frostfern

Picked up an additional 7” last night with strongest lake effect band I have ever seen locally. I think most of it fell in a 4 hour period between 10pm and 2am. It was a bit lower ratio than normal lake effect. Definitely not 20:1. It came down so hard the flakes were riming. I could hear it hitting the window. Surprised there was no thunder. The weekly total is now over 20” and the ground depth average is now around 14.5” IMBY. Lots of drift variability though.

You don’t need to be anywhere near frostbite to feel that burning. Blood vessels in the extremities always constrict in response to cold and dilate in response to heat. The problem is very fast dilation from a constricted state is painful. Lots of immune response signalers collect in the cold extremities because low blood flow makes them vulnerable. Sudden return of blood activates all the accumulated immune signalers causing lots of burning, swelling, itching, and tingling. A problem I have is finding boots sized to not cut off circulation in my toes. I have super wide feet with a high arch and I’ve had problems with cold toes. Sometimes thicker socks make the problem worse by squeezing my toes even tighter. They also get very itchy after being numb for too long.

The grid forecast for GRR was 8-12 and only ended up with 8” at the very max. Still did fairly well given the duration of significant snow was really only 6 hours verses the 12 hours forecasted. The onset was delayed 2 hours by 850-700 dryness, the dry slot came early, then the lake-enhanced wraparound defo-band that was forecast for this morning never really materialized. Bummed I didn’t get double digits, but the lake effect fluff tonight will add plenty of depth. 15”+ depth seems very possible on top of the super solid 10” base I already have. It’s been a while since we’ve had that kind of depth. GRR is still advertising a convergence band near I-96 with up to a foot. Will see how it goes. It will be much lighter to shovel thankfully.

Exactly. Being directly under the surface low when it hasn’t fully occluded is never great. Maybe a clipper, bit a major southern stream system is going to be warm in the middle if the warm sector hasn’t fully occluded, which was the problem.

You know its coming down when it makes that soft hissing sound. Wish it would last all night.

Some proper rippage.

Getting ready for heavy band. Will get video.

I really doubt lake temperature has any significant impact on the track of winter storms. The lake only becomes an issue when temperatures are marginal to begin with. If the air coming over the lake was in the middle 20s, the warmth would boost snowfall. Milwaukee got a boost from the warmer lake temps. If the air is 32 to begin with, then raising the temp 3-4 degrees is a problem.

Nice heavy band overhead now with big flakes. Finally just barely starting to stick to the pavement. There is about .5” (and growing) on the cold surfaces.

5” from Tuesday settled and melted to around 3.5”. Tuesday was an overperfomer, just super wet and dense.

Moderate snow here, but accumulating very slowly because its a degree above freezing.

Its finally coming down at a decent rate here. Its a little granular though. Not really sleet but small grainy flakes.

This is frustrating. Doubts creeping in.

That confirms what the radar was showing. I noticed watching snowstorms over the years that changes between sleet and snow often go in cycles. New returns begin as sleet, then transition to heavy snow as the warm layer that temporarily moved in aloft gets lifted and cooled.

Normally that kind of thing would be caused by a collapsing MCS, but it moved west-to-east which is not the right direction. Its a mysterious thing.

That’s so weird. I can’t really speculate what the source is. Seems related to the brief drying that’s now filling back in. Looks a little sleety initially.

There is some dry over the Ohio valley too, N of the convection. I said N Illinois but I really meant the whole area. Just don’t like seeing the initial zone that clobbered Chicago shrink rather than expand.

Hope it does because at the rate its moving that dry bubble is going to be crossing lake michigan before the virga currently overhead reaches the ground. I know its way too early but these things make me pull my hair out.

Kind of upset about the big gap over N Illinois. Is convection robbing the moisture or what? It has to fill in once the low really starts deepening.

Ready 2 b bonecrushed.

Definitely lots of tree stickage. Thankfully the late-hanging leaves are all off by this time of year. I don’t know the species, but I have a few shrubby trees on the border of my yard that seem to hang on to their leaves until mid-December, and last year a bunch of branches broke off in the pre-Thanksgiving storm.

It was around 5” here in the grass, 4” on the driveway. I can confirm awful to shovel, especially after putting it off and driving on it. There was some light drizzle yesterday evening during the dry-slot lull, but it was ripping fat flakes the rest of time, even with temps around 33.

I picked up around 5” here, but it was quite variable. Places with lots of blacktop around didn’t accumulate as much compared to surrounding rural areas. Oddly, the rooftops of parked cars seemed to accumulate the most.

It looks heavy and wet followed by flash freeze and wind with lake effect white-outs. It will be the worst driving conditions in a long time no matter what the totals are. Any change-over to rain will just make the ice situation worse when the cold hits.