frostfern

21 hours ago, BuffaloWeather said:

Lake effect snow off of Erie is the wettest of the great lakes. Our ratios are usually 1:15 to 1:20. I think it has to do with being the southern most lake and higher lake temps on average for events. A lot has to do with the flow of the wind. NW wind is usually higher ratio snow due to colder conditions. I get hit with W/SW wind which is usually not as cold resulting in lower ratios.

Snow from a single dominant band may have updrafts strong enough to cause significant riming of flakes.  Places in northern and western Michigan don't get those kinds of bands most of the time.  It's typically persistent light snows from weaker bands with some orographic enhancement added in the slightly higher areas up north. 

Also, immediate GRR area gets a lot of nickle-and-dime 2-3" snowfalls that add up to more when measured over days than if the same liquid were to fall in a single 24 hour period.  The relationship between depth and liquid content isn't linear.  Seems more logorithmic to me with fluffy snow as the bottom layers compress under the weight of new snow added on top, especially when you get over 6".  This biases smaller snowfalls to higher ratios than big ones.

1 hour ago, WestMichigan said:

If only the GFS would verify.  Nearly 3' IMBY.  However the Euro says no way.  Give me less than 12".  Either way, definitely looking to double my YTD snowfall and maybe more.

Lake effect is always weird in terms of measurement.  Very high winds can cut down on the fluff factor, as can a low DGZ causing more plate-dominant snow.  Think you'd need 25:1 ratio at least to get three feet out of any model output.  Lake effect is always better than 10:1, but you need temps in the mid 20s and wind under 15 mph to get the crazy 20:1 ratio dendrite-dominant feather-fluff.  Even then it doesn't really feel like as much as the official measurement because when it gets deeper than 6" it settles fast under it's own weight even within 6-12 hours of falling.

1 hour ago, Chicago Storm said:

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How much of that in SW Michigan is post-frontal lake-enhanced snow?  WAA stuff will be dense, but behind the front I'm assuming 10:1 is on the low end.  

I'm hoping for a quick front-end snow, followed by dry slot, then a heavy west-flow lake effect event behind the occluded front as the system pivots away to the north.

Haven't had a good clipper-train / lake-effect pattern in a long time.  Hopefully this pans out.  GFS almost looks too cold for good accumulations though.  Would prefer the DGZ rise above 5000 feet with waves coming across the lake.  I remember Jan 28-31 2018 had decent small accumulations with waves that added up to over a foot of snowpack despite a very low DGZ a lot of the time.

About 3" total here.  It came down good for brief period late last night.  Just lacked duration due to lack of back-end deformation snows being all to the southwest.  It's added on top of 4" remaining from the last system so there's finally a decent snowpack.  Hopefully we get some more to add to it.

I'm hopeful for a good WSW flow lake-effect pattern.  Frequent waves rotating around a nice arctic lobe would be nice.  Still a lot of uncertainty though.

4 hours ago, HighTechEE said:

Serious virga over the SW Ohio area now, hope it doesn't turn into Thunder Virga! 

Here it just went from virga and flurries to pouring snow.  I think the dewpoint jumped up 10 degrees in 20 minutes.  Went from 16 degrees to 26 degrees.  It's a plate-dominant snow with mostly smaller flakes, so not accumulating super fast.  Definitely reducing visibility though, especially since the wind is picking up.

Well, the snow finally started reaching the ground here.  Had a solid 2 hours of virga and flurries.

5 minutes ago, Hoosier said:

I went out to get a head start on some shoveling and measured 2.5" about 40 minutes ago.  It is ripping so probably topping 3" now.  The snow is kind of a sugary consistency but with some density.  Could make a snowball in my hand but it's not that great for packing.  Not overly wet at all.  

Something I've noticed is that the ratio can depend as much on wind and crystal structure as temperature.  Dendrite-dominate lake effect that falls straight down in light wind can be much higher ratio at 30 degrees than wind-blown plate-dominant synoptic snows at 27 degrees.  I have seen 14:1 ratio with massive aggregate flakes even with a temperature of 30, provided there isn't a lot of wind and the depth is only a few inches.  Of course, once you get a depth of more than 4 inches, even dendrite-dominant large-aggregate snowpack will compress quickly to a 10:1 ratio if the temperature is anywhere near freezing.  It's usually under 4 inch snowfalls that can have a lot of variability based on crystal structure and wind.  Once you get a lot of depth there's more compression due to weight and so the ratio's become more purely temperature dependent.

18 minutes ago, Gino27 said:

Battled virga for about 45 mins but am snow now!

Still dealing with "heavy virga" overhead here.  Getting some pixie flurries with composite 25 dbz overhead.

7 minutes ago, zinski1990 said:

Still never experienced that. Even when I was younger living in The UP don't remember it

Thunder-sleet seems to be a more common phenomenon.  Had quite a lot of lighting with ice storms in Feb 2019.

Just now, mimillman said:

Gotta appreciate the road accums 

Have to live somewhere with a north-facing hill then.  Weird how it often makes a difference even after dark.

2 minutes ago, mimillman said:

Dry air in the heart of the city causing issues again. Roads are wet with puddles so will need solid rates and big flakes to overcome that if anything is to stick. Visibility has improved and I can see the south loop buildings from my place which are about 1.5 miles away

LOL.   Since when do we care about accumulation on salted roads.  I assume most of us are not the age where we are praying to get days off school.

Just now, sbnwx85 said:

Heavy virga here. 

Had a virga band sitting overhead all afternoon here.  Mix of virga and filtered sunshine.

20 minutes ago, madwx said:

It's not really a dryness thing here, its more just a slower progression northward of the forcing for precip.  Getting reports of drizzle on the SW side of Madison so we just need the forcing to arrive(probably in an hour or so) and well be golden.

It's definitely dry here at 28/18.  Was hoping to add at least a little to the snowpack.    It looks like the backside deformation zone will be closer to you later tonight into tomorrow morning.  Here the front end is all we're going to get as the upper low is forecast to fizzle as the energy transfers to the mid-atlantic.  I'll be surprised if I eek 2 inches from this.  You'll probably do a little better as you'll at least have a decaying deformation band overhead for a little bit of time.

Just now, SchaumburgStormer said:

Hoping to ride this side of the sleet line for as long as possible 

Hopefully adiabatic cooling can force the line back south if the lift intensifies.

Just now, madwx said:

still dry here.  Precip start time is going to be at least a couple hours behind what most models had

There is a lot of low-level dryness.  Areas closer to the lake seem to be overcoming the virga onset quicker.

31 minutes ago, Owensnow said:

I am right on the northern edge of the .50-.75 qpf range lol here in SW Ontario (kingsville)

 

cmon North baby

The front end is 100% virga here so far.  There's been some radar returns aloft for a while now but the low level dryness is eating it all on the way down.  Not that I'm expecting more than 1-3" here.

On 1/28/2021 at 6:41 PM, McHenrySnow said:

Let's hope that block saves us, because February 2019 was painful here. Storm after storm going right overhead. 

I can skip any repeat of the February 2019 ice-mageddon.  Did a number on my poor trees.  Just give me snow damnit.

Hoping we finally get into a classic clipper train with arctic intrusions after the rainstorm on the 4th.  It's been a long time.  Lake ice on Lake Michigan is still minimal so enhancement looks good.

12 hours ago, WestMichigan said:

I haven't seen 12" yet either.  Just broke double digits for the year earlier this week.  Here's hoping a warm lake and some friendly winds/850 temps during the month of February for both of us.

It's been remarkably boring.  Maybe set a record for the amount of non-sticking 35 degree snow lol.  

On 1/20/2021 at 3:09 PM, slow poke said:

This map clearly shows where the higher elevation areas are in northern lower. It’s been such a warm winter that the few degrees colder that the elevation provides makes a huge difference so far this winter.

It's the same thing a lot of places this year.  Good totals in the mountains but not much elsewhere due to marginal boundary layer coldness.  The Adirondacks got dumped pretty good too.

Well, it looks like it will at least be less of a snooze-fest than the winter so far.  It looks more like a roller-coaster-ride than a winter lock-in though.

5 hours ago, SchaumburgStormer said:

Lots of butt hurt in here for a “storm” that was never actually modeled on fantasy land. Always “we are getting closer” or “nice trend”. 
 

This kind of pissing and moaning for a real threat vanishing is one thing, but to be upset that the weenie hallucination disappeared is beyond ridiculous. 

Surprised I didn't make people salty saying I'm happy to get some LES from this.  The phantom synoptic event on the ECMWF messed up the Christmas Eve LES scenario by turning the wind too northerly as happened almost all last winter.  I think last year set a record for the number of completely snowless cold outbreaks here IMBY.  It made me understand Chicago people better.  Here in the snow belt cold usually comes with some snow but last year was really frustrating.