jayyy

Agreed. We definitely did better than anticipated with banding early on, which saved us up here… big time. We verified, but definitely not in the way we expected to. Models showed that insane banding initially setting up near 95 (MoCo - HoCo death band type depiction) which is what gave those areas 3-6” before the flip on some guidance. However, the band setup shop about 25-30 miles north of the general consensus and those areas closer to 95 never quite got the jump start they needed to overcome that stubborn warm layer . Over 3” fell in roughly 90 mins to kick off the storm up our way (sorry you were asleep for that man, I was hoping to see your and @clskinsfan ‘s names pop up in the thread as that crazy band was parked over the area from Winchester to Manchester) This, of course, was a huge help in terms of verifying the warning. We had 6.25” of fluff when I cleared the board as sleet began mixing in more prevalently , then I measured 2.25” of snow / crust when precip finally shut off for a total of 8.5” of frozen. Roughly 7” remain due to compaction. Such a shame for folks closer to 95. It’s just been that type of winter. Yet another storm where a 1 degree bust at the mid levels takes away a 6+” opportunity from the metros and immediate suburbs. It’s never anything big… but there’s seemingly always that ONE thing that hinders that area. Really hope the craziness that is March in terms of dualing air masses brings that area their biggie. They deserve a break.

They definitely did better than those dreadful 10:1’s or snow depth maps for sure.

My brother is reporting 2” of pure sleet west of turf valley near the rt 40/ interstate 70 juncture.

Still in awe at the power of that +1c warm layer between 800-825. With a surface look like this….temps in the low 20s at onset….heavy precip… we still managed to mainly be ice/sleet for the metros. That damn trough (lack thereof) killed us as far as getting an appreciable area wide snowfall.

The northern tier likely came the closest. The Winchester to Manchester area saw very heavy banding for about 8 hours under those bands. My guess is that we are above 0.8” QPF going off of 10:1 ratios. If ratios were lower, then we saw even more than that.

That’s Harlem for ya. Didn’t need the NAM to tell you that was going to happen. I grew up in NW Rockland county where it was typically 5-8-10 degrees colder during storms and snowed twice as much annually despite being only 25-30 miles away from downtown (as the crow flies) That’s just the climo of that area. 287/87 has always been the fall line in the NYC metro. It’s a different world N and NW of the NYS thruway. I can recall at least 7-8 storms where nyc rained and my area saw over a foot. The Bronx always did better than Manhattan which did better than Brooklyn, queens, and the island, etc. 24-36” of pure snow in downtown NYC is extremely rare for a reason. Your point about the NAM’s performance is spot on. Inside of 24-36, the hi res has been cash money. I’m not sure how many storms people need to live through until they grasp the NAMs dominance in the short range and that it is literal garbage outside of 60. I said it to @WinterWxLuvr last night…. If the 3k NAM shows a near identical low track and high positioning to Globals within 24 hours but shows the warm Nose 50 miles further north, you best be paying attention - its probably right. IMO, the NAM shouldn’t even be looked at until within 48. It will save people a ton of confusion about the NAM showing a snowstorm in Ohio / Buffalo 5 days out and the whiplash it does to reality within 48. I understand many are disappointed and rightfully so, but Models overall did quite well with this. Euro, GFS, PARA, EPS, UKMET, etc all pretty did pretty well in regards to the overall pattern evolution and track a few days out, which is what globals are used for - and in the short term, the mesos (RAP, NAM twins, HRW) took it home on the nitty gritty details. That’s why using a mixture of model consensus and local climo is so important when making a forecast and why Mets don’t just choose a “reliable model” and make a forecast off of it verbatim. I know it’s tempting for folks to compare ground truth to kuchera snow maps and see a bust during what’s been a very tough winter for many, but if you analyze models based on their strong suits, they actually did pretty well here once we got within 3-4 days. In a general sense, it is a shame that in the year 2021, models are still so far apart on the details but what can we do.

So glad we decided to close shop up today. It’s fugly out there

Wait.. there’s an ignore list

Definitely. 7-9” will be common in our area. Def. a shame that sleet made its way in so quickly. No doubt we would have flirted with a foot if it hadn’t. 4-730am was some of the best winter weather I’ve ever seen, and I lived in both Buffalo and the Hudson valley in NY for many years. Damn you warm layer. Sorry to the southern crew Just cannot catch a dang break.

I’m… uh… yeah, just looking outside in awe.

Heavy snow 24 degrees

Going to be a serious icer for your area I’m afraid. :/

Holding the line. 22 degrees heavy snow

Lol, I’m only 54 miles north of DC. It’s not that far north. The climo is quite different though. Crazy what no water nearby does for the mid levels.

Going to take an actual measurement around 6 and then clean the board. These rates are pretty surreal.

21.9/21.7 RH: 99% Temps are definitely done dropping. Huge flakes. SN++.

Going to hit 6” by 9 am at this rate.

Starting sleet* There was a warm layer near dc and bwi to start. It’ll flip to snow. Not sure how long it holds though

SN++ eyeballing 2” or a bit more. Rates haven’t really slowed down since 4:30

My brother said it’s steadily quieting down and more and more snow is mixing in. He’s probably about 5 miles to your NNW

“70/30 sleet” - most recent text from my brother in EC. Said the sleet is pounding but there are definitely a bunch of flakes falling too. Suspect you guys will flip over shortly as the column cools

My brother said it’s pouring sleet in west ellicott city. Wild. I suspect it’ll change over fairly quickly

It already busted. Sleet in Leesburg Man… that warm nose loves to seek out NoVA south of Winchester. 2/7 was similar. Snow in Maryland - same latitude. Wonder what causes that

If HoCo/MoCo can hold the column until 15-18z… that may verify.

What? No way. Near Fredrick? That can’t be good.