Winter Wizard

With regard to the AO and Nina winters, there have been 41 -AO winters since 1950-51. Among those 41, 11 occurred during La Nina years, 14 occurred during El Nino, and 16 in ENSO-neutral. By percentage, this comes out to, 52.3% of La Nina years (11/21), 53.8% of El Nino years (14/26), and 69.5% (16/23) ENSO-neutral winters. Among those 21 La Nina years at DCA, the average snowfall is 12.0", below the 1981-2010 average of 15.4". In +AO years, the average is just 8.8" with only one season (1971-1972) finishing above average (1999-2000 was exactly average). In -AO Nina years, the average is 14.4", however only 3 out of 11 featured above average snowfall. If you remove the massive outlier of 1995-96, the average falls to just 11.2". For BWI, those numbers don't get much better. In fact, they arguably paint a bleaker picture. Among those 21 La Nina years at BWI, the average snowfall is 16.0", below the 1981-2010 average of 20.1". In +AO years, the average is just 12.1" with only one season (1999-2000) finishing above average. In -AO Nina years, the average is 18.9", however only 1 out of 11 featured above average snowfall and it's, you guessed it, 1995-96. If you remove the massive outlier of 1995-96, the average falls to just 14.5". If you break it down by month, in Nina winters at DCA, 4/21 Decembers have seen above average snowfall (3/4 in -AO years), 7/21 Januarys (4/7 in -AO years), and 4/21 Februarys (2/4 in -AO years). At BWI, it's 7/21 Decembers (5/7 in -AO years), 8/21 Januarys (5/8 in -AO years), and 5/21 Februarys (4/5 in -AO years). Long story short, historically speaking, La Ninas are no bueno for the Mid-Atlantic, which should not come as a surprise. Clearly Atlantic blocking helps, as PSU outlined, but still an uphill battle from there. I'd be interested to see how the Pacific numbers shake up too - I imagine the +AO years had at least a semblance of +PNA/-EPO/-WPO.

Well this was a storm for the books here in Annapolis. I could clearly see the edge of the shelf cloud and rotation right in front of me. Some pretty extensive damage in Edgewater, which is a few minutes south of me. Full videos (2 parts) attached in this tweet

Last night’s flood event in Wilmington was statistically a once-every-1000-year flooding event. Insane. Scroll up in the thread for full video of the flooding. Can anyone recall what the stats were for rainfall intensity during the Elliott City floods?

Last night was officially considered a once-every-1000 year flooding event in Wilmington.

For reference, going back to 1950, average rainfall for the month of August in Wilmington is 3.79”. So if this is accurate, we just saw over a month’s worth of rainfall in 30 minutes. Incredible.

I don’t live in Wilmington anymore, but in 20 years of living in the area, I have never seen flooding this bad in my backyard. The entire backyard is now submerged. It’s a screenshot from a video, which I tweeted out, so sorry for the grainy quality.

I lived in Wilmington for 20 years and this is the worst flooding I’ve ever seen at my old house. Way worse than Irene, Sandy, Isaias, etc. apologies for the grainy pic, it’s a screenshot from a video. Most of the backyard is totally submerged and the basement is flooding. What a week of weather.

That storm near the Bay Bridge is no joke, just had some penny-sized hail here in Annapolis. A nice little surprise.

Ended up getting hit with an initial round of convection here in Annapolis before the main squall line went through. Part one actually had some pea-sized hail along with torrential downpours. Second one also had torrential downpours, but contained stronger winds. No reports of damage here, but friends in Rockville reported several downed trees in their neighborhood.

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.

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

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.