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3/1-2/15 Obs/Nowcasting


SR Airglow

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Yes - this drives me crazy. I try to report a representative sample of snow totals over the viewing area. It involves a tremendous amount of "weeding out" the weenie totals. 

 

Yeah, that's good you do that because they don't do that here. I've also seen them report live from a town and somehow report a total that wasn't in the PNS. God help us if that's the reporter measuring on a sidewalk..lol.

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I always chuckle how I'm almost always the lowest in Hartford County. Granted I'm not in a great area but some of the :weenie: snowfall obs out there are hilarious. I've channeled my inner Cweat and have driven around some of the nearby towns to verify that many numbers we get are inflated high.

but end of storm measurement is different than 6 hrs. Don't know why Coastal thought Staffordville was high pretty consistent, also Hammer Nailz,take a ride. I was there Sat,Tolland definitely has more OTG than Coventry and so does Vernon
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Yeah CoCoRAHS says either is OK - though 6hr is preferred. 

 

I do a hybrid since I'm frequently working during storms so I try to measure as close to every 6 hours as I can but it's more like evey 10 or something. 

 

I've always generally measured at the end of periods of snow.  I've never understood the arbitrariness of clearing a board every six hours.  Outside of having rate information it clearly does nothing but inflate the total of snow that fell.  Even if you're trying to capture rate information, six hours is too large a window to capture hourly data where rates may fluctuate every minute. 

 

I just don't see what's wrong with measuring when it stops snowing because that's what 99% of the population is going to look out and see and say that's what fell.  It also lets you compare data with measurements taken before that idea came about in the early 90s.

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I know Jeff a little bit and I know Metherb knows him. I will see if I/ we can get Jeff on here to defend himself to all the accusations. He's been doing this for many many years. I don't think he's making anything up. Hopefully he will come on here to defend against the accusers .

 

I've mentioned the board to him and suggested that he join but I haven't seen him.  I see hm every few months around town.  He's pretty active in the community.

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I've mentioned the board to him and suggested that he join but I haven't seen him.  I see hm every few months around town.  He's pretty active in the community.

I'm friends with him on FB and we communicate every now and then. I just sent him a PM . Hopefully he won't take what Ryan and others have said as too harsh. We'll see what his response is

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But the problem is that now your data may not jive if you only measure after the snow fell. If most now are doing it every 6 hrs, your total may be low Metherb. 

 

Yeah I know but I've been doing it for over 30 years and I'd rather be consistent.  I'm usually not that far off.  I was just lazy last night and went to bed and measured around 6:30 this morning with my usual AM ob.  Usually I would have measured last night when it stopped.

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I'm friends with him on FB and we communicate every now and then. I just sent him a PM . Hopefully he won't take what Ryan and others have said as too harsh. We'll see what his response is

 

What are you talking about? I haven't said a thing about him. 

 

You're honestly a jerk. 

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But the problem is that now your data may not jive if you only measure after the snow fell. If most now are doing it every 6 hrs, your total may be low Metherb. 

 

Yeah it's hard because besides the first order stations we have no idea how people are measuring. 

 

I normally rely on the CoCoRAHS and the coop stations to make lists to use on air. They seem far more accurate than the majority of reports we see in a PNS. 

 

I almost never see a report in a PNS that's up to date and say, "wow, that seems low" - but probably 1/3 or 1/2 reports I see I say, "hmm, that sounds high"

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I know Jeff a little bit and I know Metherb knows him. I will see if I/ we can get Jeff on here to defend himself to all the accusations. He's been doing this for many many years. I don't think he's making anything up. Hopefully he will come on here to defend against the accusers .

 

 

 

 

 

"Accusations"...lol. I said those reports are often on the higher end. That is a fact...not an opinion. As any person would do when performing diligent QC, that is a red flag.

 

Whether you like it or not or agree with or not, that is what the data says. Maybe he lives on a lot that the snow blows into...in that case, the measurements may be accurate, but not representative of the surrounding locals.

 

 

 

But keep up the drama queen antics.

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And now the latest thing in the media to do, is to rush to the "jackpot" town and report live from there. Another reason to weenie out the total.

How is that the latest thing?

Doesn't the weather channel send people out to where they think the highest totals will be ahead of time?  Even Ryan's crew was in Brooklyn before the Blizzard knowing that between here and Putnam was going to be a jackpot zone.

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How is that the latest thing?

Doesn't the weather channel send people out to where they think the highest totals will be ahead of time?  Even Ryan's crew was in Brooklyn before the Blizzard knowing that between here and Putnam was going to be a jackpot zone.

 

 

You see the highest total from the PNS reports on the news almost instantly when it comes out.

 

Example: The Lunenburg, MA totals were on TWC's list of the totals every time they came out and were at the top. There were no TV crews in Lunenburg.

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How is that the latest thing?

Doesn't the weather channel send people out to where they think the highest totals will be ahead of time?  Even Ryan's crew was in Brooklyn before the Blizzard knowing that between here and Putnam was going to be a jackpot zone.

 

This year especially I have noticed it in the Boston market. They report live and then have the total on the top corner. It just looks like a ratings thing now. 

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To Will's point...there's a lot of bad coop obs out there. Even from decades ago. I've seen a lot of monthly data where all of the anow totals are rounded off and the liquid equivalent is always a perfect 10:1...almost like they arbitrarily decided this looks like our "average" snow so it must be 10:1. So you end up with a lot of crap like 2.0/0.20" or 10.0/1.00".

 

I'd nominate Ft.Kent coop, at least when I lived there (1976-85.)  My first 5.7 seasons (moved on Jan 1) were at roughly the same elev. as the coop, and they averaged only 83% of what I recorded, only 89% of CAR, though in every winter the piles and pack looked deeper in FK than CAR.  The final 4 years I lived ina back settlement about 470' higher than the coop.  CAR snowfall those years was essentially identical (118.7 vs 118.3 for the earlier period) while FK snowfall dropped from 105" to 95".  Meanwhile, my avg jumped from 127" to 144".  Given the CAR status, my totals would probably have been 125"+ had I stayed down on the flats.  In any case, FK coop was significantly under-measuring - sometimes it looked as if they would use the change in snow depth as their snowfall record. 

 

Even good coops can have some apparently bad days.  Farmington's records go back to 1893 and there's less than 1% missing data, except for snow depth, for which records begin in 1941 and are occasionally missing in the 1950s and early 60s.  However, they have some very odd snowfall numbers for a few events since I moved to the town next door, in particular the blizzard of Dec. 6-7, 2003, about which I've ranted before.  The coop recorded 40" while I had 24" (and the New Sharon coop, a once-a-day measurer, 23".)  We were at church, 1.5 miles SE of and about 100' higher than the coop, less than 2 hr after accum snow ended that Sunday morning, and the stuff in the parking lot looked about the same depth as what I'd blown out of my driveway.  30" I could've swallowed; 40", no way.

 

Another big dump last night - 0.3". 

My observation time has been 9 PM since Jan 1976, and in the interest of maintaining a consistent record, I've continued to observe at that time, while adding the 7 AM obs for cocorahs, thus two potential measurements for snowfall per 24 hr.  On occasion I've taken an additional measurement during the day for an accurate account.  One example was the fluff surprise last Dec 13, when we had 2.7" of 25:1 feathers from 9A to noon.  Had I waited until 9P, that would've been about 1.5".

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How is that the latest thing?

Doesn't the weather channel send people out to where they think the highest totals will be ahead of time?  Even Ryan's crew was in Brooklyn before the Blizzard knowing that between here and Putnam was going to be a jackpot zone.

 

Yeah we generally will send crews to areas around the state that are highly populated and also the town that is forecast to "get the most" - same deal with the aftermath of a storm. 

 

My problem is when you look at TV weathercasts and all the snow totals listed on the screen are the highest numbers around and not a representative sample. 

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Yeah I know but I've been doing it for over 30 years and I'd rather be consistent.  I'm usually not that far off.  I was just lazy last night and went to bed and measured around 6:30 this morning with my usual AM ob.  Usually I would have measured last night when it stopped.

wow and you always do well, during the long duration events I do it otherwise this winter I would be a half foot lower with the three long events....I am not as much of a stickler with the 12 hour events etch, whether they admit it or not a lot of folks here are measuring at least every six hours
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You see the highest total from the PNS reports on the news almost instantly when it comes out.

 

Example: The Lunenburg, MA totals were on TWC's list of the totals every time they came out and were at the top. There were no TV crews in Lunenburg.

 

This year especially I have noticed it in the Boston market. They report live and then have the total on the top corner. It just looks like a ratings thing now. 

 

Yeah we generally will send crews to areas around the state that are highly populated and also the town that is forecast to "get the most" - same deal with the aftermath of a storm. 

 

My problem is when you look at TV weathercasts and all the snow totals listed on the screen are the highest numbers around and not a representative sample. 

I guess I always thought it was that way.  Been like that as far as I remember...  The snowfall totals being listed with largest amounts first.  Even BOX lists their totals from highest to lowest.

 

I can see the obvious downside to outsiders who see that Luneburg total for example and make the assumption that all of Mass got the same amount.   It is informational hype.  Throw out the biggest numbers first. Wow them with the heavy hotties, and go down from there.

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