ORH_wxman

Probably '99-'00. I think before that it was '88-'89. edit: actually I'm not sure what you are asking. If you are asking when was the last time that one SNE station failed to get 8", then it was probably '09-'10 at BDL.

Took this one on Feb 7th....we actually added 3-4" to this the next morning. That was the high point of the season the next morning when we had about 38" on the ground. In this pic, we had about 34" on level ground.

We lost snow in the open areas by mid March but the woods held onto snow pack until mid April. But if you were doing it by "official" guidelines, then we were down to nothing by mid-March. Those two huge torching rainstorms killed us. I still had over 20" on March 1st.

Yeah and he didn't get the good surprise either than Phil got on Jan 8th. The one where he had like a trace and Phil had 5"+. Than 10 miles NW everyone got 2-3".

Eventually we'll have another '04-05 where Phil's snow pack is twice that of Kevin's like it was that winter.

That was a great storm down there. A huge bust in the positive direction. I don't even think more than 3" was forecasted anywhere down there 6 hours before the storm. Even Plymouth county got whacked pretty hard with warning criteria.

That event sort of turned the worm for us last winter. We had blown a couple of golden chances...and we thought we were going to completely miss that one too but we ended up getting a surprise 2-5" snowfall over those 2-3 days...enough to give us a White Christmas when it was looking bleak. Once we had that positive bust, we managed to go on quite a roll right through early February.

Yeah they got like 25-30" out that way with more on the spine in 1/12. 1/12 was the best storm for our region as a whole. 1/27 though was really cool, it had some extremely intense snowfall rates for a few hours. 12/26 was a bit disappointing though I can't complain overall since I still got 12" in that storm...many others had single digits.

I think you had to go more out near the NY border to get the good stuff in W MA. That dryslot even got Mt. MRG. ...FRANKLIN COUNTY... HEATH 8.0 339 PM 12/27 TRAINED SPOTTER CHARLEMONT 7.0 1100 AM 12/27 TRAINED SPOTTER WHATELY 4.5 132 PM 12/27 TRAINED SPOTTER ...HAMPDEN COUNTY... BLANDFORD 9.5 812 AM 12/27 HAM RADIO WESTFIELD 6.8 200 PM 12/27 MEDIA SOUTHWICK 6.8 847 AM 12/28 EAST LONGMEADOW 6.5 830 PM 12/27 HAM RADIO CHICOPEE 5.3 811 PM 12/27 HAM RADIO WEST SPRINGFIELD 5.0 829 PM 12/27 HAM RADIO AMHERST 3.0 839 PM 12/26 HAM RADIO AGAWAM 2.8 756 PM 12/26 HAM RADIO SPRINGFIELD 2.8 737 PM 12/26 HAM RADIO ...HAMPSHIRE COUNTY... PLAINFIELD 12.5 235 PM 12/27 TRAINED SPOTTER CHESTERFIELD 7.5 727 AM 12/27 HAM RADIO WORTHINGTON 6.0 1045 PM 12/26 SPOTTER WESTHAMPTON 6.0 1100 AM 12/27 AMHERST 5.5 1210 PM 12/27 GENERAL PUBLIC GRANBY 5.0 1115 AM 12/27 EMERGENCY MANAGER WARE 4.1 828 PM 12/27 HAM RADIO

12/26 had a broader circulation than the other two which hurt us I think. Also having it be further west hurt...and developing a little bit too soon. BOS was hammered by the CF enhancement though in that one so ironically it was their best storm despite that one having us in the least favorable mid-level location.

You can see how compact the mid-level centers were....and we knew that based on their track that any dryslot would have a very hard time penetrating far past the south coast. You could clearly see it get swallowed up very quickly on this series of radar loops. I remember not being worried about it at all but some were freaking out, lol.

That 500mb pattern is awesome. The vortmax strength was the highest I had seen in a winter storm since 12/9/05.

Right they have to check the building construction too. That's what led to the controversy over the Worcester tornado in 1953 (I started a thread on it in the NE subforum). If the building codes are in question, then what looks like F5 damage might not necessarily be. Healthy trees being snapped off fairly relatively low on the trunk tends to be a good indicator too.

Agreed, but this is not a surprise. I think most people would see that. We are driven mostly by curiosity. Its great to try and save lives...and that is a big plus with severe storm research....but in the end, its kind of a fake line. Tornadoes are cool, quite interesting, and relatively little is known about them, so people study them. But potentially saving lives is a nice addition to that field. I will potentially save lives by forecasting a snowstorm more accurately and trying to advance the techniques of forecasting them, but I was interested in the field because I love the power of snowstorms and like heavy snow rates. I think people should go after what they are interested in. We aren't long on this earth, so go for it.

You are a lot more noble than I am to humanity. I went into meteorology (and stuck with it) because I love snowflakes piling up at a rapid pace. I will admit for the purpose of this thread that meteorology is not the majority of my income though.

Here is my detailed recount of the March 4-6, 2001debacle. There's a lot of "stories" behind it. First off, almost all guidance was going for a monster Mid-Atlantic HECS about 96-108 hours out. Back then the time range beyond 96h meant very little...but models actually did have it further out than that. Only a few model went further. The UKMET, ECMWF and the MRF (the extension of the AVN which is now the GFS all in one package) all called for it. By the time we got to 84 hours out, all models showed it still...basically 2-4 feet for DC-NYC with Boston getting fringed....except the old ETA-x....the old ETA went to 60 hours, but the "ETA-x" was the ETA to 84h which eventually became the NAM (run under the ETA) to 84 hours but is now run under the WRF and not the ETA anymore...ETA has been retired from operational use, only used in the SREF now. That run of the ETA-x had the storm much further north and crushing New England while limiting the snow in the Mid-Atlantic. I believe this was Friday at 12z. Nobody took it seriously as it was the ETA extended beyond its already 60h limit. The next run at 00z Friday night, the ETA-x showed it again, but the other models held serve....the ECMWF didn't run at 00z back then...only at 12z, so its solution was non-existent. It was the best model back then too like recent years. We were now at 72h out or closer. The 12z runs came out on Saturday morning and they shifted north, limiting the snow for DC (probably from 2-3 feet to about 1-2 feet), but from Wilmington DE northward it was still monstrous except the UKMET shifted slightly north of that, to Philly and northward. A little side note. The AVN had performed absolutely brilliantly in the other big east coast storm on December 30, 2000 and also on the December 3, 2000 North Carolina/Virginia bust. The ETA hadbeen way too bullish and far west in both events while the AVN schooled it. So a lot of attention and credence was being given the AVN. That was a big factor in the forecast IMHO. After those Saturday morning runs at 12z (while the ETA showed a huge hit north again at 48-60h now in the operational run)...the forecast was still for a monster M.A. hit. The 12z ECMWF wouldn't come out until around 8pm that evening. It used to come around at that time back then. As 8pm rolled around, the ECMWF all of the sudden jumped way north and agreed with the ETA solution. But most forecasters disregarded it as it had been pretty steadfast before (maybe a burp run?) and the AVN was holding really steady and it had done so well on East Coast storms that winter. By Saturday night, the GGEM started to go north, the AVN held serve once again (having been the model of choice all winter), the ETA went north again taking Philly and nearly NYC out of the huge snow and hammering New England/Boston with a storm like Feb 1978. UKMET I don't recall what happened, but I know the forecast stuck close to the AVN. Again there was no 00z ECMWF run back then. Only 12z. By 12z Sunday morning just 24h before the event, the AVN once again gave a monster hit to the mid-atlantic except it shifted a bit north...it was mostly Philly northward. The ETA gave New England a huge HECS again, the GGEM finally went well north...and so did the UKMET. The ECMWF would have to wait until 8pm as usual. Most forecaster were trusting the AVN because it had served them well that winter after the obscene ETA busts and the AVN had nailed two major east coast storms. When 8pm came in, the writing was on the wall if there was any doubt left. It was way north and took Philly and possibly even NYC out fo the big snows, though NYC was still on the line. The forecasts started being revived when the 00z AVN came in late that Sunday night and it finally jumped north, but still not far enough....it still gave big snows to Philly (but not historic totals) and historic totals to NYC. I think this is when most operational forecasters knew something was terribly wrong. You have to remember it was so hard to trust any model that winter and the AVN was the best until that point. That was the first storm that I recall Dave Tolleris (whether you like him or not) came up with the old "EE rule"...when the ETA and ECMWF (both start with "E") agree, you don't go against them. I was lurking on ne.weather back then. When the EC came north to agree with the ETA back on Saturday, he said the M.A. was cooked and got a lot of crap for it on the boards as you can imagine. That's just my personal recollection of all of that storm. I don't claim for all of it to be 100% accurate, but I usually remember things very vividly, so I think at least most of it is right. There was a lot of controversy and talk amongst the weather people both on ne.weather and the NWS back then. It ended up being a huge interior New England and NY State HECS. Even the models at the last second kind of busted at Boston...only getting 10" while they were forecasted for double that...but the suburbs got all the snow. Very incredible storm both from a forecasting standpoint and also as a student observer back then when I first learning a lot of the intricacies of forecasting and models.

You probably got similar to what I did in 2009. It was a drier snow and no elevation dependency.

Oh wow, I didn't even catch the year...I was thinking of 1/18/10...not 1/18/09....but yeah 1/18/09 did produce two separate storms too....they were pretty good. In the 2009 events, I totaled 11" I think....in the 2010 MLK 2 punch setup, I totaled a bit shy of 8". Amazing that the dates matched up exactly.

http://www.meteo.psu.edu/~gadomski/NARR/2010/us0118.php

That was the MLK event.,..but it was actually 2 events listed on 2 separate PNS reports....you probably had like 9" total or so (6" from event #1) . I had around 7-8" total.

It wasn't pure OES but there was definite ocean enchancement....the norlun trough of February 19, 1993....it hit Chatham with 20" of snow...and most of the Cape had over a foot.

We have a lot to relive in this thread since 1992....starting with that Dec '92 storm. We've certainly been in a good streak for great events. Though I would say maybe we are starting to get due for another one. We really haven't had an amazing winter event since 12/9/05. We had some fun events in '07-'08 and '08-'09...but nothing truly remarkable unless you lived where I was and the rest of the relatively small area that was absolutely demolished in the December 2008 ice storm.

Indeed he is, already made a few posts. http://www.americanwx.com/bb/index.php?/user/904-typhoon-tip/