Kmlwx

I know we all love to say it - but can you imagine if this QPF firehose was entirely snow. Man...it would be snowing cats and dogs...

I only have some limited video with a very bad quality camcorder I took during the Feb 2007 storm. But this is wild the amount of sleet pouring out of the sky. At my high of the day at 22.5 and it's been creeping up. I am NOT expecting to touch/exceed 32 but still worth monitoring. Let's hope this stays IP and doesn't go to ZR... Crazy stuff out there - even if it wasn't a "clean" snowstorm for us - the science nerd in me is fascinated by this type of storm. It's rare! Usually sleet is just a stop in the transition to rain for us. Seldom do we just dump sleet for hours on end like this. Arctic airmass doing arctic airmass things!

The amount of sleet between shoveling sessions is pretty incredible. Good workout if nothing else....

At my high of the day in Colesville (19.9 degrees) - still major sleet falling.

Radar looking a bit more splotchy recently. Definitely a sleet bomb out there for sure.

Plenty of time for it to be in Chicago by later in the week!

Precip hitting the side of the house sounds like pop rocks/rice krispies. We haven't had a sleet bomb in a while so I'm down for this. Hopefully we can avoid it going to ZR. Although...this week is going to be hell at work so I would be totally fine with a full week closure (which is really just WFH).

I eyeballed 5-6 inches around when it flipped. Surprised you only got that much! Maybe compacting? I was up around 5:45 when it looked like 4-5.

Pinging away here in Colesville, MD

Just radar in general. It may very well be sleeting at those locations that show it - but it's just a word of caution that the radar beam is not moving horizontal to the ground across its entire journey. It doesn't *always* reflect ground truth. It's only one of many reasons why radar meteorology is challenging!

Seems people forget that the radar beam rises in elevation as it gets farther away from the radome. Hence the donut appearance in winter weather events - and also subsequently why low level rotation for tornadoes can get missed in radar sparse zones away from the radar. The beam height near Winchester is over 2500ft. Once you get out to Delray, WV it's almost 5000ft!

He's an emergency manager so I trust him. He may have the info before it hits most outlets.

Also not to rag a on a local met - but Doug K is not known for being the spitting image of 100% reliable

Sleet is included in snow totals in obs/climate reports. That product is freezing rain accretion.

February 2006 and and 2007 were pretty memorable for specific reasons.

Adding as well that we have to remember DC/Baltimore aren't traditionally "snow towns" - sure we go on runs but the trick is to set expectations in check. Enjoy the snow falling as much as you can - and you'll find that going from a 12 inch storm to a 6 inch storm doesn't hurt nearly as much. Life is just too short to hand wring when we just aren't a snow region.

Nope - I feel pretty locked in to a 5+ inch storm which while would be "disappointing" I love to see snow fall and I love tracking. My NFL team lost in humiliating fashion this year and my other hobby (plane spotting) has a super low success rate outside of airshows too. I'm looking forward to seeing flakes falling and a nice blanket of snow. Since the upper end of this in MBY is not a true HECS (2ft+) while more snow is always better - I'm fundamentally treating this as though I'll be happy with 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, (you get the point) inches. I actually think it would be cool to encase it in sleet too. But cold powder is fine too. I just want it to snow more than an inch or two. I think that's essentially a lock in MBY.

Ya'll are so predictable...just saying

And some of it ends up being because in the biggest snowstorms, snow is pushed into school parking lots. Not excusing "needless" closures by any means - but I know that was a major thing after the 2010 storms.

TEAL74 flight (Recon) is airborne and feet wet off the west coast for their mission.

"At least it's not hour 300+" But that would be a wild progression. Imagine this weekend's storm, icebox cold, a 1-2 inch refresher or cartopper on Thursday and then a deform beatdown the following weekend.

I think you are right - though we haven't necessarily done that in a while. And there will always be those that just ignore the separated threads anyway. Every now and then I think some folks on here want to treat it more as a fast-paced Discord server rather than a message board/forum.

"The trend is really alarming for MBY" "Hate to see this" "It's trending so bad for MBY"

This is incredibly eloquent and well-written. As always, @North Balti Zen - great post! I think @bncho's ceiling is certainly so much higher than folks like me - just gotta get past the "growing pains" part of an AmericanWx user/weather enthusiast

Also I think people underestimate how much time the younger folks have in HS/college to spend on the forums - again....that was me in the past. I can barely stay up past 9pm anymore....and having a full time+ job takes up all other time. I'll never forget being weenie tagged on Eastern. Put me in my place REAL quick.