RitualOfTheTrout

3 hours ago, jwilson said:

For those interested, KDKA had a few segments on the outbreak from 40 years ago.

https://www.cbsnews.com/pittsburgh/news/1985-tornado-outbreak-western-pennsylvania-40-years/

This wasn't something I was aware of as a kid, but I now know people that were in Hermitage that day and had to shelter.  Still the only F5 in PA history, and they've since said a couple of those F4s would have been re-classified as EF5s under the new scale.

Pretty detailed write-up here: 40 Years Later: The May 31 1985 Tornado Outbreak

I was living in Sarver, PA where the one F3 lifted at the time, pretty young but have some vague memories of that event. Probably a contributing factor to why Im on a weatherboard today.

Also probably why this was my favorite book as a kid.

Looking at the radar, feels like a winter storm, watching the heavy returns creep NE.

33 minutes ago, Mailman said:

This weather is terrible.

Your not wrong. 

Sunday looks nice, then we should get a taste of summer.

Wild ride in this morning through Allegheny County, roads closed, miles and miles of neighborhoods without power, no traffic lights / street lights. Debris everywhere. Some places looked like war torn hell-scapes.

41 minutes ago, blackngoldrules said:

I think the line did weaken some as far as the precip goes. But still very high winds, especially when it first hit. Enough to knock my power out.

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Yeah, maybe plateaued right around Allegheny line, still 72mph gust nothing to sneeze at.

Tree down in the little wood strip in my backyard too.

24 minutes ago, andyhb said:

Warning has that line moving E at 75 mph. Widespread wind damage likely in the Pittsburgh metro. Also TPIT is down.

Hey appreciate the Met post. I see you are in OK, did you used to live around here or just following the severe outbreak?

Power was out about 5 minutes here, back on for now. It was pretty erie for about 5 minutes before it hit, power was flickering while it was still sunny.

4 minutes ago, Ahoff said:

Looks like Allegheny County is actually going to be rocked this time.

Looks like it, barring some last minute weakening its right in the bullseye.

Hope I can get dinner off the grill in time!

8 hours ago, Rd9108 said:

Idk on the NWS people showed some ominous looking clouds so I wouldnt be surprised if what you saw was actually some rotation especially since the line became tornado warned just east.

Just making my way through the comments now, lots of reports / pictures of some pretty crazy stuff out of New Kensington. At least I know I wasn't seeing things lol.

2 minutes ago, Rd9108 said:

Looks like we just dodged a bullet. Id rather not deal with tornados. Although would like to safely see one, one day. 

Not going to complain about missing a tornado. Lol

Still not sure what we saw. The clouds were moving so fast on approach so maybe it was an illusion of perspective or something, but it sure looked like a very broad area of rotation high up in the approaching cloud deck.

Won't forget this one for awhile!

That cell that just went through here just got warned for tornado... Not suprised. My son and I were watching the cloud deck approach and I swear it looked like we could see the clouds rotating, or almost moving perpendicular to the storm morion, then all hell broke lose. May have just dodged a bullet.

37 minutes ago, RitualOfTheTrout said:

Odd cloud movement with these storms. In-between two bands, getting some light rain now. May be enough to take some of the bite out of the main line, but time will tell.

Thats a negative.. about 60 seconds of insane wind and hail, complete white out. That was intense. I thought the windows were going to get blown out. We don't typically get hit straight on like that.

Odd cloud movement with these storms. In-between two bands, getting some light rain now. May be enough to take some of the bite out of the main line, but time will tell.

Most of sliding just to south of me, still had a enough to get a coating. Looks like some pretty good returns in western Allegheny.

Coating on the grass here with light to moderate wind driven snow.

15 hours ago, CoraopolisWx said:

A true I-79 classic. 

Yeah, it seems like lately our region is divided on bigger storms. That Jan 94 storm track was perfect. Really an unusual distribution of snow. 

8 hours ago, Burghblizz said:

Those calendar day totals  underestimate a bit. 2018 was over 11”.  Dec 2020 was as well. That airport total wasn’t too representative. Solid foot in many places. 

Yeah, I was going to say December 2020 was definitely double digits. I got stuck at work with an issue that day and drove home after 11pm so that one sticks out but must be skewed by the "single daily" total.

That makes it more like 4 years which I'd say is more inline with our statistical odds of that type of event. It doesn't do anything to satisfy the big storm itch though.

1 hour ago, jwilson said:

Everyone can take a week off.  Going to be quiet for a little.

If another -EPO develops like the ensembles are showing, we're going to get more cold air in early March.  Question is if anything becomes of that, but I think that regime prefers the cold & dry formulation we've seen already this winter.

I'm still chasing a big storm.  Little nuisance snows at this time of the year aren't of interest.  They're fine in November and December when setting the holiday mood.

I enjoy the little snows, especially if it stays cold with snow on snow. That being said we are about at the end of realistically keeping snow on the ground so by early March Im much more interested in a bigger storm.

Jeff V had a stat today our largest daily snowfall is 2.6 inches (midnight - midnight) and that was last weekend.

1 hour ago, Burghblizz said:

Some briefly insane snow rates with these squalls cutting through southern Butler Co and Northern AGC.

Doesn’t last long - but cool to look at (or worth watching out for if driving)

Had one blow through here, lasted almost 10 minutes. Snow was legit heavy. Looks like another round moving in now.

17 hours ago, Rd9108 said:

What could go wrong? 

Rather see it than not. Would be a great end to winter if we can manage a warning criteria event in the next couple weeks.

31 minutes ago, Burghblizz said:

Eventful day with flooding, 50 MPH wind gusts, mini-paste bomb and now snow squalls.

NWS total will make a run at 3” (thought I saw 2.6” so far)

Will probably wind up over 5” since yesterday. Great winter scenes this weekend - just crappy the first batch got washed away. 

It was a great little event, I agree to bad the first batch got washed out, but better to have snowed and melted than to have never snowed at all. 

Made the best of yesterday with an impromptu sled and snowman session with the boy. Daughter just got her permit so took her driving tonight to get some bad weather driving experience (some donuts in an empty parking lot too ) then finished it off with dog walk pulling the boy in the sled in heavy snow. Sometimes I think cold and snowy weather gets me more motivated to be outside than warm weather lol

46 minutes ago, blackngoldrules said:

Looks like some more in Ohio developing and heading our way. Maybe eek out another inch?

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Looks to be filling in nicely. Id say another inch is doable based on that.

8 minutes ago, PghPirates27 said:

Ripping good here. Huge flakes.

Radar indicated change over should be going through Allegheny now. Actually a couple wet flakes mixing here too now.

1 minute ago, Rd9108 said:

The seasonal trend has been for a fast Pacific flow and for bigger storms to get shunted south and east whenever the TPV is involved. There's just no way to slow down the energy crashing into the Pacific North West which is knocking down the ridge. I still think we atleast get a storm bigger than 3 inches this season but it won't be this next one.

I agree, only to add that has been a problem to some extent (fast Pac flow) for more than just this season. 

2 hours ago, Burghblizz said:

For midweek - NAM looks like it wants more of a longer duration, steady, WAA type snow. Maybe a more modest…but more realistic “good” solution. 

Right now its really the only model showing it, but its an easier path (All Southern Stream) to something vs what we needed with the big phase. If it can amplify nothing to really suppress it. 

58 minutes ago, jwilson said:

Predictably, the mid-week storm is turning into another southern slider and missing PA.  That's the seasonal norm.

It was all too delicate and tenuous of a setup.  Too many things to go wrong.  It's a shame all the models at once locked onto a big solution because it's a massive tease, but I think that's the danger of model watching outside of a couple days lead.

Also further demonstrates the tendencies of a cold-ENSO winter, and why the events in warm-ENSO winters are much more "stable" and easier to track.  This isn't even 1996 anymore, and the increased speed of the northern jet is difficult to navigate.

Anytime you are depending on the PV let alone interactions with individual lobes rotating around its absolutely tenuous. To be honest aside from maybe a run of the cmc this was never going to be a huge storm for us anyways.