step in something that did NOT come out of a dog in other news it is currently 27 degrees in New City 

10 minutes ago, LibertyBell said:

If we could get a separate set of equipment to measure weather info at Prospect Park that would be awesome, I've been going there since I was 5....I used to play frisbee there with my Dad!

Anthony / MJO loves the snow and he still lives in Bklyn so maybe he will do us a solid and Skitch on over to prospect park on snowy days with his yardstick in hand ?  Just a thought 

truly unchartered waters this winter as we actually have something to track and do model comparisons on,,,,feel as though I just saw a Bigfoot

1 hour ago, Nibor said:

Flurries/light snow Edgewater, NJ. 

Go have lunch at the River House ( the best Chinese food you might ever eat, I drive there from New City ) in other news = is this snow that I am currently seeing covering my property or are my eyes deceiving me ?

1 hour ago, MJO812 said:

Yes

sign me up

1 hour ago, jm1220 said:

If this winter’s not an F I can’t think of one that possibly could be. Flowers shooting up in mid February and bugs everywhere sitting on generously 1.5” for the season and no real threat to speak of (I don’t consider 2/28 a real threat yet where I am unless by some miracle it trends away from being another crap SWFE). Whatever takes this horse behind the barn and puts it out of its misery sooner, the better. GTFO “Winter” 22-23. 

If the professor were grading this winter on a curve, even taking into consideration the few cold days that we had it would still be an F,,, how about a double F ?

Interesting drive today just north of Liberty ( NY that is ). I drove from Buffalo South and the temps were well above freezing when I began my drive , I dealt with some light rain and the surfaces were wet along the way but a few miles north of Liberty the temp suddenly dropped from 35 to 30  and all that was once wet turned white - even the highway. It was an interesting few miles until I got past Monticello/ Wurtsboro where the temp went back above freezing,,,,heck I even saw some trucks spreading salt a rare site this year

5 hours ago, MJO812 said:

I'm declaring winter over

 

Goodnight

Ant, the phrase " we'll get em next year " NEVER had more meaning as I am right there with you brother. There have been other bad winters but IMO none of those came close to this one especially when we began with such high hopes and expectations = remember in early and mid December we were all talking about a white Christmas ? Seems like a lifetime ago

https://twitter.com/TheChiefNerd/status/1626400083313930240?s=20

6 hours ago, USCG RS said:

 

Inciteful - Yes. But still missing a plethora of things - some of which I believe could provide even further light on the situation. 

1) You had a local Fire Dept, ill-equipped to handle an actual Haz Mat Emergency. While all FDs are trained on Hazmat, etc.. the smaller the Dept, the less training you have for a major Haz Mat incident. Even Class 1 (ISO Class) Depts are many times ill prepared to handle the immediate aftermath of a Haz Mat incident of this scope. The immediate responding FD/EMS/PD was from a town of 5K persons with -I believe- an all-volunteer Dept. These volunteers work other jobs for a living and dedicate their time to assist the community. As such, they are rarely trained to handle anything outside of a "routine" emergency (Ie - House Fire, Motor Vehicle Accident/Crash, Medical, Etc). Compound that with the fact that this small Dept likely has little in the way of funding for these types of emergencies and well - You're crippled out of the gate. 

2) All emergencies are Inherently local. This is what is taught -and I believe to be true - in the National Response Framework (NRF), which are the guidelines provided to all local Emergency Managers for how to react to all Emergencies. So how does this affect East Palestine, Ohio? 2 Ways. First, we already discussed that the responding Dept is ill equipped and funded for this type of emergency. Secondly, the NRF would then provide a manner in which to scale up the Response. So, the Incident Commander (IC) -Sometimes a Unified Commander (UC) depending on the set up of the response- has to quickly determine the nature of the incident and how to properly scale; Ie what is needed to scale. In this case, you would need to ascertain the scope of the Incident, what is the cause of the fire, how you are going to need to respond to the fire and what other hazards are around. A seasoned IC can relatively quickly ascertain this, however, you have a unique situation (Serious HazMat) with a likely skeleton crew (Volunteers who have to respond during working hours) with a crew that may or may not have ever even been trained for this type of incident (and by training - I mean actual training, not mandated slide training). Therefore, the IC is at an immediate disadvantage and is incredibly outmatched with regards to resources needed. So, we scale up. The closest ISO 2 dept (ISO is 1-10, with 1 being the best and most ready to respond - 2 is a pretty good ISO) is Youngstown, approximately 20 miles away. Then you have Pittsburgh (ISO-1) about 50 miles away and Cleveland (ISO-2) about 85 miles away. This leads to my next point;

3) The Depts listed above are well funded and equipped to handle these types of incidents (or as well as a local FD can be), however you have several issues. First, it is going to take time to mobilize these units. Dispatch has to liaison with these Depts and explain the situation. Assuming there are Mutual Aid Contracts in place, the process is somewhat streamlined. Without these contracts (50/50 chance), the process becomes further complicated. No contract means no formalized manner in which the mutual aid unit responds, no promise of response, and most importantly - the mutual aid Dept may not have a standardized manner in which they can scale themselves up to meet the need of the requesting Dept. However, let us assume that the mutual aid Dept. has an agreement. The mutual aid Dept. is going to have to call in reserves/persons not working. Perhaps, one unit can be immediately spared, however, remember, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Etc, are all busy Depts and they are scheduled to handle their own depts issues -with little wiggle room to spare. Now, most mutual aid agreements are penned based on the idea that a large fire (Non-Hazmat), large Motor Vehicle Crash, etc has occurred. These agreements are not penned with the idea of a multi-state Haz Mat disaster in mind. It is not that this is never thought of, it is simply the fact that a response of this magnitude is going to need a plethora of depts (National, State, Local, Federal & even Private). But I digress, let us pull it back from this Rabbit hole for a minute. Mutual Aids are going to take time. Haz Mat Mutual Aids are going to take longer; and this is not even mentioning the Federal Mutual Aid Response needed. So what happens now? You have an IC on the scene of a nightmare, with very little information, significantly limited resources and a ticking time bomb. Let us go to the next point.

4) Information. Information is scarce when you first pull up. It has likely been dispatched as a train derailment. Beyond that -most likely- the First Responders are gathering the info on their own. So, Responders pull up to a scene. You have a fire and you have a massive derailment. We do not know what chemicals we have, what is burning and how many injured/casualties. First responders are looking for placards, however, they may not even be able to find them at first. Remember, this is a derailment. the placards could be damaged, missing, destroyed, obscured, etc. Then, you have to communicate with the hauling company, which also takes time. What is on this train? How many of the substances are on this train? Etc. Etc. Etc. While the placards - if located- will tell you the substances, it will tell you how much. Likewise, the manifest is on every train. However, again, this is a derailment. Is the conductor alive? Can they reach the cargo manifest? Is it damaged. Heck, is it complete (I have been on many scenes where, well, let's just say humans cut corners and/or make mistakes). Information is scarce. That withstanding, the Thread in question explains very well how the information is obtained and how it works from here with that regard. 

5) Humans are responding. Humans whose family live in the town they are trying to protect. Humans are outmatched, underfunded, overworked, and not even paid. Humans, who are fighting panic. We all become scared and we all fight panic. Panic is not what the movies portray it as - panic is a survival instinct. However, what overcomes panic? Training. Training that is minimal at best. I bring this up not to fault the responders -they are, well.. amazing humans- however, I bring this up because too many Emergency Managers remove this element from the equation. Emotions are running very high and this is going to cause somewhat of a response lag because there is little training to overcome it (specific training for this type of incident), there is little information and their family is in immediate danger. It is not to fault the responders, it is simply a reality that further complicates an already horrific situation.  

So now let's take all of the above information into account. There is a plethora of aspects to this type of event, however, the Thread was addressing why they let it burn. Part of the reason this was allowed to burn was simply due to the fact that resources to fight the fire were not available, information to determine the best course forward was slim and -most importantly- the life of the responders must also be taken into account. First Responders are scarce. We all want to believe that there is an endless supply of emergency personnel, but the truth is that emergency personnel are scarce. The time it takes to train these personnel is intensive and it takes even longer to season a responder. As such, Emergency Personnel lives are taken into account -or should be- in all responses.

The main reason, however, was there was simply no other choice. The population likes to believe that all emergencies can be tamed and brought under control with the proper resources. Likewise, the population tends to believe that resources for handling emergencies are unlimited. Neither of these assumptions are even remotely true. The truth is -sometimes- you have to make very tough decisions. Tough decisions such as sacrifice a 500M radius area to save a mile radius area. Sometimes these decisions are simply due to a lack of resources. Sometimes it is due to the fact that the nature of the emergency was simply too damaging. 

Either way, the full scope of this disaster is not even close to being understood.

 

 

RS, thanks for your input it's appreciated,,,,,5 days after this derailment occurred  ( if not sooner ) officials were telling and encouraging residents " it's ok to return home " = insanity. It has been almost 2 weeks and those people in Ohio are being lied to.

4 hours ago, LibertyBell said:

Thats an awesome thread I read it to the end and when he concluded about the government and media response leaving a lot to be desired

agreed, it was very insightful thats why I shared it

Liberty and others this is the best analysis thus far that I have seen on what has taken place in Ohio well worth the time to read

https://twitter.com/rycunni/status/1625290671799033856?s=20

14 hours ago, LibertyBell said:

When those regulations got rolled back that rail company saved 2 billion dollars-- hopefully they lose more than that in lawsuits.

Liberty, as was the case with many other stories it took the media over a week to report on this just as they have not reported on so many other things. Hopefully they are ALL held accountable. In other news this winter sucks on so many levels

On 2/13/2023 at 6:26 PM, Will - Rutgers said:

idk who would dare attack ohio but i trust the military will pay them back dearly

Norfolk Southern, whose top shareholders incl. BlackRock & Vanguard, told the gov’t how they wanted this disaster handled = This is something to think about long and hard
 

This winter sucks ass,,,,,,enjoy Spring today and Thursday folks unreal

On 2/7/2023 at 4:14 AM, LibertyBell said:

So he is our local groundhog?

 

could be that he is this guy 

43 minutes ago, Brian5671 said:

Brian you are aware that I posted that 3 days ago when that was exactly what the GFS and my local forecast showed,,right ?

my local forecast along with the GFS is showing rain and snow for New City next Friday and Saturday 

3 hours ago, LongBeachSurfFreak said:

I’m going to say this now, the futility record goes down in flames in March. As much as I would like to forget this non winter and move on to spring there are storms on the way and one if not more will produce 

your keyboard to Mother Natures ears,,,the only thing is ( for snow lovers  ) March snow is gone a day later but after enduring this winter I will gladly take any snowstorm even a March snowstorm

was 8 now 9 in New City

2 hours ago, Stormlover74 said:

Yep we'll never see a complete shutout

We might not see a complete shutout but it literally feels like a no hitter