JustinRP37

Actually it is 10 weeks and 6 days until spring. Winter is sleeping in at this point. Somebody poke her with a stick and get her going. At least get some cold nights so local ski areas can resurface their trails and get to 100% open. Anytime to get to January and you are not 100% open, it is troubling.

To those always wondering why long range forecasters say above average snowfall year in and year out... what do you see on Twitter and click more? A headline that says below average snowfall expected in the Northeast or “Bitter Cold and Snowy Winter for the Northeast Expected”? This is why people have to look at the track record of the person calling for the brutal cold. To us winter sports enthusiasts, this is peak season! One massive storm doesn't make the season! It isn't even cold enough to make snow at night currently in Southern NY and southern New England.

People always confuse me with the obsession of only considering annual snowfall. Annual snowfall means nothing to winter sports enthusiasts if the vast majority of the winter is a torch. We have had quite a few winters that if you look at snowfall, you'd conclude wow that was a cold winter. As a tick biologist, the duration with snow cover is actually much more important for ticks than just having a bunch of snow that melts within a week. Snow acts as an insulator and does provide many ecological benefits. One day I'll organize my snow cover data better for online posting.

The big difference is scientists aren’t forecasting a 100-200 square mile area when they are forecasting the temperature rise. It is very hard to pinpoint weather conditions, but easier to forecast global temperatures. Even though we are cold, much of the globe is still above normal, and that above normal blob is larger than the cold blob. Basically it is easy to say that it will snow somewhere in December than it is to say Central Park will receive 3-6 inches in December 16th, 2018. Scientists can look at species movements and see how the rise in greenhouse gases will change the weather in the future in the general sense.

It was an epic storm and as much as I loved it, I could do without the power grid going down for a month. Because of that storm, I lost one year of my PhD research, but luckily it was in the beginning of my research. Happy to report I am done with that now though. It was an awesome storm. I drove from Tuckahoe, NY to Avon, CT just as it was starting. It was incredible to literally hear the trees just imploding from the weight.

Let’s get the leaves off the trees before hoping for snow. Leaves still pretty green here in the NYC metro. The Halloween storm was so impactful partly because of the leaves on the trees. And let’s not forget that that after that storm the rest of winter sucked.

Why does anyone want MORE rain up here? I'll take frost covered pumpkins in the morning with sunshine all day giving way to a DRY 60s.

Agree. I want to know where it has been 'dry'. When I go for my runs, I have not seen totally try pavement in quite sometime. It is unbelievably damp out even on our 'dry' days. I don't think we have gone more than 72 hours without some rain in quite some time.

No ocean or Great Lake to tap into for moisture. Their cold is a ‘dry’ cold lol.

But we have been setting many a record high low temperature this 'fall'.

Ditto! Some many leaks this year springing up. Both my office and home. Let us all catch up and let us get some vitamin D with the sun! It looks like we will get that drier weather!

We definitely didn’t have snowcover in much of the area from mid-January through February. In fact we were busy in the lab dealing with ticks that were out!

One thing I am worried about is how averages always seem to win out. With so many locations having near record precipitation, when do we fall back into a dry period? There could be a good chance that we flip to cold and dry. We will see...

But we are still getting the heat... Last night set a record high low at LGA. This time of 80s are still well above normal, but people always forget to look at the low temperatures too. Average daily temperatures have been running above normal pretty much all month with a few breaks. A string of average high temperatures does not mean the pattern is average if your low temperatures are well above average.

Yeah if it could just go ahead and stop raining for a bit that would be nice. Our COOP building had never had as many leaks as this year with how hard and wind driven the rain has been. It is literally finding all the crevices to enter the building. Can't wait to move within a year to a bigger place (hopefully without any leaks because this is ridiculous).

I guess you know I'm sleep deprived haha. Snowless summer haha. I know some people would love a snowy summer on here. I need sleep.

Yeah one thing I noticed this year is Long Island was much sunnier than just inland. I had to go to the field station a bunch further upstate and going from the city, I was amazed how different the days were. I would look at beach webcams and what not and it would be clear on the south shore and cloudy upstate. Just impressive dynamics really this summer with those dews.

Thanks! Yeah looking at the cloud cover data it has been pretty impressive for awhile. Hopefully we don’t flip to dry and snowless for summer, but we will see. Even though I do not think I will be able to get out skiing this year (just welcomed my son into the world), I do love a nice bluebird winter day with great snow cover.

Born and raised here... This summer was not typical of this area, sorry to say. Quick look at hours of dews above 70 and cloud cover for the summer will quickly show you this was not a “typical” summer. And as Bluewave pointed out 117 days of measurable precipitation and counting for #1.

I'm hoping that we can finally string together a dry week with much more sun after today. The constant cloudiness is really starting to weigh on people I have noticed. No wonder so many people are vitamin D deficient here haha!

We back!! Withdrawals are over!

Withdrawals are over the site is back!!!

They say patterns can be hard to break. Well this whole rain on the weekends pattern has been one of the most stubborn patterns I can ever remember. I am hoping that fall gives us some nicer weekends. And I swear to God if ANYONE says we could use some rain after a dry week or two... After all those fall leaves are supposed to make a nice crunching sound when you step on them, not turn to a soggy mess!

Here in the NYC region this drier air is taking its sweet time on arriving. Dew point this morning was still above 70 degrees. Down to 69 now, but you know it has been rough when you think 70 DP feels better. However, it looks like Monday we return to 70+DP.

I remember some old school Windows reinstalls could take that long. Where the hell did I put that 3.5 inch floppy disk now?