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Pittsburgh PA Area Rest of fall and Winter 2019-2020 thread


meatwad
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Snow Squall Warning

SNOW SQUALL WARNING
NWS PITTSBURGH PA
212 PM EST WED DEC 18 2019

OHC067-081-PAC003-051-125-129-WVC009-029-069-182012-
/O.NEW.KPBZ.SQ.W.0002.191218T1912Z-191218T2015Z/
212 PM EST WED DEC 18 2019
Harrison County OH-Jefferson County OH-Allegheny County PA-Fayette
County PA-Washington County PA-Westmoreland County PA-Brooke County
WV-Hancock County WV-Ohio County WV-

The National Weather Service in Pittsburgh has issued a

* Snow Squall Warning for...
Northeastern Harrison County in east central Ohio...
Southern Jefferson County in east central Ohio...
Washington County in southwestern Pennsylvania...
Southern Allegheny County in southwestern Pennsylvania...
Westmoreland County in southwestern Pennsylvania...
Northern Fayette County in southwestern Pennsylvania...
Northeastern Ohio County in northern West Virginia...
Brooke County in northern West Virginia...
Southeastern Hancock County in northern West Virginia...

* Until 315 PM EST.

* At 212 PM EST, a dangerous snow squall was located along a line
extending from 7 miles northwest of Tiltonsville to 8 miles east of
Derry, moving southeast at 35 mph.

HAZARD...Heavy snow and blowing snow. Wind gusts up to 30 mph.

SOURCE...Radar indicated.

IMPACT...Dangerous life-threatening travel.

* This includes the following highways...
Interstate 70 in Pennsylvania between mile markers 2 and 57.
Pennsylvania Turnpike between mile markers 55 and 100.
Interstate 79 in Pennsylvania between mile markers 23 and 60.
Interstate 376 in Pennsylvania between mile markers 61 and 84.

Locations impacted include...
Pittsburgh, Penn Hills, Mount Lebanon, Bethel Park, Monroeville,
McMurray, Greensburg, Weirton, McKeesport, Steubenville, Washington
and Jeannette.

PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS...

Consider avoiding or delaying travel until the snow squall passes
your location. If you must travel, use extra caution and allow extra
time. Rapid changes in visibility and slick road conditions may lead
to accidents.

Reduce your speed and turn on headlights! During snow squalls, the
visibility may suddenly drop to near zero in whiteout conditions.

LAT...LON 4013 7917 4009 7926 4006 7928 4001 8022
          4025 8088 4039 8105 4048 7943 4045 7939
          4048 7936 4045 7936 4047 7934 4045 7933
          4046 7930 4044 7930 4042 7927 4043 7924
          4041 7916 4037 7912 4037 7909 4033 7902
          4013 7917

$$

 

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Snow squalls / bands were fun today. Looks like one last round moving through now before we dry out and moderate, unfortunately just in time for the Holiday.

While we can never roll out a fluke setup or transient cold shot long rang not looking great for snow prospects, hopefully by Christmas we can see the signs of a good pattern locking in for Jan.

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1 hour ago, RitualOfTheTrout said:

Snow squalls / bands were fun today. Looks like one last round moving through now before we dry out and moderate, unfortunately just in time for the Holiday.

While we can never roll out a fluke setup or transient cold shot long rang not looking great for snow prospects, hopefully by Christmas we can see the signs of a good pattern locking in for Jan.

Starting to see some signs of the models seeing cold during the first week of January - just need to hope we get the precip too.

Screen Shot 2019-12-18 at 11.30.48 PM.png

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5 hours ago, Digger said:

I guess Rudolph is going to earn his pay tonight.

 

I'm having a hard time remembering a day where it was so foggy for so much of the day...

Seriously-driving from the laurels into bethel park was ok-leaving bethel around 8pm to come home-it was thick thick fog until we hit Uniontown....not sure what the deal was with all that dense fog-hope you all have a wonderful Christmas and hope New Years brings some snow and a better pattern

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24 minutes ago, ChalkHillSnowNut said:

Seriously-driving from the laurels into bethel park was ok-leaving bethel around 8pm to come home-it was thick thick fog until we hit Uniontown....not sure what the deal was with all that dense fog-hope you all have a wonderful Christmas and hope New Years brings some snow and a better pattern

Glad you made it home safe.

This is some of the lowest visibility I can remember in a awhile.

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10 hours ago, PghPirates27 said:

anything on tap for the next few weeks? not seeing anything looking that great.... still looks to be kind warm.

Absent a fluke event, I would say no.  There might be a brief relaxation period of the overall pattern in early January.  Otherwise . . .

This is the doldrums.  50F days around the holidays and an extended period heading into January where snow doesn't really exist.

Funnily enough, the Euro weeklies back in early December gave us a total of 11" of snow through the end of January (which of course is well below normal).  I thought that was extreme, but as of now I'm more convinced it may be prophetic.  This pacific pattern is stout and may last for the foreseeable future.  If a pattern change does happen, and it can, we may not know about it until after the fact.  However, a lot of winter forecasts also called for an early end to winter.  If those are to be believed, "winter" may have only existed in November.

One problem we're seeing, I think, is the GFS/GEFS issues overdoing cold in the mid-and-long ranges.  They keep wanting to give us snow but it caves every time to the Euro once the timeframe closes.  Now they can't be trusted, but I don't know if that's a pattern issue or a model bias.

Watch the main indices (PNA / AO / NAO / EPO / MJO) and see if any flip to more favorable conditions.

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4 hours ago, Rd9108 said:

This winter looks bleak. Only a big storm can salvage it and even then all of the forecasts are gonna bust low. Don't worry it will be snowing in April atleast. 

Yeah, after a few brief shots at more normal winter conditions the next couple days and again next week it looks like models are locking into a pretty robust SE ridge. Could be towards the end of January until things hopefully improve. Maybe we can manage to get something before that sets in and even if not in Jan you can fluke your way into a storm so while not optimistic right now still worth monitoring. 

I'd love to get a cold and snowy January one of these years rather than these miserable Springs of late but that probably won't be the case again this year. 

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Yeah, the longer this goes on, the more I'm convinced it is simply an extension of the pattern that served us last winter.  They aren't quite the same, but it's more a matter of these conditions are a follow up to those previous.  These cycles can last for multiple winters.

I don't buy the 10-day solutions that consistently get punted backwards as we get closer.  I'm more interested in watching what is driving the current pattern and seeing if there's any chance of it breaking down.  Right now, I don't see anything.  It's a strong central pacific ridge, supported by the flow upstream, that won't abate.

This simply won't be a great winter.  That's how the dice rolls on occasion.

I should add: there's always the possibility we get a popup storm solution.  2016 comes to mind.  Unlikely, and the overall pattern won't be conducive to repeats or consistency, but that's really all there is to save the overall snow totals.

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17 minutes ago, RitualOfTheTrout said:

Some snow squalls making their way into Northern Allegheny / Westmoreland now, I wonder if they will be able to hold together. Would be nice to see some snow coming down.

squall.jpg.4cbb77757e28d3327cf0ae7b075757ff.jpg

Nope. I’m up just north of Wexford...not very impressive and on radar the band looks to be falling apart. 

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3 hours ago, KPITSnow said:

Jeez...I never say this. I’m ready for spring....even snow squalls disintegrate when they get near us. 
 

it is comical reading the comments on here that yesterday’s storm was originally too far north and a mix and ended up being south of us. 

Sort of like how 10 days ago the GFS wanted to give us 10" of snow, and instead we'll be approaching 70F.

I wonder how the NWS feels about their updated model.

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We’ve only had 1 or 2 winters in the last 40 years that we’re under 20” - but the way this is going we could make a serious run.

On the bright side, less time pissed off over near misses. ☺️

PS: I feel like the new Snow Squall warning is a bit overused. We had one in the early 90s that also came with warning criteria snows. So it was a pretty special event. Now it’s changed to just a low visibility squall. I get needing to keep people aware, but warnings (with all kinds of alerts on people’s phones going off) is a bit much

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2 hours ago, Burghblizz said:

We’ve only had 1 or 2 winters in the last 40 years that we’re under 20” - but the way this is going we could make a serious run.

On the bright side, less time pissed off over near misses. ☺️

PS: I feel like the new Snow Squall warning is a bit overused. We had one in the early 90s that also came with warning criteria snows. So it was a pretty special event. Now it’s changed to just a low visibility squall. I get needing to keep people aware, but warnings (with all kinds of alerts on people’s phones going off) is a bit much

2015-16 was the last year under 30" (29.6").

1990-91 was the last year under 20" (17.2").

The only other year in relatively modern history below 20" was the winter of 1973-74 (16.6").  Otherwise you're going back to the 30s, which apparently was a horrendous decade for snow.

More recently, there was that pretty futile stretch in the late 80s and 90s where PIT was below average 13 out of 16 years, including six years in a row two separate times ('86 thru '92 and then '96 thru '02).  This stretch was interspersed with quite high yearly snowfalls exceeding 70" three times (72.1" in '92-'93, 76.8" in '93-'94, and 74.5" in '95-'96).

Going below average this year would make 4 of the last 5.

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