OrdIowPitMsp

Woke up to a dusting at home, the airport recorded 0.1" a mile to my south. Completely dry at work 10-ish miles north in White Bear Lake. Southern burbs received 1-2" and the I-90 Albert-Lea - Rochester corridor wins again with 3-5" totals. Pretty cool driving through the gradient today.

High of 32F at the airport today.

Down to 19F this morning, coldest of the season.

Bottomed out at 21.7F at the PWS this morning

We are flying into Auckland, spending a couple days in that area (coromandel peninsula, city center ect...), then heading to Rotorua and Taupo. We are both avid outdoors-people, and will be hiking the northern circuit of Tongariro National Park and tent camping on an active volcano. Driving south from there we plan on checking out some of the wineries around Hasting/Napier, then spending a day in Wellington before hopping on the ferry to the south island. Plan on doing a trip to Tasman National Park for the beaches, and maybe stop over in Marlbourgh. Christchurch is probably where we will spend New Years as we currently have a hotel reserved, and from there drive over the Arthurs Pass region and doing short hikes along the way to Greysmouth. Currently looking at booking a helicopter tour of Franz Joseph or Fox glaciers, there are mountain huts only accessible by helicopter right on the edge of the glaciers that we are looking at spending a night at as well. From there we plan to drive and hike around the Haast pass region, and Fiordland National Park for some more camping, then end our trip with couple days in and around Queenstown, before flying back to the states. Our south island itinerary is less set in stone, as we are still putting things together, but that is a general idea. Definitely want to try and squeeze in penguins in Dunedin if possible. I've seen wild penguins before but my wife hasn't. What i've learned from planning this trip is New Zealand is an incredible country and our trip is only half as long as it properly needs to be.

Just gonna vent real quick. Getting missed to the south 3 times in October really sucks for a weenie like me. Waiting for climo to even things out but I’m sure that will happen while I’m in New Zealand for my honeymoon Dec 22 - Jan 8 you can lock it in. at least it’s been fun to track something

Coworker lives 50 miles north of the twin cities and said he had about 3” on his car this morning. Flakes mixed imby but nothing accumulated. Duluth got walloped, smashing all time May snowfall records.

KMSP 090359Z 02015G25KT 3SM -SN BR BKN009 OVC016 Switched over to snow in Minneapolis, already 6-7” reports around Duluth.

Lots of people across central Minnesota being caught off guard. Some significant totals possible from Duluth up along the north shore. Good chance we see some flakes in the cities tomorrow morning too. What month is it?

I was about to post in the winter 2018/19 grade thread but I think I’ll keep that on hold thru the weekend......

9.7” from this three day storm now 5th largest April snow event.

I can now add Thundersleet to weather events I’ve expirenced.

Getting a burst of pea sized hail and sleet now. Maybe even some liquid too. Really coming down hard. Edit: NWS issued a special weather statement for a line of strong thunderstorms. Didn’t hear any thunder, but definitely a dynamic system.

8.0” at MSP through 7am.

Measured 6.8” on the deck. Lots of compaction so true total is undoubtedly higher. Roads are a sheet of slush and ice.

4.2" from the first wave. Lull now, should be rip city again by morning. 71.5" season total.

Well things have escalated quickly here. 2” down and easily adding an inch an hour. Good thing I left work early, the roads are snow covered....so much for the April sun.

Snow has started in Minneapolis, definitely going to start sticking soon. No mixing issues yet.

Wagons north. Looks like we’ll get more of a mixed bag of precip here then purely snow. As long as MSP records 2.7” and we get to 70” on the season I’ll be happy.

NWS Chanhassen has issued a Winter Storm Watch for the twin cities. Saying there could be some isolated 20” totals but officially forecasting 7-15” for the area. Could see winds sustained over 30mph snow its gusts over 50mph.

GFS not backing down at all, in fact now showing more widespread 30” totals in southern MN.

Repeat of April 2018?

Torched up to 64 yesterday. Felt incredible and melted off most of the remaining snow in the yard. Still lots of piles and some snowcover in the woods and north facing slopes.

I guess this could go in a few different threads.... here’s some photos of the Cannon River flooding from Welch Village Ski Area on 3/23. This is the highest I’ve seen the river in the 4 years I’ve been skiing here.

What has been described as a “perfect melt” produced the first dirt patches in the yard yesterday. All last week we had sunny days with highs in the mid 40s and lows in the upper 20s which provided a gradual melt. Lots of ponding of water and flooded rivers but worst case scenario has been avoided here.