whitemountainhiker Posted January 23, 2011 Share Posted January 23, 2011 Simply beautiful. I thought it had to be -40 to get this stuff, but it is coming down this morning...2nd day in a row. Videos below!! THe vids don't do it justice, and I apologize for the "Fritz Wetherbee" Chronicle music on video 2. I can't stand that guy. :-p Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted January 23, 2011 Share Posted January 23, 2011 SImply beautiful. I thought it had to be -40 to get this stuff, but it is coming down this morning...2nd day in a row. I'm gonna try to get a video Nice! We seem to get it almost daily here during cold NW flow patterns. Last week we had several days with accumulating diamond dust snows under clear skies. The diamond dust usually leaves less than an inch, but sometimes it can be quite robust. I was skiing around with Tim Kelley of NECN for a few days last week, and we kept talking about how even under clear skies it continued to snow. By the end of the day your car had a fresh white coating on it even though the sun was shining all day long. When I see diamond dust, I think of awesome views. The true diamond dust under clear skies often brings out sun pillars, halos, rainbows, and all sorts of neat phenomena. This was last week... sun pillar from sun light reflecting off the tiny crystals in the air. Rainbow illuminating the ice crystals (diamond dust) in the sky... this stuff was coming down steadily and accumulating. Here's a good shot of the snowing under sunny skies. Visibility is reduced and it just continued to snow all day long with not a cloud in the sky. Temperatures were not all that cold. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Allenson Posted January 23, 2011 Share Posted January 23, 2011 Yup, here too this morning. It actually "piled up" to 0.3". As I mentioned in the NNE thread, I was hoping for a pillar this morning but the timing wasn't quite right. I did snap off one shot though. Can't see the dust falling but it's noticable on the trees: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
whitemountainhiker Posted January 23, 2011 Author Share Posted January 23, 2011 Oooh those 2nd and third pictures really show it! When I went to Lyndon State a few years ago, I remember seeing the snow with clear skies, and thought...geeez!! This place gets so much snow, that it even snows with clear skies. I didn't realize it was diamond dust, till quite awhile later. It is def more rare in Lebanon, but it does happen. I tried taking a picture of it, but it was difficult to do so. I got 2 videos loaded up, though I may have to youtube them to embed to this website. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
whitemountainhiker Posted January 23, 2011 Author Share Posted January 23, 2011 Yup, here too this morning. It actually "piled up" to 0.3". As I mentioned in the NNE thread, I was hoping for a pillar this morning but the timing wasn't quite right. I did snap off one shot though. Can't see the dust falling but it's noticable on the trees: Man, doesn't that look like your quintessential "freezing my tuckas off" winter picture from Northern New England! Overcast, snow cover, burr. I find that I feel colder when its sub zero then when it is clear skies. Perhaps its psychological, since I am always in the dumps on a cloudy winter day. This is as close as I could get to diamond dust in a picture this morning. You can barely see it.....just the yellow orange flecks in the pic. Not very good... SOmewhere within my tens of thousands of pictures, I think I may have some clearer shots of it. I'll look. And I'm going to upload the 2 vids I took Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted January 23, 2011 Share Posted January 23, 2011 Yup, here too this morning. It actually "piled up" to 0.3". As I mentioned in the NNE thread, I was hoping for a pillar this morning but the timing wasn't quite right. I did snap off one shot though. Can't see the dust falling but it's noticable on the trees: Yeah, everytime I notice diamond dust in the pre-dawn darkness, I always make sure to be available around sunrise to look for a pillar. And like you, even if there isn't a pillar, drinking hot coffee and watching the sun rise over a beautiful landscape isn't the worst way to spend a morning. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted January 23, 2011 Share Posted January 23, 2011 SOmewhere within my tens of thousands of pictures, I think I may have some clearer shots of it. I'll look. And I'm going to upload the 2 vids I took Yeah you can see it in that picture... diamond dust is one of the hardest wintertime phenomena to capture on camera. I've tried so many times and yet that's why last week I had to use the sunlight reflecting and refracting (not sure exactly which one each optical phenomenon is) off the diamond dust to show it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
whitemountainhiker Posted January 23, 2011 Author Share Posted January 23, 2011 Here is one from Chester NH. I'm sure its happened a little more than I can remember, but this was the 2nd time I saw it there, and I lived there for 20 years Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Allenson Posted January 23, 2011 Share Posted January 23, 2011 Nice shots, dudes. I always like the DD too--very cool to see, all cold, crystaline and sparkly. Anyway, it's all done here now--bright blue skies overhead atm. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OKpowdah Posted January 23, 2011 Share Posted January 23, 2011 Dusting this morning in Keene. Reminds of Jan 2004 -- woke up to a dusting every single morning. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DeVries Posted January 23, 2011 Share Posted January 23, 2011 That's cool. Heard of it, but not sure I've ever seen it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
whitemountainhiker Posted January 23, 2011 Author Share Posted January 23, 2011 Nice shots, dudes. I always like the DD too--very cool to see, all cold, crystaline and sparkly. Anyway, it's all done here now--bright blue skies overhead atm. Yup, all done here as well. If anyone else has pictures or video, post away. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dendrite Posted January 23, 2011 Share Posted January 23, 2011 You have to be careful though. Not all flakes falling from the sky with the sun shining are diamond dust (IC). I lived near Chester for 23 years and never witnessed it once in Auburn (although there was one cold morning in 1994 that may have...CON had IC). I did witness it on a clear cold night (-27F) in MN once. It has to be cold enough for water vapor to spontaneously form into ice so that's generally why it has to be -25C or colder. Very clean air usually requires -35C or colder, but when you start threatening -25C in the US you can see it too since there are more smaller particles in the air to act as condensation (deposition) nuclei. The other day I had some light snow with mostly bluish skies. Clear air mode picked up on the light echoes and the blue sky had a very faint milky appearance indicating an extremely thin cloud and there were a few cumulus around. The midlevels were squeezing out every last bit of moisture we could and we had prime growth by deposition. I don't consider that IC though as I believe temps were in the 10Fs. Today GYX radar is picking up on the faint -SN as well from a disturbance ushering in the coldest air of the season as well. I'm a little over 60 miles from the radar site so the 0.5deg tilt is over 2500ft above my location. IC tend to occur under 1000ft AGL. In other words, at my location from GYX they would easily be under the beam. IC vs -SN can be a grey area though. I'm still hoping to see the classic case of it here in NH like I saw in MN. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Allenson Posted January 23, 2011 Share Posted January 23, 2011 ^ Thanks for the write-up, Dendrite. Great explanation. I reckon we were just having light snow then.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HoarfrostHubb Posted January 23, 2011 Share Posted January 23, 2011 I was having light snow this morning under clear skies, but not diamond dust. That video and the pics were great Thanks Dendrite for the explanation Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
whitemountainhiker Posted January 23, 2011 Author Share Posted January 23, 2011 You have to be careful though. Not all flakes falling from the sky with the sun shining are diamond dust (IC). I lived near Chester for 23 years and never witnessed it once in Auburn (although there was one cold morning in 1994 that may have...CON had IC). I did witness it on a clear cold night (-27F) in MN once. It has to be cold enough for water vapor to spontaneously form into ice so that's generally why it has to be -25C or colder. Very clean air usually requires -35C or colder, but when you start threatening -25C in the US you can see it too since there are more smaller particles in the air to act as condensation (deposition) nuclei. The other day I had some light snow with mostly bluish skies. Clear air mode picked up on the light echoes and the blue sky had a very faint milky appearance indicating an extremely thin cloud and there were a few cumulus around. The midlevels were squeezing out every last bit of moisture we could and we had prime growth by deposition. I don't consider that IC though as I believe temps were in the 10Fs. Today GYX radar is picking up on the faint -SN as well from a disturbance ushering in the coldest air of the season as well. I'm a little over 60 miles from the radar site so the 0.5deg tilt is over 2500ft above my location. IC tend to occur under 1000ft AGL. In other words, at my location from GYX they would easily be under the beam. IC vs -SN can be a grey area though. I'm still hoping to see the classic case of it here in NH like I saw in MN. This is exactly why I was surprised to see this two days in a row here in Lebanon, and wasn't sure if it was diamond dust or not.... The times in Chester were extremely weird. I remember when I was 8 years old, there were these crystals that appeared to be suspended in the air, totally clear sky. I remember this so well because that was when I was really getting into the weather, and I was completely flabbergasted, because snow with clear sky made no sense to me. And MAN was it ever cold that morning...def below zero. The picture I put up was from Jan of 2005 around 7:30am. Those also appeared to be somewhat suspended in the air, and just kinda floating around. Is there a place where I can find METARS from previous hours for Lebanon? I think it has been "overcast" but if you were here, you could see that there was a very low cloud, with blue above it. I read somewhere that IC can fool the automated stations to thinking its overcast. If this wasn't the true diamond dust, I hope that we see something like this tomorrow morning, since the lows are expected to drop so damn much. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dendrite Posted January 23, 2011 Share Posted January 23, 2011 This is exactly why I was surprised to see this two days in a row here in Lebanon, and wasn't sure if it was diamond dust or not.... The times in Chester were extremely weird. I remember when I was 8 years old, there were these crystals that appeared to be suspended in the air, totally clear sky. I remember this so well because that was when I was really getting into the weather, and I was completely flabbergasted, because snow with clear sky made no sense to me. And MAN was it ever cold that morning...def below zero. The picture I put up was from Jan of 2005 around 7:30am. Those also appeared to be somewhat suspended in the air, and just kinda floating around. Is there a place where I can find METARS from previous hours for Lebanon? I think it has been "overcast" but if you were here, you could see that there was a very low cloud, with blue above it. I read somewhere that IC can fool the automated stations to thinking its overcast. If this wasn't the true diamond dust, I hope that we see something like this tomorrow morning, since the lows are expected to drop so damn much. Well I'm not saying what you had at LEB this morning wasn't IC. Same for Chester for that matter. I just wanted to throw that disclaimer out there. LEB got below -20C and in the river valley you can trap some smoke particles under the inversion that can help enhance the effect at relatively warmer temperatures. The snow crystals were extremely small this morning. Mostly columns and bullets. The ASOS sensors struggled to even detect it. If you view the last 24 or so METARs/SPECIs from sites you'll find a lot of reduced visibility obs with occasional -SN and HZ. In truth it was just these very fine crystals falling. I also had blue showing throughout the sky this morning with the sun shining while the crystals fell. I consider what fell here as -SN and not IC though. The high res NMM on the past 2 runs has had some -SN during the morning today. There's a weak inverted trough over the area and a vortmax plowing through right about now at H5 in advance of the low level CAA coming in. Even though cloudiness in sparse it's enough to create a little lift and squeeze out some light snows. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
whitemountainhiker Posted January 23, 2011 Author Share Posted January 23, 2011 Well I'm not saying what you had at LEB this morning wasn't IC. Same for Chester for that matter. I just wanted to throw that disclaimer out there. LEB got below -20C and in the river valley you can trap some smoke particles under the inversion that can help enhance the effect at relatively warmer temperatures. The snow crystals were extremely small this morning. Mostly columns and bullets. The ASOS sensors struggled to even detect it. If you view the last 24 or so METARs/SPECIs from sites you'll find a lot of reduced visibility obs with occasional -SN and HZ. In truth it was just these very fine crystals falling. I also had blue showing throughout the sky this morning with the sun shining while the crystals fell. I consider what fell here as -SN and not IC though. The high res NMM on the past 2 runs has had some -SN during the morning today. There's a weak inverted trough over the area and a vortmax plowing through right about now at H5 in advance of the low level CAA coming in. Even though cloudiness in sparse it's enough to create a little lift and squeeze out some light snows. Interesting stuff, thanks for writing all this up. Do think Lebanon could hit -32 like the MAV MOS is predicting? That temp almost makes me nervous haha. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dendrite Posted January 23, 2011 Share Posted January 23, 2011 Interesting stuff, thanks for writing all this up. Do think Lebanon could hit -32 like the MAV MOS is predicting? That temp almost makes me nervous haha. It wouldn't shock me since MOS has you going near calm around 6z. I'm hoping for a 1/22/1984 although on that day the high crested over us with perfect timing to let the Merrimack River Valley radiate strongly all night too. CON hit -33F for one of their coldest temps on record. 12z 850s that morning were only about -17C to -18C too. I'll see if I can find an archived sounding for that morning. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hvysnow79 Posted January 23, 2011 Share Posted January 23, 2011 Is there a place where I can find METARS from previous hours for Lebanon? I think it has been "overcast" but if you were here, you could see that there was a very low cloud, with blue above it. I read somewhere that IC can fool the automated stations to thinking its overcast. http://www.wrh.noaa....er=off&sid=KLEB Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mattb65 Posted January 24, 2011 Share Posted January 24, 2011 I was up near Killington this morning and saw the teeniest flakes dusting up everything under a blue sky - definitely confusing but I'm glad to see this thread. At first I thought it was just blowing off the trees but it was even coming down in clear areas and it really reflected the sun brilliantly. Only other time I ever saw anything like this was skiing out in Utah on a really cold morning. Beautiful! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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