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Capital Weather Gang - 2015-16 Winter Outlook


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And if not for a pattern change giving you a terd and us a bone, there could have been a bloody war between our areas! Lol

 

LOL

I'll be rooting for you guys this year.

Tons of good people I met at those conferences.

I don't usually post much but I was in Boston that winter and man I don't think that 3 week stretch will ever be topped for me.  

 

Just moved to DC this year, so good to see some familiar faces in this subforum  :lol:

Glad you got to experience that, man.

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Having been on the forums for over a decade now...the unwritten etiquette of posting in another region's thread (or subforum)sort of goes like this:

 

1. Don't tell them they've had a great winter if you have and they haven't. (i.e. actually research how they have done if you weren't paying attention)

2. Know the climo of that region if you are going to post about their weather, model solutions, snow chances, etc.

3. Don't say you wish the next storm will hit them and miss you because everyone will know you are lying....root for them to steal their snow from North Carolina or something or root for an all-inclusive storm

 

Well, this is pretty much it, I think.  The 3rd point is probably what almost everyone here and in other forums feels, if we're honest with ourselves!  I think one of the biggest "breaches of etiquette" I've seen here was from the non-event March 6, 2013 storm.  As many here know, we had gone through two-plus years of not having a single event give us more than 2".  That storm looked so much like it would break the streak and end that bad winter on a high note at least.  We ended up with white rain, while outside of Richmond, they got several inches or so...then Boston got a foot as I recall.  Of course, everyone here was mourning that event and pretty upset, then someone from the Richmond area (I think?) posted an image of Nelson from the "Simpsons" saying "HA-HA!!!"  In hindsight (and even at the time) it was kind of funny, but it was pretty rude and unnecessary.  At the same time, I don't like seeing people from this forum getting "in your face" to those in SNE or NY when they get screwed or when we do well and they get fringed (I saw some comments like that in 2010).

 

Personally, if we do well here in the mid-Atlantic and DC area in a storm and get, say, 12"  or so...I don't much care if Boston or New York, or somewhere else farther north with better climo gets 25-30" out of it.  I won't be sitting here getting pissed off that somewhere else got double what we did in a case like that.  It would be nice to have a "coastal runner" that hammers most everyone, sort of like PD-II (is that the last real event we had like that?).  And personally, I "lurked" up in the SNE forum during one of their blizzards this past year and one from a couple years back (Feb. 2013??), mostly out of interest.  Nothing was happening here of course, but reading the comments and looking at some of those photos was pretty incredible.  Almost like watching a historical event take place live (in a meteorological sense!).

 

What I think a lot of people get crushed by is getting rain while not far away someone is getting buried, especially when the winter is going poorly and that might be the only real chance.  Or something like the Boxing Day 2010 storm where it seemed like everyone shared and we got a dusting (and wasted cold air/good pattern that month!).  I imagine Feb. 2010 was similar for the Boston folks, though they at least got decent snow that winter I believe(?).  That's partly the thing here, why many get very sensitive:  a "meh" to not so great winter up there is (to us?) still not all that bad and not like it would be a near-shutout.  In this area, it would be a single-digit snowfall or worse kind of winter.  Again, an artifact of climatology I suppose...I'm sure the standard deviation around the mean in BOS is much less than DCA/BWI/IAD.  In Cleveland where I grew up, even a mediocre winter is almost guaranteed to produce something good at some point (partly thanks to lake effect!); again, the SD around the mean is not nearly as large as here, and the variance from year to year is not either.

 

Sorry for the long-winded post!

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Yea, as brutal as Feb 2010 was here, I was glued to this sub forum.

You guys being further south can get some moisture laden juggernauts.

 

True, though unfortunately a good number of our  moisture laden juggernauts here occur when it's 35-40 degrees...and rain! :lol:

 

It's a weird contrast.  In my experience living in northeast Ohio, we got many 4-8" or 6-12" type of storms and plenty of brutal cold.  But until I came here to the DC area, I never witnessed a synoptic-scale 20"+ event (and in my time here I've now experienced 3 such storms since 2001).  And believe me, I lived through some of the worst (or should I say, best?) winter storms in Ohio's history.  That includes the blizzard of Jan. 26-27, 1978, which did not dump an excessive amount of snow but still in my mind was the most severe event of its type that I've lived through (near 100MPH wind gusts and temperatures in the single digits).  Those kinds of huge amounts of snow just simply do not occur in Ohio, or I should more accurately say that it is extremely rare, perhaps even more rare than here in the mid-Atlantic (certainly more rare than it is in New England).  The possible exception to this would be lake effect events, but those are not synoptic scale.

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True, though unfortunately a good number of our  moisture laden juggernauts here occur when it's 35-40 degrees...and rain! :lol:

 

It's a weird contrast.  In my experience living in northeast Ohio, we got many 4-8" or 6-12" type of storms and plenty of brutal cold.  But until I came here to the DC area, I never witnessed a synoptic-scale 20"+ event (and in my time here I've now experienced 3 such storms since 2001).  And believe me, I lived through some of the worst (or should I say, best?) winter storms in Ohio's history.  That includes the blizzard of Jan. 26-27, 1978, which did not dump an excessive amount of snow but still in my mind was the most severe event of its type that I've lived through (near 100MPH wind gusts and temperatures in the single digits).  Those kinds of huge amounts of snow just simply do not occur in Ohio, or I should more accurately say that it is extremely rare, perhaps even more rare than here in the mid-Atlantic (certainly more rare than it is in New England).  The possible exception to this would be lake effect events, but those are not synoptic scale.

 

 

Remember the blizzard of 78 well.  Was a sophomore in HS in my home town of 5500 people about 15 miles North of Dayton, in the part of Ohio that gets REALLY flat and windy.  Remember the night before the blizzard working with my dad on our airplane and the barometer in the altimeter was dropping like a rock.  Could adjust the altitude every 5 mins while the rain poured outside and the wind picked up.  Woke up the next morning about 6 am wondering what the sound was outside (the wind).  Tried to look out the windows but they were all snowed over on that side of the house from the flash freeze that took place about 2am.  Was nearly whiteout in town and completely whiteout outside of town.  Like you, it was the wind and cold that I remember the most. 

 

My dad (local paramedic), the town's volunteer fire dept, the city police and city maintenance crews all assembled at our little firehouse to develop the response plan.  The local farm/construction equipment dealer came into town with an enormous case front end loader with a 14 foot blade and chains.  Our department got our 6wd rescue squad, a few SUVs manned by the sherrif and a couple of snowmobiles to go out in the storm to rescue people who were loosing power (we had two snowmobiles of our own at home).  They made trips out all day as the blizzard roared all day.  That night, things really started getting bad as even more people started loosing power and fuel oil as the temps dropped well below zero.  My dad helped delivered a baby in the back of the rescue squad along the way as the rescue entourage evacuated countless others to bring them into town. 

 

We had a family of 6 stay in our house for nearly a week, along with a couple stranded commuters and an area farmer who stayed a couple days.  We had plenty of food in our freezer chest in the basement and that came in handy.  Everyone in town just chipped in and helped each other out and opened their houses to those from the more rural areas who were less fortunate.  That's what we do in the USA as everyone knows... 

 

In some places even the big Case FEL could not forge a path through the drifts.  Some of the area roads were completely impassable for nearly a week until the snow blowers from Wright Patterson AFB came out to do what only a big snowblower can do.  But that wind, the cold and the duration of 36 hours plus....  That's what I remember.  We only got about 14" of snow around Dayton, but the drifts in the rural areas were 10 feet+ in areas.

 

It was 3 or 4 days before the main state routes were open enough to get food shipments into town.  Side roads were still largely impassible until about 5 days after.  In many areas farmers resorted to horses to get out and that was iffy with the drifts.  People were starting to get up tight until those food deliveries came in.  Makes you wonder what would happen around here if we had a really debilitating HECS.  Not a good snow that gets us exciting, but a really cataclysmic event.  I've lived here since 85 and while Feb 2010 was a good snow maker along with a great snow year, would not consider it even remotely close to 78 from a disabling perspective.  If we had something here with 20" and 80mph winds with sub zero temps, the net impact could be or would be cataclysmic, especially when people start getting cold and hungry.  Does anyone know how many trucks of food come into the Wash-Baltimore metropolitan area on a daily basis just to keep pace with consumer needs?  Would probably boggle our minds if we really knew. 

 

(mods - my apology if this should be over in banter...)

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Remember the blizzard of 78 well.  Was a sophomore in HS in my home town of 5500 people about 15 miles North of Dayton, in the part of Ohio that gets REALLY flat and windy.  Remember the night before the blizzard working with my dad on our airplane and the barometer in the altimeter was dropping like a rock.  Could adjust the altitude every 5 mins while the rain poured outside and the wind picked up.  Woke up the next morning about 6 am wondering what the sound was outside (the wind).  Tried to look out the windows but they were all snowed over on that side of the house from the flash freeze that took place about 2am.  Was nearly whiteout in town and completely whiteout outside of town.  Like you, it was the wind and cold that I remember the most. 

 

...

 

Yeah, sorry to continue the banter here (honest!), but it's nice to see someone else who recalls that same storm this many years later!  Your recollection and story are pretty interesting.  I think the Dayton area (actually much of western OH) got more snow since they were west of the low plus there was an enhanced convergence zone there.  In northeast OH we got on the order of 6-10" on top of several inches of old snow.  The low essentially went right over KCLE and it was intensifying rapidly as it moved through the state...bombing out over 40 mb in about 24 hours, to ~957mb as it crossed Lake Erie.  I also recall the day and evening before, it was rather balmy (well, upper 30s or 40s) with drizzle.  They had blizzard watches up that night, and given the conditions it seemed very surreal.  I was awakened by the wind sometime pre-dawn, looked outside...it was raining and this streetlight nearby was wavering back and forth.  Woke up a couple hours later and it was a white-out.  I read somewhere that the temperature dropped 30 degrees in 2 hours.  The drifts were incredible in many places, even without an extreme amount of snow.

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Yeah, sorry to continue the banter here (honest!), but it's nice to see someone else who recalls that same storm this many years later!  Your recollection and story are pretty interesting.  I think the Dayton area (actually much of western OH) got more snow since they were west of the low plus there was an enhanced convergence zone there.  In northeast OH we got on the order of 6-10" on top of several inches of old snow.  The low essentially went right over KCLE and it was intensifying rapidly as it moved through the state...bombing out over 40 mb in about 24 hours, to ~957mb as it crossed Lake Erie.  I also recall the day and evening before, it was rather balmy (well, upper 30s or 40s) with drizzle.  They had blizzard watches up that night, and given the conditions it seemed very surreal.  I was awakened by the wind sometime pre-dawn, looked outside...it was raining and this streetlight nearby was wavering back and forth.  Woke up a couple hours later and it was a white-out.  I read somewhere that the temperature dropped 30 degrees in 2 hours.  The drifts were incredible in many places, even without an extreme amount of snow.

 

 

Always great to hear personal accounts of the January 78 storm.  It was before my time but I've kinda become obsessed with it lol.  Here's a map of snow totals:

 

 

post-14-0-26042000-1447738841_thumb.png

 

 

(sorry for the OT)

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Can you say mass weenie suicides? He predicted the first one inch snowfall at DCA on January 17th lol.

I almost needed to open the Panic Room for a rant because the anchors were cheering on a bull**** winter :lol:

Humans naturally dislike snow. We're tropical.

All us snow lovers have a mental disorder ;)

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Always great to hear personal accounts of the January 78 storm.  It was before my time but I've kinda become obsessed with it lol.  Here's a map of snow totals:

 

 

attachicon.gifjan78snow.png

 

 

(sorry for the OT)

 

 

Great map - never seen that in all my years before now.  Thanks!

 

My home town is in the little finger of dark green 10-15" on the SE corner of the big blob of dark green - New Carlisle in western Clark County.  Recall they said we got about 12".  But again, it was the wind, cold and combined intensity of it all. From just north of our town up through Northern Ohio around Defiance, Sidney and Lima they really got sacked from the wind and deeper snow amounts.  Same for Northern Indiana.  Flat as a pancake up there with just open fields and nothing to break the wind at all.  The governor of Ohio activated the National Guard who used helicopters to rescue people and make drops of hay and alfalfa to stranded farmers with livestock starving.  While Michigan got more snow, don't recall them having it as bad as Ohio and Indiana (fewer people up their North of Detroit and they are used to getting much more snow), but this was before CNN and Twitter etc when news was more localized except for Walter Cronkite.  Hit me up on the private side if you'd like to hear more.  Thanks..

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Great map - never seen that in all my years before now.  Thanks!

 

My home town is in the little finger of dark green 10-15" on the SE corner of the big blob of dark green - New Carlisle in western Clark County.  Recall they said we got about 12".  But again, it was the wind, cold and combined intensity of it all. From just north of our town up through Northern Ohio around Defiance, Sidney and Lima they really got sacked from the wind and deeper snow amounts.  Same for Northern Indiana.  Flat as a pancake up there with just open fields and nothing to break the wind at all.  The governor of Ohio activated the National Guard who used helicopters to rescue people and make drops of hay and alfalfa to stranded farmers with livestock starving.  While Michigan got more snow, don't recall them having it as bad as Ohio and Indiana (fewer people up their North of Detroit and they are used to getting much more snow), but this was before CNN and Twitter etc when news was more localized except for Walter Cronkite.  Hit me up on the private side if you'd like to hear more.  Thanks..

 

 

The storm was so wrapped up that much colder air existed farther south in Indiana/Ohio as compared to Michigan, so I think that combined with Michigan being a more snowy place is what made the impact worse farther south.  And yeah, I will hit you up privately.  :D

 

BTW, as this may be of general interest, that map that I posted was generated here.  It's free to register, and you can get maps for other areas of the country too:

 

http://mrcc.isws.illinois.edu/CLIMATE/

 

(Go to maps of data ---> Interpolated station data)

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The storm was so wrapped up that much colder air existed farther south in Indiana/Ohio as compared to Michigan, so I think that combined with Michigan being a more snowy place is what made the impact worse farther south.  And yeah, I will hit you up privately.  :D

 

BTW, as this may be of general interest, that map that I posted was generated here.  It's free to register, and you can get maps for other areas of the country too:

 

http://mrcc.isws.illinois.edu/CLIMATE/

 

(Go to maps of data ---> Interpolated station data)

 

Yeah, due to the intense circulation, that storm actually had an unusual southwest moving warm front which rotated through Michigan into Indiana.  It enhanced the uplift and resulting snow in that region.

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Humans naturally dislike snow. We're tropical.

All us snow lovers have a mental disorder ;)

 

Now wait just a minute there!  On second thought...that's absolutely correct! :D  I've gone out several times at night to take measurements and photos during events like Snowmageddon and so on.  I'm sure there were people wondering who the nut-case was wandering around in the snow in the middle of the night, with a yardstick and camera!

 

The Topper Shutt forecast doesn't seem all that surprising, and is actually pretty similar to CWG's from what it sounds like.

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True, though unfortunately a good number of our  moisture laden juggernauts here occur when it's 35-40 degrees...and rain! :lol:

 

It's a weird contrast.  In my experience living in northeast Ohio, we got many 4-8" or 6-12" type of storms and plenty of brutal cold.  But until I came here to the DC area, I never witnessed a synoptic-scale 20"+ event (and in my time here I've now experienced 3 such storms since 2001).  And believe me, I lived through some of the worst (or should I say, best?) winter storms in Ohio's history.  That includes the blizzard of Jan. 26-27, 1978, which did not dump an excessive amount of snow but still in my mind was the most severe event of its type that I've lived through (near 100MPH wind gusts and temperatures in the single digits).  Those kinds of huge amounts of snow just simply do not occur in Ohio, or I should more accurately say that it is extremely rare, perhaps even more rare than here in the mid-Atlantic (certainly more rare than it is in New England).  The possible exception to this would be lake effect events, but those are not synoptic scale.

 

I experienced first hand both the bizzard of '78 and the March '08 record 21" snowfall in Columbus.  Columbus only received around 7" of snow in the '78 blizzard.

 

The March '08 21" of snow was cool, it was disruptive, it happened on a Saturday and everything was pretty much back to normal by Monday/Tuesday.  The blizzard was a whole different animal despite it's relatively meager snow amount.  It hit like a wall overnight Wednesday into the predawn hours of Thursday.  From a foggy, drizzly, mild day to roaring winds, white out, and flash freeze. (imagine the June 29, 2012 derecho with single digits, white out conditions, and drawn out over 12 hours).  

 

We were off school the entire following week. 51 people died state wide, 70 total throughout the region, half of those were stranded motorists.  Roofs were torn off houses and buildings, windows blown out, and massive devastation to livestock and agriculture.  I read that there was a species of bird (type of wren), that was totally wiped out and the Ohio quail population took a 90% hit and still to this day hasn't recovered to pre-blizzard numbers.

 

We were without power and were living in a subdivision where the houses were fairly close.   My folks decided to go spend the day at the neighbors and I still remember that short 50' walk to the neighbors house in the middle of a whiteout...every vivid detail. You had no idea if it was snowing or not....it wasn't until years later that I looked back at the actual stats and couldn't believe only 7" of snow had fallen across Columbus.

 

The difference between 6" or 24" of snow becomes irrelevant when you are an hour southwest of a storm center that bombs to 958mb, in the heart of winter, with hurricane force wind gusts and temps in the single digits.  

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I experienced first hand both the bizzard of '78 and the March '08 record 21" snowfall in Columbus.  Columbus only received around 7" of snow in the '78 blizzard.

 

The March '08 21" of snow was cool, it was disruptive, it happened on a Saturday and everything was pretty much back to normal by Monday/Tuesday.  The blizzard was a whole different animal despite it's relatively meager snow amount.  It hit like a wall overnight Wednesday into the predawn hours of Thursday.  From a foggy, drizzly, mild day to roaring winds, white out, and flash freeze. (imagine the June 29, 2012 derecho with single digits, white out conditions, and drawn out over 12 hours).  

 

We were off school the entire following week. 51 people died state wide, 70 total throughout the region, half of those were stranded motorists.  Roofs were torn off houses and buildings, windows blown out, and massive devastation to livestock and agriculture.  I read that there was a species of bird (type of wren), that was totally wiped out and the Ohio quail population took a 90% hit and still to this day hasn't recovered to pre-blizzard numbers.

 

We were without power and were living in a subdivision where the houses were fairly close.   My folks decided to go spend the day at the neighbors and I still remember that short 50' walk to the neighbors house in the middle of a whiteout...every vivid detail. You had no idea if it was snowing or not....it wasn't until years later that I looked back at the actual stats and couldn't believe only 7" of snow had fallen across Columbus.

 

The difference between 6" or 24" of snow becomes irrelevant when you are an hour southwest of a storm center that bombs to 958mb, in the heart of winter, with hurricane force wind gusts and temps in the single digits.  

 

Hey Buckeye,

 

     Yup - you nailed it.  As Hoosier and I were talking, it was the wind and the cold that I remember the most as well.  Despite being in some pretty intense snows here in the USA, in Europe, Japan and New Zealand, the only other time I've ever experienced true white out conditions was on the Hintertux glacier in Austria one July in 1989 (yes, a true whiteout while Summer skiing in July!).  A freak squall came in with a front and in 10 minutes it went from party sunny with a few clouds to intense snow and wind with total white out conditions.  We had to just stop where we were on the slopes because it was too intense and couldn't see a thing - nothing.  Only lasted about 20 minutes and then the sun came back out again, but it was unbelievably intense. 

 

   People all around were freaking out on the slopes.  You could hear them, but not see them.  I'm a very experienced skier with lots of back-country time and it was so whiteout I could not see the tips of my skis. After a while I got vertigo and didn't realize it and did not know I was falling over until my head hit the slope (only time that's happened and don't care to experience it again, ever).  Two friends I was skiing with (also experienced skiers) were less than 10 feet away and we could talk to each other, but only occasionally get a glimpse of each other.  That was the only time I've experience a more intense whiteout than 78.  In 78 at least you got a break now and then when the wind went from 70 to 45 before surging again. 

 

   Remember the livestock issues too where the National Guard dropped hay and alfalfa to stranded farmers.  Don't remember how many cattle were lost, but it was a bunch.  Then the prolonged cold that set in afterwards.  Believe we had -28F and went nearly a month without it getting above freezing.  Had problems with water mains breaking around town.  In Ohio, foundations must go down 4 feet below grade to protect from frost heave and settling, compared to only 2 feet here in NVA.  That year the ground froze down to 5 feet or more in some places and a lot of people had problems with cracked foundations and other issues, to include our house which was built in 1880. 

 

    Can't contemplate the impact of something like 78 hitting a major metropolitan area these days.  Especially one not one equipped to deal with it.  Here in DC, it would be a catastrophe.  Maybe that would help weed out some of the weenie bureaucrats we have running around there mucking things up....

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I experienced first hand both the bizzard of '78 and the March '08 record 21" snowfall in Columbus. Columbus only received around 7" of snow in the '78 blizzard.

The March '08 21" of snow was cool, it was disruptive, it happened on a Saturday and everything was pretty much back to normal by Monday/Tuesday. The blizzard was a whole different animal despite it's relatively meager snow amount. It hit like a wall overnight Wednesday into the predawn hours of Thursday. From a foggy, drizzly, mild day to roaring winds, white out, and flash freeze. (imagine the June 29, 2012 derecho with single digits, white out conditions, and drawn out over 12 hours).

We were off school the entire following week. 51 people died state wide, 70 total throughout the region, half of those were stranded motorists. Roofs were torn off houses and buildings, windows blown out, and massive devastation to livestock and agriculture. I read that there was a species of bird (type of wren), that was totally wiped out and the Ohio quail population took a 90% hit and still to this day hasn't recovered to pre-blizzard numbers.

We were without power and were living in a subdivision where the houses were fairly close. My folks decided to go spend the day at the neighbors and I still remember that short 50' walk to the neighbors house in the middle of a whiteout...every vivid detail. You had no idea if it was snowing or not....it wasn't until years later that I looked back at the actual stats and couldn't believe only 7" of snow had fallen across Columbus.

The difference between 6" or 24" of snow becomes irrelevant when you are an hour southwest of a storm center that bombs to 958mb, in the heart of winter, with hurricane force wind gusts and temps in the single digits.

Great event for you guys for sure. Just a nasty rainstorm imby. Though I remember it as another one we missed. :(
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  • 2 weeks later...

Ma*t- Cosgrove is big on a major shift to colder and snowier in mid jan. I think over the years we have had about three highly touted mid winter pattern changes and in 2007 it did occur but I think the other two, including the infamous Vodka Cold, did not occur. Is this your recollection?

 

This is my recollection off top of my head in terms of pattern changes- 

 

1999-2000 - DT touted big February - never happened

2001-02 - Vodka cold - JB - never happened

2004-05 - Touted for early January - delayed, not denied

2005-06 - Big March - never happened

2006-07 - People were too quick with this one but happened as you mentioned

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