ORH_wxman

Lack of precip this month has also helped keep it above normal....we almost always have an ugly onshore linger low that keeps us in the 50s a few days....haven't had anything close to that this month.

Yeah I'm a huge fan of December snow....which is why I couldn't rank last season an F. We had pack here for like 27 out of 31 days and 27" total. That is an excellent month. Would have been better without that hideous cutter around 12/8-12/9 but at least we refreshed right after that with a 5-6 incher. I'm still waiting for a Dec 1995 though....basically where we run the table in December. Those are hard to get. All of our recent good Decembers that had big events before Xmas had black marks on them....2007, 2008, 2013, 2017, 2019...2009 was ok, but even that had the ugly cutter right after Xmas. Latitude is really important in December though....moreso than other winter months including March.

Nice. Yeah your spot is gonna have a crazy gradient from just a few miles away. You’ll even have quite a bit more than Gorham center I’d bet on many days. Berlin is a pit for snow...they might literally average half your snowfall. Prob 80-90ish but it increases quickly heading south.

The microclimate extremes didn’t occur to me until I was much older in college. I sort of knew about them in high school in my own area but I still assumed a place like BTV was far superior to the ORH hills for snow until I started driving up there sometimes during winter. There were a number of times they had bare ground or very very thin cover when I left N ORH with 6”+ OTG. That’s when I realized the retention aspect there was pretty weak because I knew they averaged about 10” more per season. Then I’d drive east into the mountains and the snow would go from almost nothing in Williston or western Richmond to being totally buried within a few miles. It was crazy. I didn’t realize microclimate gradients like that were common there.

I'm also wondering if we're finally going to change the PAC up a bit....all that heat in the eastern PAC to the north of ENSO region (like off coast of Baja and CA) is eroding more than most recent years. Still not there yet, but something to track

Owners of clorox stock?

Maybe Leominster if things go right? I feel like Gardner has no shot with their elevation. Were only like +17 or so at 850. Tough for anyone outside the real torch areas to hit 90 with those ML temps.

Yeah I’d be surprised if he was below 165-170” if we assume the current cocorahs site’s roughly 185” average is accurate based on 11 years of data (a dubious assumption)....though maybe it depends where on his property...lol. It seems like that plot of land goes from like 1575 feet near the entrance down to below 1375 at the far end toward rt 2. I think the house is around 1500? Nice. Hopefully you pull a -30 in one of the really big arctic outbreaks we get once every few years. I’d bet there’s some diamond dust fairly frequently in that area. One of my favorite phenomena.

Warmest it gets at 850 is +18C...and some models struggle to get above +16....plus SSW flow. I'd bet against much over 90F in eastern areas unless we trend a little warmer aloft or more WSW at the sfc. BDL can put up a 95 though with those numbers....they'll cook at least excuse imaginable. NNE gets near +20 at 850 so you're gonna see big numbers again up there. CAR might be the warmest in NE on Thursday, lol.

Make sure you get a thermometer set up there. The local Cocorahs doesn't do temps....I'd be curious to see how low you can go in the elevated valley between those 3k peaks to your north and the Presidentials to your south.

Time to bump the sea ice tracking for 2020....we're coming off last year's top 3 finish for both area (3rd lowest) and extent (2nd lowest). 2020 is off to a slower start than 2019 was, so it will need to catch up some more to get into contention. 2020 started off fast in May with extensive meltponding (most on record), but that trend reversed near the end of the month and early June when extensive refreezing of melt ponds caused the area to stall. We've been falling faster again recently. For those who follow this thread regularly, you know I like to track NSIDC area in late June because it is the most accurate predictor of minimum area/extent later in the season. Here is where we currently stand on area vs other years (i.e. 2019 had 250k less area than this year on this date) 2019: -250k 2018: +300k 2017: +230k 2016: -150k 2015: +90k 2014: +340k 2013: +390k 2012: -600k 2011: +120k 2010: +150k 2009: +860k 2008: +410k 2007: +10k As you can see, we're running somewhat low in the post-2007 world, but not as low as several years. You'll also note that some years like 2011 which finished very low were not standing out yet. There is still time for things to change in either direction which is why I usually start tracking closely in mid-June through the end of the month when I make a prediction based on the month-end values. There is currently a hostile pattern over the arctic for the ice which is aiding some big numbers right now, but the forecast looks to go toward a reverse dipole pattern by the end of the week and stay there all of the next week if ensemble guidance is correct....so that would likely slow down the losses. I'll update this tracker every few days until month-end....probably doing daily updates in a final few days of the month.

Yeah SDD captures the tenor of the season in terms of retention much better than max depth. Max depth is a crude way to look at it but SDD is a more complete picture.

67.5 here right now...it's actually cooler than ORH to my west....ocean influencing the eastern temps for sure.

Yeah the raw snow total was excellent at Randolph this year but the max snow depth was a little on the low side. Here are the max snow depths and total snowfall for each winter at the current site (which is right near Phineas...about 200 feet up the hill and a mile or less away)...I'm actually surprised at how "low" the max depth in 2010-2011 was...that was not a warm winter like this one was and it had an extra 34 inches of snow.

Didn't see a thread yet for next winter. We're getting past the "spring barrier" for ENSO forecasts....which means we're emerging into a clearer picture of what it will look like in that region going into fall. There isstill uncertainty, but it is reduced compared to a few weeks ago. We're currently looking like we will be heading into La Nina after a weak El Nino. Here's the latest ECWMF and C3S (used to be EuroSIP) plots: They are pointing toward weak El Nino by fall....we'll see if that develops further into a moderate/stronger forecast as summer wears on. There are some very cold anomalies in the eastern region at depth, so it's possible that it could translate into something more than a weak Nina if we start getting easterly feedback. Anyway, there is precedent for La Nina winters following a weak El Nino....most recent examples are: 2007-2008 2005-2006 1995-1996 1970-1971 3 of those 4 years were pretty strong winters in New England. The outlier was 2005-2006, though all 4 had big Decembers. The QBO looks to be going negative (though it's not in a hurry at the moment)....that would make '07-'08, '05-'06 and '70-'71 the best matches. '70-'71 and '07-'08 were pretty potent La Ninas (both high-end moderate or borderline strong) while '05-'06 was not. It remains to be seen where this one is headed. There is evidence in both directions. I'm kind of leaning moderate at the moment with the big subsurface anomalies and the model guidance already going solidly weak Nina....I feel like the guidance tends to underestimate the strength historically.

Reminiscent of the post-2/4/95 lack of snow. I think we had a total of like 1.5" of snow that year after the storm on 2/4. This year, we had a little more but they were little 1-2" jobs before the 4/19 storm. Maybe that means December 1995 is en-route. We're going into La Nina too.....

Jan-Mar was about as bad as it gets. Maybe 1955 matches it. I'd probably rank it an F if I was where you are since the coast didn't get as much benefit from the December snows. I wanted to rank it an F here, but I couldn't with 27" in December.

Friday seems like the least likely day to have onshore flow issues.

90s can shove it....much rather have 68 than 90-95. I'll be ok with 80-85 though.

The December here keeps me from giving the season an F. Hard to be a total failure when we get like 27” of snow that month plus a white Xmas. But still a solid D.

Euro looks like a Tip screen door special for eastern areas next Saturday. Scooter throwing furniture in his basement while it’s 90 at BDL.

68F right now. Feels amazing. Doing yard work today and this is perfect.

Got down to 49 here. Perfect sleeping weather. Had the window open.

The pattern is clearly getting to Kevin. It’s just not SNE’s month for big heat despite some teases in the medium range. NNE has been getting it and it looks like it goes over the top again later next week and then ensembles show troughiness moving back in. Maybe we get some big heat in July. There’s some signs that July could be pretty hot.

Lets get some flakes up there down to the base.