tamarack

Yesterday the GYX 90%-most likely-10% for Farmington was 0-1-4. This morning it's 2-4-12. Slight change. Actual forecast is 3-6, so maybe we can finally get a 1"+ event this month. Not quite what was happening last year on this date, but decent. Nice cold ground (low was 14°) so accum shouldn't be an issue (unless it's only S-- and doesn't start until afternoon).

Catpaws became mostly snow about 11:45, began to stick about 12:10, an inch new 45 minutes later. Pretty, but the solid echoes are nearly past our location.

Just mid-30s catpaws here, especially going over the hill to the west. In other news, the ice jam at Farmington Falls has cleared.

Latitude month - useless cold for SNE, 30"+ in the Maine foothills. Pack reached 43" on 3/20/14, 2nd latest we've reached 40" here. It's been awhile, but I've gotten pizza there a few times. It was the real NY/North End style pizza that I love. Not the doughy Greek bullshit that many pizzerias serve. Worked 3 years at a pizza shop in BGR 1973-75; owner was a 2nd-gen Neapolitan-American from Brooklyn so we made the real deal (though I mostly built Italians, rarely pounded dough). Manager of Pizza Hut would come to Napoli's when he wanted good stuff.

Canada geese in the field and on the "goose puddle" (refilled by yesterday's ice jam on the Sandy) along Rt 2 here. They must've decided that spring has sprung, flying a couple hundred miles of night-time travel, gambling that there will be food available where they land. Deep blue sky here after the low 20s morning.

>2 feet in NYC, <2" for the Maine foothills - that worked for Feb 2006. Chances for a repeat in late March 2025: 0.001%.

I thought I'd never see another month as awful as that one. The 8-week stretch of summer 2009 that had just 7 days without rain came close, but in our neighborhood, June 2023 at least tied with May 2005 for horribleness. Not as abnormally cold, but only 4 days without rain and a mere 20% of available sunshine, easily the lowest of any month I've recorded here.

Midlevel warmth spoiled it up here. Started with 7" powder then 3" IP from 1.1" LE at temp in upper teens, capped with some ZR. Total LE was 1.92", an 18-20" potential turned to 7.5".

Things started off great, with 8" Thanksgiving night and 9.3" on Dec 5, the two biggest snows of the season. We had recorded 24" by Dec 10. From then on, it has been a bunch of itty-bitties, other than the Feb 16-17 event which matched the T-Day's 8". We've had only 2 warned storms, tied with 2015-16 for the fewest; median WSW is 6. (Dec 5 was an overperformer, forecast was 3-6.)

At 65.0" here. Annual average is 89", YTD is 77" so we're a foot shy of the 3/17 cumulative. There's no 22" dump around the corner, like last March, but another 6" gets us to 80%.

The duration of snow cover in SNE/CNE? Still 8" pack this morning though it's hurting. Last year on 3/17 we were down to patches. Who knew that 23-24 would have that 3-storm 40"+ Hail Mary after the equinox?

Chickadees are calling spring's "phee-bee" rather than winter's "chick-a-dee-dee". Low clouds gone, mid-morn, full blue now.

Touched 50 yesterday, first time since mid November. Despite the full sun, that warmth only dropped the pack from 13" to 12". Low rh might've limited the melt and that solid pack easily carries our 45-lb Lab mix. Found depths 8" to 20" in the woods near our road while adding a medium-size white ash to the firewood supply.

That would be impressive. I'm at +2 but that's using my personal averages which began in May of 1998. If I'd had 1991-2020 norms at my site, the departure likely would've been +3 or +4. Nowhere near +7. Of course, we still have 12" on our lawn and 12-18" in the hardwood stands.

Only one (non-official) site with a short POR here - 5/98 onward, but the average max has barely moved while the min has climbed quite a bit. 10-year averages: Period - MAX MIN 1999-2008 52.6 30.4 2015-2024 52.7 31.9 1.5° in 16 years for lows, 0.8° for means - I'd call that significant. (SSS, of course)

5° AN here after the cold on 3/1-4, but I'd not call it "impressive" - only one day was 10+ AN. Might get some +15 days with the upcoming rain, however. GYX has been cautioning about ice jams. The Sandy jammed briefly in early Dec then the 2" RA cleared it. Re-jammed later that month, from just upriver from the New Sharon bridge to 1/4 mile upstream from the new bridge in Farmington Falls, about 5 river miles. Ice is probably being bottom-reduced a bit by river flow after the rain on 3/6.

Meaning that the only way humans can stop polluting is to die, preferably near the south pole so our rotting corpses don't return that CO2 into the air. As posted above, we are stewards of the planet, not the owners. "Moreover it is required in stewards, that a man be found faithful."

April 1982 is one of the 2 most powerful snowstorms I've experienced, even though its 17" total isn't in my top 20 for depth - the timing and the 60 mph gusts put it in with Feb 1961

More than rival. I've been in Maine for 52 years and haven't seen a storm very close to your top two. Lots more 8"+ events here and deeper/longer pack, but not the superbombs.

That 1983-84 winter included the only times in our Fort Kent days that school was closed due to snow, 1.5 days in 10 years. The Feb surprise cost a full day as the 1-3" forecast meant that the plow folks slept thru the 18" in 9 hours, waking up to a morning's worth of parking lot clearing. The March bomb started overnight with about 6" new by sunrise and another 6" forecast, so the buses ran. By late morning snow was falling at 3"/hour with radar showing lots more to come, so students re-entered the buses at noon. The 30 miles to Allagash has few hills but the 25 miles to Winterville has some notable climbs. Everyone got home okay as 2 feet plus accumulated. (CAR had 29.0", their biggest at the time.) The school superintendent lived next to the high school and folks figured that was why school was never closed. He said that was incorrect; he'd send his German shepherd out to get the morning paper. If she made it to the box, there would be school, even if he had to help her back to the house.

Those 3 weren't huge snowstorms, just powerful coastals. The season's big snows came March 23-24 and April 4-6, without much wind damage. Dec 18 was flooding rain (no snow) and destructive wind - possibly the 2nd greatest flood on record for the Kennebec watershed (after 1987) and longer power outage than I had in the 1998 ice storm, along with major wind damage to our woodlot. I had 9" on Jan 10 but the inch of rain atop made such a mess that for the first time ever, I paid to have my driveway plowed. Very high tides caused damage on the coast. Blower would jam every 4-5 feet, so I spared the machine. Jan 13 was similar though only 3.8" snow and record high tides that produced far more wreckage than the 10th.

True. Once one gets away from the coast, March is a winter month for NNE. (Especially the first half)

29.3" last March, with 22" in one dump on 3/23-24. Looks to be way BN this March (avg is 17.4" but 4 of 26 Marches had <4") unless something changes.

Last winter had the storms. The 3 events, 12/18, 1/10 and 1/13 were far more powerful than anything that has come our way this winter.

1983-84 in Fort Kent had 'only' 171" but the pack depth and SWE were enormous. Total precip Nov-Mar was over 25" and most was frozen. A significant IP/ZR event in mid-Dec produced a 3" crust (1.9" water) that would carry a bull moose. The 18.5" surprise (forecast was 1-3) in early Feb had the pack at 61" on the morning of 2/6 but 4 days of 25° AN chopped it to 37" by 2/16. On March 14-15 we had 26.5" that pushed the depth to 65" - 80" in the northern tip of Maine - with 16" SWE at home and probably near 20" on Big Twenty Twp. (Both that storm and that pack are the tallest I've experienced.) Then April was dry with many warm days after frosty nights, and all that water made it safely down the St. John.