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March 13-14, The Blizzard of 2017: Obs


Rtd208

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Pretty big bust for the I-95 corridor in terms of snowfall, but not in terms of total frozen precip, at least from maybe Trenton northward, where it hasn't been rain as far as I know. I had about 7" of snow/sleet on the ground about 90 minutes ago (7.5" now, with some compaction) and I shoveled the driveway at that point and 90 min later I now have about 2" of sleet on the driveway, which is the equivalent of about 6" of snow, so I have about 13" of "snow equivalent," in terms of total frozen precip mass, even if I only have 7.5" depth (partly due to compaction - the 7" + 2" sleet did not equal 9" depth, lol), which is just as hard to shovel or plow and is just as bad on the roads - it's just not the same depth it would be if it were all snow and maybe isn't as pretty. From a meteorological perspective, snow and sleet are just counted together, as depth, so it is more of a bust from that perspective. I'm guessing we should get another inch or two of sleet (3-6" snow equivalent, which would bring us to 16-19" of "snow equivalent" mass) unless it changes to rain, although it's still just 29F, so that's unlikely - and if it does, it would be freezing rain, which the NWS warned about, which would be really bad. 

 

So maybe a topic for another thread: should we be "measuring" some sort of "snow equivalent" in some way?  No easy way to do it, but there ought to be a way to convey that 6" of snow and 4" of sleet is roughly the same mass as 18" of snow even if the depth would probably be maybe 8", due to compaction, not 10", as the sleet on top of the snow compacts the underlying snow significantly.  Or just convert it to liquid equivalent and then assume 10:1 to compare it to other snowstorms - problem there is then you'd always have to do this for every snowstorm to get them on the same mass basis.  In truth, snow mass is a better gauge of impact than snow depth, anyway (mass is more important than depth for shoveling and removal and is just as important for travel impacts), but I doubt it'll ever really be used, since depth is so much easier to measure.  Curious what people think.  

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3 minutes ago, RU848789 said:

Pretty big bust for the I-95 corridor in terms of snowfall, but not in terms of total frozen precip, at least from maybe Trenton northward, where it hasn't been rain as far as I know. I had about 7" of snow/sleet on the ground about 90 minutes ago (7.5" now, with some compaction) and I shoveled the driveway at that point and 90 min later I now have about 2" of sleet on the driveway, which is the equivalent of about 6" of snow, so I have about 13" of "snow equivalent," in terms of total frozen precip mass, even if I only have 7.5" depth (partly due to compaction - the 7" + 2" sleet did not equal 9" depth, lol), which is just as hard to shovel or plow and is just as bad on the roads - it's just not the same depth it would be if it were all snow and maybe isn't as pretty. From a meteorological perspective, snow and sleet are just counted together, as depth, so it is more of a bust from that perspective. I'm guessing we should get another inch or two of sleet (3-6" snow equivalent, which would bring us to 16-19" of "snow equivalent" mass) unless it changes to rain, although it's still just 29F, so that's unlikely - and if it does, it would be freezing rain, which the NWS warned about, which would be really bad. 

 

So maybe a topic for another thread: should we be "measuring" some sort of "snow equivalent" in some way?  No easy way to do it, but there ought to be a way to convey that 6" of snow and 4" of sleet is roughly the same mass as 18" of snow even if the depth would probably be maybe 8", due to compaction, not 10", as the sleet on top of the snow compacts the underlying snow significantly.  Or just convert it to liquid equivalent and then assume 10:1 to compare it to other snowstorms - problem there is then you'd always have to do this for every snowstorm to get them on the same mass basis.  In truth, snow mass is a better gauge of impact than snow depth, anyway (mass is more important than depth for shoveling and removal and is just as important for travel impacts), but I doubt it'll ever really be used, since depth is so much easier to measure.  Curious what people think.  

I was just thinking we are piling up some impressive sleet....i cleaned early because the threat of rain on top of what I guess was about 5 inches at the time would be impossible to clean, and since then everything is covered up again. But the heck with it. It's March, nature will take care of it.

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