Winter Wizard

Spring is quickly approaching the DC area! "In parts of the Southeast, this year's spring is the earliest in the 39-year record" https://www.usanpn.org/news/spring

To add insult to injury, places such as Midland, TX and Oklahoma City are currently under winter storm watches and are likely to blow away our seasonal totals over the coming days.

13/-7 in Natick. Visiting the area for AMS and family so this will be my first New England winter storm.

For once l’ll be rooting against the snow since I have a flight back from Boston tomorrow afternoon. Would be pretty fitting for my flight to get canceled or delayed coming back from a weather conference. Only supposed to get a few inches up here though so not worth being a weenie and rooting for a cancellation.

I grew up very close to the high elevation spot and in marginal events, there can be a significant difference between my house and ILG. Best recent example I can think of is 2/3/14 where I received over 4 inches and the airport barely got 1. In the last winter I measured every event in North Wilmington (2014-15), I received about 30% more snow than the airport over the season. That being said, I do understand @RevWarReenactor's frustration about the area because that area is often painstakingly close to bigger events but ends up on the wrong side of the gradient. @psuhoffman outlined this before with Miller Bs, but it's true for mixed events and southern sliders too. Mdecoy's situation is a bit worse than mine was when I lived in DE, but I still missed out on events such as 2/1994, 12/1995, 12/14/13, and 3/4/19 by maybe 20 miles. Meanwhile storms like 1/30/10, both March 2014 storms, 2/16/15, and 1/13/19 were advisory level storms while downstate and the DMV got crushed. Delaware is also pretty susceptible to dry slotting during big Miller As, which was most evident in the Blizzard of 2016 when NCC was a relative minima compared to the surrounding areas.

Annapolis, MD: 11/12: T 12/11: 0.2" 12/16: 0.1” 1/7: 1.0” TOTAL: 1.3”

This one has I'm sure been overshadowed by more recent storms, but 10 years ago today, this was an all timer for Long Island and the mid-Atlantic and MECS for NYC.

Annapolis, MD: 11/12: T 12/11: 0.2" (from coworker) TOTAL: 0.2"

BWI: 23.2" DCA: 13.7" IAD: 25.1" RIC: 10.8" Tiebreaker SBY: 10.3"

DCA: +5.5 and 0.25", good for 2nd warmest and 3rd driest IAD: +4.6 and 0.41", good for 3rd warmest and 2nd driest

Yup that one was a coastal that was way too far east for us. But brought a swath of 6+" to Norfolk/Virginia Beach to Chincoteague as well as eastern Long Island and Mass. Looks like DC didn't even see flakes from that one.

That was a backloaded winter if anything, which is typical of weak El Ninos. DCA temps and snowfall by month: DEC: +0.4 (0.1") JAN: +0.1 (6.4") FEB: +0.6 (5.2") MAR: -3.7 (0.8") Big storms that winter were the KU in January 2005 and back to back coastal storms in late Feb. January 2005 was a classic Miller B screwjob for the DC/Baltimore metro that crushed everyone north and east of Cecil. February 24-25 was a fast moving coastal that brought a wide swath of 6+" to Maryland east of DC although DC itself was a relative min. I don't recall the exact details of February 28-March 1, but I believe this was a storm where the primary low redeveloped too late, which kept the heaviest the snow well north and east of the metro. So as a result, it ended up being an average winter for DC and Baltimore, above average for Philly and NYC, and an all timer for Long Island and SNE including Boston.

BWI: 11/7 IAD: 11/7 DCA: 11/25 RIC: 12/2 Tierbreaker: 10.24"

Going to be out storm chasing in the Plains from 5/7 to 5/17. Pattern isn't the most favorable, but should still get a few solid chase days in.