OHweather

Man, you must've been in a local screw hole. 5"+ amounts to your west, east and south. The lake is warmer in the western basin so yeah that might've kept you warmer and made it harder for snow to stick.

Nice 2"/hour METAR at CLE a few hours ago.

Just so I'm on record lol. I'm off to the Hocking Hills and starting sipping my beverages already so I'm just going to post the map with no commentary. "Enjoy" I guess?

Nice little event last night turned into. Looking at the newer models right now and it looks like they've gone from pivoting the clipper snow band over the lake to doing it right over the central lakeshore. Someone could get over 8" if that happens. The downside here is that's a narrow band, and if it slips any farther south Cleveland and Geauga County see much less snow.

Wonder if you Geauga folk will wake up to 2" this morning. Been decent snow much of the night in spots.

NE Ohio looks to get dry slotted for several hours tomorrow evening, after perhaps a quick burst of snow along the cold front early in the evening, but conditions still look good for moderate to even briefly heavy lake enhanced snow late Friday night into Saturday as wrap-around synoptic snow wraps in. Lake-induced instability will be moderate, with inversion heights above 10k feet and deep moisture to over 15k feet through most of Saturday morning. The flow will be NNW, however Lake Huron moisture/synoptic moisture should keep good snow fairly widespread. The heaviest amounts will be in the higher terrain, where I can envision several hours of near 1" per hour snow occurring. My first thought is the lakeshore struggles and only sees a couple inches, but the higher terrain could very well see up to 6" or so. It will be windy, so it could be a very wintry scene Saturday morning with a good amount of falling snow and blowing snow.

This one is looking interesting up there for sure. The clipper may be accompanied by a narrow band of moderate synoptic snow, and there still looks to then be a period of lingering decent lake effect into much of Saturday behind the clipper. If the clipper snow hits northern OH, the combo of that and the LES could push some areas to over half a foot. Most of this snow falls Friday night so there shouldn't be much trouble accumulating, and ratios could climb decently by late Friday night and Saturday morning.

I said this about 6 days before this past weekend's cold snap and it promptly trended milder, so at the risk of jinxing another cold snap, from 4-5 days out, the cold air for Friday-Saturday looks pretty damn impressive and the potential seems to be there for notable lake effect for the time of year. The heart of the upper trough moving overhead Friday night into Saturday would, if it verifies, provide for a period of extreme instability and a pretty moist atmosphere. This looks like a short fetch event so significant amounts may be confined to where any upstream lake connections set up. Looks like a pretty potent vort max rides through the Ohio Valley Friday evening which may add some synoptic lift to aid the lake effect. I could see a setup like this producing half a foot of snow somewhere in NE OH or NW PA. The airmass will be so cold that any snow that falls at night would probably be pretty high ratio. During the day it may be harder to accumulate well, although highs on Saturday may struggle to hit 30, so if you get accumulations to start Friday night they may continue during the day Saturday. Anyways, here's what the GFS looks like in BUFKIT for Saturday morning. Can't get much better looking than that in December, so we'll see how much this changes

Had a tad under 2" here. Some 3-4" amounts in parts of southern Summit, Stark and Wayne Counties. Not really a noteworthy amount of snow but it fell quickly and was accompanied by thunder and lightning which made it sort of fun.

It won't be significant snowfall wise...but Saturday afternoon and evening could be pretty wild. The models have an extremely potent shortwave moving through, causing a surface low to ride by just to our NE. It looks like a combination of very strong lift thanks to the shortwave and cold front trailing the low could cause convective showers to develop along the cold front Saturday PM as it blows through northern OH. With 850mb temps around -3C along the front there could be small hail or graupel along with some lightning with those showers. Behind the front temps quickly become cold enough for snow. The models hint at lingering lift, probably due to another wind shift dropping down west of the low, along with a very deep unstable layer and some instability off the lake Saturday evening, which could lead to a period of off and on and intense snow showers, before the activity becomes more disorganized and lighter by late Saturday night. A little lake effect could persist into Sunday but it looks disorganized by that point. The wind fields Saturday late afternoon and evening behind the cold front look very intense. A very strong pressure gradient and strong cold air advection is a good combination for strong winds, and the NAM and GFS both have a period of 50 knot or stronger winds just off the ground Saturday evening. Any convective showers along the front could produce strong gusts, and then there may be a period of very gusty winds behind the front. We'll see how the models change...but as it looks now, the combination of snow squalls and wind gusts possibly pushing 60MPH near the lake and 50MPH inland could create quite a scene. I could see the higher terrain making out with 1-3" of snow by Sunday morning. Not the most snow but these very dynamic systems are always fun.

There's still time for it to change but the models remain locked and loaded on a pattern that would generally be favorable for robust LES next Sunday-Monday. If CLE escapes without an inch, it would be an incredibly short winter at CLE. Geauga County got accumulating snow in mid-November and almost seems like a shoe in to get some next weekend if the general pattern holds, shows you how dependent we are on the lake in NE Ohio. I know some of you have moved on to Spring, which is understandable, it'll be April in a few days, but I'm selfishly hoping for some LES next Sunday before I head back to Athens.

Although it's still far out and may change, the pattern has consistently been shown to feature a robust -EPO (western Canada/Alaska ridge) and possibly a -NAO for the first week of April. That's something that can support a decent April snow in northern OH. It's possible the pattern doesn't end up favorable, or that the pattern ends up favorable but smaller details don't work out, but there's probably an elevated chance compared to normal for snow the first week of April up there. I'm farther south and don't have the benefit of lake effect precip here, so I don't really like my chances down here, but up there it's something to keep in mind. I'll be home April 1-3, so maybe I can see some flakes then

Have been getting some decent snow showers at times through the morning and have about an inch down. As someone who likes snow, I always chuckle at other people who like snow saying they "don't want" a snow event at the beginning of March because it's too small...especially in a winter where Cleveland and the west side have been extremely snow starved. I understand 1-3" of fluff isn't the most exciting, but snow is snow and personally, I enjoy any amount of it. If you're really ready for Spring to start, it's coming in less than a week and a small snow tomorrow isn't going to do anything to slow it down. It just gives snow lovers one last bit to cling to is how I look at it. If we were going for an all time futility record I could see rooting for a miss. Although this winter should be bottom 5 or maybe even bottom 3 in the snowfall department, least snowy isn't possible anymore.

The tally for what I've seen in Athens is 22-23", and they haven't had any other substantial snow when I've not been there, so that's roughly where their seasonal total stands. That's actually a bit above normal!

There's a half decent lake enhanced setup late tonight into early Wednesday. Maybe someone in the higher terrain can squeak out 2-3". What a winter...

It's snowing pretty good in Chardon, with some on the roads and a good accumulation on the grass. Pretty sad if the lakeshore doesn't even squeak in 1" out of this.

It looks like the higher terrain is finally seeing better snow. I'd have to imagine accumulations of half an inch per hour are occurring, and moderate to briefly heavy snow in the higher terrain will continue for a while. Closer to the lakeshore it'll be more of a struggle.

Just so I'm on record, here's my map. Don't have time for any sort of a write-up, busy day and I have my own Wx issues here to worry about. I can certainly see someone jack-potting to 8-10" assuming any mixing issues at the beginning of the storm aren't too prolonged.

Looks like they haven't looked at any model runs since yesterday morning. They still have time to fix it this afternoon and get some lead time on the snow but they better get it right now and not wait till 4am to do it.

The Euro has an additional (after this morning) QPF of a quarter inch for CLE with the 0.50" line running from SW to NE through central Summit and Geauga.

You'd probably get two feet if that happened

Here's my thinking on amounts. Very impressive snow squall potential along the front. It'll be quick moving, but will hit during the commute and may be very intense...a little lightning wouldn't shock me...so it could be nasty. Lake effect conditions with a NW wind are very favorable through about midnight, so I'd expect disorganized but still intense squalls to affect Lorain and Medina east through midnight, with intensity and coverage decreasing some after midnight as drier air moves in and as it gets cold enough to limit snow ratios. Some snow showers will continue through Saturday but dry air/short fetch/potentially still iffy ratios may keep additional amounts light. There's potential for a few to several inches in the higher terrain of the Snowbelt with potentially moderate to heavy amounts where the Lake Huron band sets up. I'm not impressed with the setup near the lakeshore after the quick early-evening squall. I also don't agree with (nor am I surprised about) CLE not issuing advisories west through the entire metro area with a burst of heavy snow and wind during the commute and very dicey conditions continuing after the commute for several hours with lake effect squalls and gusty winds. Amounts as is should at least get close to advisory criteria and the low visibility/blowing snow/falling temps/timing should be compounding factors that would push many over the edge in terms of issuing advisories.

I'm guessing those areas got 8-10" total based on the 7" in Shaker through 5pm Weds and radar from the rest of the event. They only got hit with the band for about an hour last night so I think that's reasonable.

My general thinking is a short duration of heavy snows late tomorrow afternoon and evening followed by lighter multi-bands with lower ratios due to the cold Saturday into Saturday night. My early guess is 3-6" in the higher terrain from Medina east through the Snowbelt with 6-10" where the Huron connection is (most likely eastern Ashtabula or NW PA). Amounts are marginal but the burst of heavy snow late tomorrow and falling temps/gusty winds tomorrow night into Saturday should and "hopefully" will prompt advisories from Lorain and Medina Counties east.

There was 7" in Shaker as of like 5PM yesterday. Hopefully they have another 24 hour total reported this evening, which would help. I have the radar loops saved from early yesterday on which will help but I always give the ground truth reports most weight if they're there.