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Central Pa - March Monster 2017


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40 minutes ago, Superstorm said:


Superstorm 93 is tough to beat. The thundersnow and winds were no comparison.


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Yes. Total snowfall is just one aspect when comparing storms. Considering that the storm of '93 dropped over a foot of snow in Birmingham, between 4"-10" in Atlanta, an incredible severe weather outbreak across Florida, blew the windows out of the old Spectrum in the middle of the Flyers game that afternoon, and over 4' of snow in parts of the southern Appalachians, that storm will be one to be benchmarked against for years and years to come. 

No doubt this was an amazing, historic storm that severely impacted millions in the northeast US, but '93 was still way beyond this. 

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I'd be interesting in some mets thoughts on WPC/NWS knowing the coast wouldn't see the forecast totals but not revising forecasts.

Any thoughts guys? I can see both sides.


I think they may of put themselves in a bind issuing watches so early. Even more though is that the low tracked west of most modeling, save the NAM, by 25 miles within 24 hours; what happens if it tracked 25 miles east after they downgraded? There was a rather insane gradient and I'm pretty sure the track was still reasonably within the range of error for a lot of models. People don't understand these factors and want precision that's just not there. One could argue March climatology and with trends that the big cities were going to mix regardless and they probably were right, but it's the suburbs were one can go from 4" to 15" in 25 miles.


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Hey all, stopping in to say congrats to those of you who cashed in on the snowfall. This was a very impressive system to watch unfold. The banding structures with the system were wild and it's a shame we couldn't stay all snow in the southern tier, but the warm intrusion was a tough pill to swallow. Idk if anyone here is interested in learning more about flake structures and conditions warranted for certain types of snow (Since everyone here had a different snow type from south to north), but I found a really nice scholarly article about it. Thought I'd share!

 

https://www.its.caltech.edu/~atomic/publist/rpp5_4_R03.pdf

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24 minutes ago, canderson said:

I'd be interesting in some mets thoughts on WPC/NWS knowing the coast wouldn't see the forecast totals but not revising forecasts.

Any thoughts guys? I can see both sides.

It wasn't clear what was happening here. And a small deviation in track would've resulted in much different totals, and given the model fluctuations it was wise IMO to keep the higher totals. Amounts increased fast as one went NW from the coast into NW NJ and the Hudson Valley. I had 3.5" of slush while a poster from Middletown, NY had 24" 80 miles away. Had the low gone 50 miles east, I would easily have had over 12" and maybe approached 18". 

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One can choose to error on the side of precaution; or one can choose to error on the side of the route 78 ice/snow/sleet boondoggle. One affects everyone in the region to a lesser degree, the other one affects much fewer people to a much greater degree.


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1 hour ago, jm1220 said:

WTF is with the 20" report in Centre Hall? Bogus? State College only had 9-10".

Also congrats on the big storm out there (for most)!! It was much sloppier here on the coast. 

It was a bogus report.  I talked to NWS this morn and that came up along with the KMDT report.   I think 15" is the highest total in Centre County now.   

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5 minutes ago, 2001kx said:

Here is mid page..i have nothing on left or right?

 

Here's the map he was referring to: 

17309760_1396541950396888_4163332006948445897_n.png.fcbbff7d03d5c2b2e5b39e80ab2f4e87.png

 

Looks fairly reasonable.. I'm sure Fulton county saw a bunch of snow but there were no reports in or near there to help generate the map. That Centre Hall report that was bogus does stick out like a sore thumb haha. 

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2 hours ago, Cashtown_Coop said:

Well,  it all comes down to QC at the airport.  I don't want to get too deep into this because it's not my battle to fight.   

 

Cashtown, or anyone else, can you please explain the flip- flopping snow total from MDT for this event?

Last night, they had 19.3 for the 2 day total, but then changed it back to 17 inches a little later.Then overnight I saw the 3am daily summary that bumped it back to the 19.3 when I posted.Then around 5am, it was changed yet again to the 17 inches for the 2 day total ?!

In the grand scheme of things it doesn't matter much, but I would like for them to get it right.

Also, both of these final numbers apparently didn't factor in any additional accumulation after 5pm yesterday, when MDT had 4 more hours of light snow until 9pm.

 

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57 minutes ago, Blizzard of 93 said:

 

Cashtown, or anyone else, can you please explain the flip- flopping snow total from MDT for this event?

Last night, they had 19.3 for the 2 day total, but then changed it back to 17 inches a little later.Then overnight I saw the 3am daily summary that bumped it back to the 19.3 when I posted.Then around 5am, it was changed yet again to the 17 inches for the 2 day total ?!

In the grand scheme of things it doesn't matter much, but I would like for them to get it right.

Also, both of these final numbers apparently didn't factor in any additional accumulation after 5pm yesterday, when MDT had 4 more hours of light snow until 9pm.

 

Haha I dunno what kind of QC they do at MDT but I wonder why it's so hard to get a straight measurement from them. I don't buy the excessive liquid equivalent of 2.53" they reported for the storm either (unless they revised that too). Can't really speak for that end of the state but even with the mix line infringing into the southern tier a bit I find it hard to believe Harrisburg had that poor of a snow ratio. I know back here this was literally the fluffiest snowfall of the winter. The snowfalls I got back in Jan/first part of Feb were the type of wet snowfalls you'd see on April 1st or something. 

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