Roger Smith

Doctor No says maybe.

Any mention on your local news of the emergency situation in eastern Nova Scotia and PEI? People are snowed in by that slow-moving storm last week, with 30-40 inches on the ground. Could be an opportunity for anyone with a plow on their pickup to contract some work as local crews are overwhelmed trying to keep major routes open. Last few days at Sydney, NS (converted to F and in): Date ___ max __ min _____ snow ___ snow depth Feb 2 ___ 32 ___ 28 _____ 3.9 _______ 5" Feb 3 ___ 31 ___ 29 _____ 16.1 _______11" Feb 4 ___ 33 ___ 28 _____14.0 _______28" Feb 5 ___ 33 ___ 32 _____ 4.4 _______41" Feb 6 ___ 33 ___ 29 _____ 0.6 _______42" winds have been N-NNE 25-35 mph so not severely drifted just a level or undulating 3-4 feet. It's an area used to snow and probably 2' cover is not unusual but 3-4 feet is trapping people in their residences.

Euro not as good, similar track but absence of colder air until storm explodes off coast. GFS holds the only promise of significant snowfall south of 40N. At this time range, not an entirely bad situation. I am seeing hints of a two-wave solution developing, that may work in your favor.

I bet $18.99.

12-18" will fall and 3.7" will be measured.

I see some potential in that for two reasons, (a) it does not have very much warm advection, and (b) it develops a tight northeast to north gradient just as it's leaving land. It doesn't look like it wants to edge north which is also good, if it could edge south towards NC-VA border it could improve. 1-3" first call. Wherever it does set up will get 4-6" but that looks to be se PA into s NJ at present. Blizzard of 1899 clone on Feb 18-19 gets your attention.

Nature created many dry lakes in western interior, now we've created a few more.

RJay, I saw your post in the NYC banter thread, and I see the above forecast. As you know, I did try to alert you to the late forecast situation. I will ask the gang here how much leniency I could show == as you know, I don't want to be punitive in a fun contest, especially with a regular entrant, but I can't accept a forecast without any late penalty during seriously late time periods (I have looked the other way for just about everybody here once or twice on 1st afternoon/evening and gone very lenient on 2nd). So hang in there, I will see what we can do about this one. Part of my decision would be based on how much advantage could you have gained by looking at charts on 3rd and posting the above, having not looked yet, I don't know how different your forecast is from others. (okay now I looked, it's fairly close to consensus ... and I don't believe guidance has changed a lot since I looked at it on Jan 31st) By the way, still cannot send you private message, tried just now. I am going to suggest 10% if anyone wants to comment on that send me a p.m.

No wonder (North) America is ahead, always go with leading edge technology. These underground computers do nothing but process visual cues for a full year and then without trace of error they proclaim an infallible result. Or so I was told by Wiarton Willie (Canada's leading climate expert) (Wiarton is YVV on Lake huron, Georgian Bay actually). There is also a Shubenacadie Sam but I understand he could not get through the 40" snow drift to give his opinion, but I would say six more weeks of winter could be a sensible interpretation of what he was grunting down there under the snow. (eastern NS has been buried in 30-40 inches of snow recently). I laugh at media coverage out west, we also have not only groundhogs but marmots looking for shadows. The news guy says, without any trace of irony, "In the east, P-Phil (or Wiarton Willie etc) are calling for an early spring, but our local expert, Cascades Curtis (or whoever) disagrees ... and calls for six more weeks of winter. Talk about a grasp of climate, either spring comes early or winter stays on everywhere in N America. ... and they want to be my latex salesmen. Anyway, I know they only show the rodents to annoy their weather person who has to pretend to be interested. Usually the intro is, "the rodent says X but our expert, who is so much smarter than a rodent, says what? Expert? Are you awake?" And they don't really sound very confident about knowing more than a rodent, to be honest.

Could add to historical notes, on Feb 3, 1947 Canada saw its lowest ever recorded temperature of -81 F at Snag located near the Alaska border. That station no longer exists, it was active due to WW-II construction projects and closed many years ago. Watson Lake in southeast Yukon had its lowest ever value of -74 F on Jan 31, 1947, so it was quite a cold week up there (I noted the Alaska records mentioned today and previous days incl -80 F). 1947 is also famous for a very severe winter in Britain and northern Europe, the Baltic Sea was almost totally frozen over (which is quite unusual south of Finland) and in England and Ireland, large snow drifts stopped road and railway travel for days or weeks at a time. It was the coldest February on record (-1.9 C) in the Central England Temperature Series (1659 to present), 1895 was 0.1 C warmer at -1.8 C, but still has the coldest week or 10-day intervals. The coldest January was 1795 (-3.1 C) and the coldest December was 1890 at -0.8 C although 2010 came very close at -0.7 C. Those record low averages sound fairly moderate (they would be close to average for Albany NY) but as experienced in a country in those days without central heating and beside a large body of open water (North Sea), so that strong east to northeast winds can bring a lot of snow and also that sort of weather over there often ends up in the -3 to -1 C range, keeping means up, but if it clears at any point, it can go down below -20 C in rural areas as it did in those years I mentioned. The coldest day on record in Britain was Jan 20, 1838 with a mean of -12 C in the CET. 1962-63 was also a very cold winter in Britain and Ireland, with locally heavy snowfalls. There were days in Jan 1963 and again in Dec 1981 with averages near -9 C, as cold as it has been since Feb 1895. Odd factoid -- early winter cold is not well correlated on either side of Atlantic, but late winter cold is very well correlated. I guess it has to do with Greenland blocking highs being more likely to produce a cold Feb or March.

Table of forecasts for February 2024 __FORECASTER __________________ DCA _ NYC _ BOS __ ORD _ ATL _ IAH __ DEN _ PHX _ SEA rainsucks ________________________ +4.0 _ +4.3 _+4.5 __ +6.5 __ 0.0 _ +1.9 __ +1.6 _ -0.5 _ +0.8 RJay _____ (-10%) ________________ +2.0 _ +2.0 _ +2.0 __ +3.0 __ 0.0 __ 0.0 __ +3.0 __0.0 _ +2.0 wxallannj ________________________ +1.5 _ +2.0 _ +2.2 __ +2.8 _ +0.8 _ +1.6 __ +2.0 _ +1.5 _ +0.5 hudsonvalley21 __________________ +1.5 _ +1.2 _ +1.4 __ +1.4 _ +0.3 _ +2.1 ___ +1.6 _ +1.1 _ -0.4 DonSutherland1 _________________ +1.4 _ +1.6 _ +1.5 __ +4.5 _ -0.1 _ +0.6 ___ +3.0 __ 0.0 _ +3.0 so_whats_happening ____________ +1.4 _ +1.5 _ +1.8 __ +5.0 _ -0.5 _ -1.0 ___ +1.9 _ -1.3 _ +2.0 BKViking _________________________+1.2 _ +1.2 _ +1.0 __ +0.9 _ +0.4 _ +1.0 ___ +2.3 _ +1.6 _ +1.2 ___ Consensus __________________+1.1 _ +1.2 _ +1.1 __ +2.1 __ 0.0 _ +0.3 ___+1.6 _ +0.3 _+1.0 Scotty Lightning _________________ +1.0 _ +1.0 _ +0.5 ___ 0.0 _ +1.0 _ +1.5 ___ +1.0 _ +1.5 __ 0.0 Tom ______________________________+0.6 _ +0.8 _ +1.1 ___ +1.2 _ -0.6 _ -0.3 ___ +0.7 _ +0.6 _ +1.1 RodneyS ________________________ +0.3 _ +1.9 _ +1.0 __ +3.5 __ 0.0 _ +1.8 ___ +0.8 _ -1.3 _ -0.2 Stormchaser Chuck _______________ 0.0 __ 0.0 __ 0.0 __ +3.0 _ -2.3 _ -1.8 ___ +2.0 _ +1.0 _ +2.5 ___Normal _______________________ 0.0 __ 0.0 __ 0.0 __ 0.0 __ 0.0 __ 0.0 ____ 0.0 __ 0.0 __ 0.0 wxdude64 ________________________-0.2 _ +0.6 _ +0.4 __ +1.2 _ -0.9 _ -0.3 ___ +0.6 _ -1.1 _ +0.5 Rhino16 ___________________________-1.0 __ -1.5 _ -0.8 __ +0.5 _ -1.2 _ -0.1 ___ +0.1 _ -0.2 _ +0.3 Roger Smith ______________________ -1.5 __ -1.7 __-1.7 ___ -1.3 _ -2.0 _ -1.5 ___ +0.9 _ +1.2 _ +2.0 ___ Persistence __ (Jan 2024) _____+2.3 _ +3.3 _ +3.2 __ +1.1 _ -0.5 _ -3.0 __ -3.5 _ -1.0 _ -1.0 (differential of persistence and consensus is 370 points) ________________________________ warmest and coldest forecasts color coded, Normal is colder than all forecasts for DEN Consensus of 14 forecasts is average of 7th and 8th ranked (not incl Normal).

Temperature anomalies in western regions are a bit misleading, we've seen one super cold spell of about a week and otherwise mostly well above normal. DEN for example averaged +13.5 for last four days but -27 for Jan 11-16. A lot of daily records have been broken in the past week. So we've come to the end of the month with ground conditions (soggy snow at ski resorts) similar to 1998 despite a different anomaly. Now in the past few winters we have seen a few cases of cold anomalies persistent all month. Feb 2019 was a very cold month all along, and winter 2022-23 was generally quite cold.

It was an oddball situation out west, a plurality of days above average but overall averages below, due to exceptional cold for a few days. DEN averaged +13.5 last four days, but was -27 for Jan 11-16.

RJay if you wander in, your inbox is full, you can probably guess my message anyway. TIA.

Scoring for January 2024 FORECASTER ___________DCA_NYC_BOS__east__ORD_ATL_IAH__cent _ c/e _ DEN_PHX_SEA__west___ TOTAL RodneyS ________________ 50 _ 54 _ 68 __ 172 __ 96 _ 76 _ 50 __ 222 _ 394 __ 92 _100 _ 88 __ 280 ____ 674 so_whats_happening ____82 _ 66 _ 70 __ 218 __ 52 _ 94 _ 60 __ 206 _ 424 __ 54 _ 84 _ 96 __ 234 _____ 658 wxdude64 _______________46 _ 38 _ 52 __ 136 __100_ 96 _ 62 __258 _ 394 __ 56 _ 82 _ 76 __ 214 _____ 608 wxallannj ________________78 _ 62 _ 70 __ 210 ___68 _ 86 _ 16 __ 170 __ 380 __ 60 _ 76 _ 90 __ 226 _____ 606 DonSutherland1 _________76 _ 62 _ 68 __ 206 __ 78 _ 92 _ 44 __ 214 _ 420 __ 36 _ 88 _ 56 __ 180 _____ 600 ___ Consensus __________78 _ 60 _ 68 __ 206 __100_ 94 _ 20 __214 _ 420 __ 22 _ 82 _ 72 __ 176 _____ 596 BKViking ________________ 94 _ 76 _ 84 __ 254 __ 78 _ 74 _ 14 __ 166 _ 420 ___10 _ 60 _ 56 __ 126 _____ 546 hudsonvalley21 _________ 84 _ 58 _ 64 __ 206 __ 86 _ 78 _ 18 __ 182 _ 388 __ 04 _ 40 _ 96 __ 140 _____ 528 Normal __________________ 54 _ 34 _ 36 __ 124 __ 78 _ 90 _ 40 __ 208 _ 332 __ 30 _ 80 _ 80 __ 190 _____ 522 Rhino16 __________________50 _ 22 _ 20 __ 092 __98 _ 98 _ 40 __ 236 _ 328 __ 44 _ 92 _ 56 __ 192 _____ 520 Stormchaser Chuck _____ 56 _ 82 _ 96 __ 234 __ 82 _ 00 _ 00 __ 082 _ 316 __20 _100 _ 80 __ 200 ____ 516 RJay _____________________84 _ 64 _ 66 __ 214 __ 72 _ 70 _ 00 __ 142 _ 356 __ 20 _ 70 _ 60 __ 150 _____ 506 rainsucks ________________92 _ 96 _100__ 288 __42 _ 60 _ 00 __ 102 _ 390 __ 00 _ 50 _ 58 __ 108 _____ 498 Scotty Lightning _________64 _ 24 _ 16 __ 104 __ 58 _ 70 _ 20 __ 148 _ 252 __ 20 _ 60 _ 90 __ 170 _____ 422 Tom _____________________ 38 _ 12 _ 14 __ 064 __ 34 _ 72 _ 38 __ 144 _ 208 __ 26 _ 78 _ 68 __ 172 _____ 380 Roger Smith _____________44 _ 24 _ 32 __ 100 __ 98 _ 90 _ 22 __ 210 _ 310 __ 00 _ 04 _ 00 __ 004 _____ 314 Persistence _____________ 66 _ 56 _ 62 __ 184 __ 00 _ 38 _ 02 __ 040 _ 224 __ 00 _ 00 _ 10 __ 010 _____ 234 ----------------------------------- EXTREmE FORECAST REPORT NYC, BOS __ wins for Rainsucks (2nd highest fcsts) and losses for Stormchaser Chuck (good scores but fcsts a bit too high). IAH __ a win for wxdude64 with coldest forecast DEN __ a win for RodneyS with coldest forecast The other locations did not qualify. DCA went to 3rd highest forecast, and rest were quite close to consensus. --------------------------- (forecasts) FORECASTER ___________ DCA _ NYC _ BOS __ ORD _ ATL _ IAH __ DEN _ PHX _ SEA Stormchaser Chuck _____ +4.5 _ +4.2 _+3.4 __ +2.0 _+4.8 _+4.4 __+0.5 _-1.0 _-2.0 rainsucks ________________+2.7 _ +3.1 _ +3.2 __ +4.0 _ +1.5 _+2.0 __+2.5 _+1.5 _+1.1 BKViking ________________ +2.0 _ +2.1 _ +2.4 __ +2.2 _ +0.8 _+1.3 __+1.0 _+1.0 _+1.2 RJay _____________________+1.5 _ +1.5 _ +1.5 __ +2.5 _ +1.0 _ +2.0 __+0.5 _+0.5_+1.0 hudsonvalley21 _________ +1.5 _ +1.2 _ +1.4 ___+0.4 _ +0.6 _ +1.1 __+1.3 _+2.0 _-0.8 so_whats_happening ____ +1.4 _ +1.6 _ +1.7 __ -1.3 _ -0.8 _ -1.0 __ -1.2 _ -1.8 _ -1.2 wxallannj ________________ +1.2 _ +1.4 _ +1.7 __ -0.5 _ -1.2 _ +1.2 __ -1.5 _ -2.2 _ -1.5 ___ Consensus __________+1.2 _ +1.3 _ +1.6 __ +1.1 _ -0.2 _ +1.0 __ +0.4 _-0.1 _+0.4 DonSutherland1 _________ +1.1 __+1.4 _ +1.6 __ +2.2 _ -0.1 _ -0.2 __ -0.3 _ -0.4 _+1.2 Scotty Lightning _________ +0.5 _-0.5 _ -1.0 __ -1.0 _ +1.0 _ +1.0 __ +0.5 _ +1.0 _-0.5 Normal ___________________ 0.0 __ 0.0 __ 0.0 ___ 0.0 __ 0.0 __ 0.0 ___ 0.0 __ 0.0 __ 0.0 RodneyS ________________ -0.2 _ +1.0 _ +1.6 __ +1.3 _ -1.7 _ -0.5 ___ -3.1 _ -1.0 _ -1.6 Rhino16 __________________ -0.2 _ -0.6 _ -0.8 __ +1.0 _ -0.4 _ 0.0 ___ -0.7 _ -0.6 _ +1.2 wxdude64 _______________ -0.4 _ +0.2 _ +0.8 __ +1.1 _ -0.7 _ -1.1 ___ -1.3 _ -1.9 _ +0.2 Roger Smith _____________ -0.5 _ -0.5 _ -0.2 __ +1.0 _ -1.0 _ +0.9 __ +3.5 _ +3.8 _ +4.5 Tom _____________________ -0.8 _ -1.1 __ -1.1 ___ -2.2 _ -1.9 _ +0.1 ___ +0.2 _ +0.1 _ +0.6 Persistence _____________ +4.0 _ +5.5 _ +5.1 ___ +8.6 _+2.6 _+1.9 __ +6.2 _+4.7 _+3.5

-1.5 _ -1.7 _ -1.7 __ -1.3 _ -2.0 _ -1.5 __ +0.9 _ +1.2 _ +2.0

Faint signs of a coastal returning to guidance for Feb 5-6, would not declare it dead yet. A good result still lies inside margin of error.

A KU is a kinda unlikely.

Record highs all over BC today, 15 to 18 C widespread. We have lost about 2/3 of our snow pack in the past week due to warm temperatures and rain. It's probably a good sign for your winter hopes, as long as warmth goes north more than east. Pebble Beach golf this weekend faces prospects of local hail showers, could be an interesting watch for weather rather than golf. On the other hand it was record warm in BC around this date in 1998 too.

The ultimate low bar for sunshine hours was January 1953 on what used to be called the Queen Charlotte Islands west of BC (nowadays it's haida gwaii) ... zero sunshine. So it can happen (without polar night). It is also very cloudy out west recently, we got a few minutes of sun yesterday, first time in weeks. I blame Pacific Ocean (cause of all our problems).

DON ... Re Twitter (X) I am also not a frequent poster, I created an account to be able to read or follow, not to post my own material, I don't think I have posted more than half a dozen of my own in ten years, so you're basically following a void as far as seeing any interesting material from me. I will follow your feed especially if there are to be consequences for outrageous tweets, I love me some consequences. A warning, I am a bit of a libertarian conservative but I agree with you on climate and coffee anyway. The other stuff is not as important. I sort of dedicated my life to studying natural variability of climate not paying much attention (in late 1970s) to global cooling and perhaps at first being a bit skeptical about global warming (having just come out of global cooling) but for quite a while now my basic position has been, let's unravel AGW and natural variability, except recently I am starting to wonder if AGW is just overwhelming all forms of natural variability and creating one bland uber-climate that has only two or three variations. Out west here we still get lots of cold and below normal temps (as you know) or if not that, heat waves. I don't think we're going to fix this climate and we're probably going to have to adapt to it, my hope is that a natural cold signal will fight back and we'll be glad to have the extra greenhouse gas at some point, but will that be 2080 or 5080 or 25080 AD? (By 25080 I doubt that anyone will know what AD refers to, possibly a new count will begin, and also even by 5080 most of the excess will be gone -- we never know what technology could develop in our future and perhaps carbon sequestration will work, so far it is very much in its infant stages). What is the new verb for tweet, as in "I tweeted ..." is it "I exed ..." or just "I did the musk." Perhaps Donald Trump will buy X from Elon and call it "Trumpet Voluntary" so when you tweet (or X) you can trump. I think perhaps you trumped that guy with his snowfall map anyway (unless it is 1888).

If ever there was an occasion for a northward shift ...

Euro a bit more progressive at 00z and no storm near coast days 9-10 but cold signal remains, possibly just a jog in road to eventual snowfall event? 10-day Gem does bring in a potential snowfall of possibly 5-8" from an inland source rather than a coastal track. GFS so far not very promising. Lots of time for general improvements. Fingers crossed.

Don, I posted (as PeterOD) on your X file, "did not know they had X in 1888." But that map could actually bust in the other direction where it shows zero snow in NC and s.e. VA. Well, the DCA new record of 80 or 81 would of course have to park over top of the second highest temp of record in Jan (79 on same date in 1950) instead of blowing away some useless nondescript record. I hate when that happens. And it does happen ... ... So I took a look in my NYC files, this is the "top 15" of snubbed records that deserve a spot: __ Robbed of a Record Top 15 __ Rank __ Days (/20) __ Details t1. ___ (17.5/20) ___ July 21, 1930, 1980 t1991 broken or denied by 1977 (104F) t1. ___ (17.5/20) ___ Nov 15, 1973 (77F) broken by 1993 (80F) 3. ___ (16.5/20) __ Dec 4 1982 (72) lost record to 74F in 1998. 4. ___ (15.5/20) ___ Sep 21, 1914 (94) denied by 1895 (95F). 5. ___ (15/20) ____ Feb 16, 2023 (70) denied by 1954 (71F). 6. ___ (14.5/20) __ Aug 9, 1949 (100) broken by 2001 (103F). t7 ___ (14/20) ___ Apr 17 1976 (91) lost record to 96F in 2002. t7 ___ (14/20) ___ Apr 18 2002 (91) denied by 96F in 1976. 9. ___ (13.5/20) __Nov 1, 1974 (81) denied by 84F in 1950. t10 ___ (13/20) ___ Apr 7 1929 (89) lost record to 92F in 2010. t10 ___ (13/20) ___ Apr 8 1929 (88) lost record to 90F in 1991. 12. ___ (12.83/20) ___ Feb 15, 1954 (69) denied by 1949 (73F) 13. ___ (12.67/20) ___ Jan 14, 2005 (66F) was not a record (70F 1932). 14. ___ (11.67/20) ___ Jan 12, 2017 (66F) lost out to 70F in 2020. 15. ___ (11.5/20) ____ Aug 27, 1953/73 (98F) denied by 1948 (100F) The list will be checked in future, there are numerous cases just outside this top 15 in the 9-11 range. (List is objectively generated by considering how many days among the 20 on either side of the lost or unclaimed record the "snubbed record" would be a daily record -- that is the meaning of the number in brackets. A tie is counted by its decimal equivalent (0.5 or 0.33) as a tie created by its inclusion. The weakest records by number broken within ten days either side are: Weakest daily records Rank __ Days (/20) __ Details 1. ___ (0/20) ___ 56F Feb 7, 2020 (lowest daily record) 2. ___ (0/20) ___ 58F Dec 19, 1899 t1931 is second lowest daily record (tied with case below) 3. ___ (0/20) ___ 58F Jan 15, 1995 is tied second lowest daily record (tied with above case) 4. ___ (0/20) ___ 88F May 14, 1900 is lowest since May 1, 2001 (87F). 5. ___ (0/20) ___ 93F June 12, 1933, 1973, 2017 is lowest after 92F for May 18. 6. ___ (0/20) ___ 92F Aug 23, 1916, lower than all records until tie Sep 15th, 91F Sep 18th. t7. ___(0.5/20) ___ 65F Mar 3, 1991 lowest after Feb 14 (62F). Tied 65F Feb 26, 1890 (t7) 9. ___ (1/20) ___ 59F Feb 2, 1988 would only beat #1 above. 10. ___ (1/20) ___ 60F Jan 10, 1876 would only beat #3 above. 11. ___ (1/20) ___ 96F June 28, 1969, 1991 (beats only 95F June 18) 12. ___ (1/20) ___ 71F Nov 17, 1953 (beats only 67F on Nov 26) 13. ___ (1/20) ___ 67F Nov 26, 1946 (beats only 66F on Dec 2, 1970) Quite a few records score 1.5 or 2.0 in this regard. It should be noted that "shoulder season" records are at a disadvantage as seasonal averages fall or rise. Even so, a few of these have entered the list.

Predict temp anomalies for nine locations (F deg relative to 1991-2020 averages) ... DCA _ NYC _ BOS __ ORD _ ATL _ IAH __ DEN _ PHX _ SEA Deadline is 06z Feb 1st. (late Wednesday evening in EST)