All Things Weather

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The weather today sucks. No golf.
 


The two big stories this week is the record cold, and the record low Mississippi River water levels. The cold blast this week is unusually cold for this time of the year, with record lows being set all over the country. NW IA saw temps in the single digits yesterday morning, shattering their old records.




 

GopherWeatherGuy said:
The two big stories this week is the record cold, and the record low Mississippi River water levels. The cold blast this week is unusually cold for this time of the year, with record lows being set all over the country. NW IA saw temps in the single digits yesterday morning, shattering their old records.




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Interesting. I wonder if it has a lot to do with tributaries too. Most of the Mississippi River area is in an "abnormally dry" status right now which isn't good of course but not super uncommon.

Current Map | U.S. Drought Monitor

droughtmonitor.unl.edu droughtmonitor.unl.edu
 


GophersInIowa said:
Interesting. I wonder if it has a lot to do with tributaries too. Most of the Mississippi River area is in an "abnormally dry" status right now which isn't good of course but not super uncommon.

Current Map | U.S. Drought Monitor

droughtmonitor.unl.edu droughtmonitor.unl.edu
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That is a big part of it. The Missouri, Arkansas, and Red Rivers are all major rivers that feed the Mississippi and currently flow through large areas of extreme to exceptional drought.

This is the time of the year that the rivers are typically the lowest, so that's part of it as well. The good news is it looks like the pattern starts to change on Sunday. We'll see how long that lasts.
 






GopherWeatherGuy said:
That is a big part of it. The Missouri, Arkansas, and Red Rivers are all major rivers that feed the Mississippi and currently flow through large areas of extreme to exceptional drought.

This is the time of the year that the rivers are typically the lowest, so that's part of it as well. The good news is it looks like the pattern starts to change on Sunday. We'll see how long that lasts.
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Looks like another round of good rain for much of the central US at the end of the week.

Do you have a good go to place to find maps of past precipitation? I used to have one at the NWS website where you could select by day, week, month or even the past year and it would show the estimated precip across the US. I think you could even switch it to difference from normal. I can't seem to find it anymore.
 

GophersInIowa said:
Looks like another round of good rain for much of the central US at the end of the week.

Do you have a good go to place to find maps of past precipitation? I used to have one at the NWS website where you could select by day, week, month or even the past year and it would show the estimated precip across the US. I think you could even switch it to difference from normal. I can't seem to find it anymore.
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We're finally seeing a more active pattern, which is typical for this time of the year, it just feels foreign because we have seen very few nice troughs in the west this year.

I like this site: https://hprcc.unl.edu/maps.php?map=ACISClimateMaps

If you're looking for some more localized precip estimates from the last day or two or even up to the last week, you can find them here: https://www.pivotalweather.com/maps.php?ds=stageiv&p=stageiv_qpe_168h_p&r=us_nc&pwplus=1
 

GopherWeatherGuy said:
We're finally seeing a more active pattern, which is typical for this time of the year, it just feels foreign because we have seen very few nice troughs in the west this year.

I like this site: https://hprcc.unl.edu/maps.php?map=ACISClimateMaps

If you're looking for some more localized precip estimates from the last day or two or even up to the last week, you can find them here: https://www.pivotalweather.com/maps.php?ds=stageiv&p=stageiv_qpe_168h_p&r=us_nc&pwplus=1
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Thanks, exactly what I'm looking for.

My wife makes fun of me for being a weather nerd (a very amateur one at that). I have no background in anything related to weather, just something I've always been interested in. I especially like the lead up to winter storms.
 

GophersInIowa said:
Thanks, exactly what I'm looking for.

My wife makes fun of me for being a weather nerd (a very amateur one at that). I have no background in anything related to weather, just something I've always been interested in. I especially like the lead up to winter storms.
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I used to be so terrified of tornadoes that I ended up becoming fascinated by them at a young age. I love winter storms too. They are my favorite to forecast because they are so challenging. I still don't sleep much whenever one hits because I get too excited.
 



GopherWeatherGuy said:
I used to be so terrified of tornadoes that I ended up becoming fascinated by them at a young age. I love winter storms too. They are my favorite to forecast because they are so challenging. I still don't sleep much whenever one hits because I get too excited.
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I get a chuckle out of people complaining when they forecast 4-6" and then they only get 3". Like really? You know how hard it is to forecast snowfall totals?
 

GopherWeatherGuy said:
Since we're going to see a triple dip La Nina, which is pretty rare, there's not a lot of data to go off of. The last two were snowier winters in the Upper Midwest, especially the last one in 00-01 with 76" of snow at MSP, and 100" where I was living in eastern SD. 75-76 saw around 55" at MSP. The only other one was 56-57 which was a little drier, with only 39" at MSP.

The most interesting thing to me is that the last two started early, with a lot of snow in Nov and Dec. We also had drier, warmer falls, until the switch flipped in Nov.

Overall I think we'll see below average temperatures with above average snowfall. I think we'll know where we are heading by the end of November though. If the pattern changes to more active in Nov and looks to continue into Dec, I think we'll see a lot of snow. If it says dry into Dec, I think we'll stay dry throughout the winter. We really need to start transitioning back to more neutral or El Nino conditions so that we can begin to chip away at the drought.
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Here we go! This is for this Thursday evening. MSP likely misses any heavy snow this time, but a lot of rain/storms followed by prolonged, well below average temperatures.



Screen Shot 2022-11-07 at 6.46.03 AM.png
 

GopherWeatherGuy said:
Here we go! This is for this Thursday evening. MSP likely misses any heavy snow this time, but a lot of rain/storms followed by prolonged, well below average temperatures.



View attachment 21648
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Blizzard warning in the Dakotas. I'm guessing that will get extended into NW MN. A foot+ and 40+mph gusts possible in some areas.
 

I dated someone from Thief River Falls and every time we went to visit her family I was just confused about the choice to live there.
 



I don't know how to imbed a tweet on here - but saw a guy tweeting from Bismark, ND this morning. Blizzard warnings out. the guy - who is apparently some kind of a weather blogger or storm chaser - said Bismark could get up to 18 inches of snow and high winds.

he showed some video and it was already looking nasty at about 9:00 this morning.

the guy's twitter is @aaronjayjack if you want to check it out.
 

short ornery norwegian said:
I don't know how to imbed a tweet on here - but saw a guy tweeting from Bismark, ND this morning. Blizzard warnings out. the guy - who is apparently some kind of a weather blogger or storm chaser - said Bismark could get up to 18 inches of snow and high winds.

he showed some video and it was already looking nasty at about 9:00 this morning.

the guy's twitter is @aaronjayjack if you want to check it out.
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All you have to do is that arrow pointing up at the bottom right of the tweet, then click on "copy link to tweet", then past it in a message.

 

The Buffalo area could get several feet of lake effect snow late this week and into the weekend. The Bills are home Sunday at noon against Cleveland. Could be an interesting game.
 


GopherWeatherGuy said:
Weather is cyclical

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Just once I want to experience something like that in person.

What’s interesting to me is how narrow those strong bands usually are. Can be huge differences in totals just 10-20 miles apart.
 

That reminded me of this doozie, which I lived through.

On Wednesday, January 20, 1982, the Twin Cities measured 17.1 inches of snowfall, breaking the all-time daily record of 15.8 inches, set in January of 1917. Within two days, the new record was broken again, as another 17.2 fell on January 22nd. Both snow events spilled into the next calendar day, leading to even higher storm-total accumulations.

The two storms, occurring in rapid success, dropped 15-30 inches of snow over half of the state, with five-day totals of 39.1 inches in the Twin Cities. One record remains from January 1982 in the Twin Cities and that is the snow depth of 38 inches on the ground after the second storm.

I was living in an apartment off Portland and Lake. I parked my car off the alley behind the house. after the second blast, the snow drifts were up to the car's side windows. when the storm started on Wednesday, I knew I wasn't going anywhere for a few days, so I walked to the Chicago-Lake liquor store and loaded up on essentials.
 


GopherWeatherGuy said:
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Weather question for you @GopherWeatherGuy - how do they actually measure the inches of snow that falls when there's also a lot of blowing wind? Measure it along a snow fence and it'll be really deep - measure it in the middle of an open field where the wind is blowing and it'll be much less. Even in my driveway there's a big variation in the depth of snow that happens from a storm.
 


Full Speed Ahead said:
Weather question for you @GopherWeatherGuy - how do they actually measure the inches of snow that falls when there's also a lot of blowing wind? Measure it along a snow fence and it'll be really deep - measure it in the middle of an open field where the wind is blowing and it'll be much less. Even in my driveway there's a big variation in the depth of snow that happens from a storm.
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I'll jump in on that. I worked at a radio station in Iowa that was an official weather observer for the local office of the National Weather Service.

as such, we had equipment designed for accurate measurements. there was a temperature unit that recorded hourly temperatures and gave a daily readout.

for precipitation, there was a fairly large open metal drum to collect snow. we would use a ruler to measure snowfall inside the drum. then, the metal drum would detach, you would melt the snow, and take a 'liquid' precipitation measurement. for rain, there was a smaller rain gauge.

now, this was almost 30 years ago, so I assume the methods and equipment has been upgraded or modernized. but that was how we did it. I don't think the radio station measured wind speed and direction - I think that came from the local airport.

most cities and small towns have an official weather observer. where I live now, it's a guy who works for the weekly newspaper and does the weather observation on the side. He sends daily reports to the NWS office in Sioux Falls, and prints out a monthly summary that he shares with the local media.
 

Full Speed Ahead said:
Weather question for you @GopherWeatherGuy - how do they actually measure the inches of snow that falls when there's also a lot of blowing wind? Measure it along a snow fence and it'll be really deep - measure it in the middle of an open field where the wind is blowing and it'll be much less. Even in my driveway there's a big variation in the depth of snow that happens from a storm.
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Basic info below. Essentially do multiple measurements in different areas and then do an average. I'm not sure if the National Weather Service has a better way but this is how it's recommended for volunteers.

How to Measure Snowfall Accurately

www.weather.gov
 

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