Yep, halfway through April and we got a combo of snow and sleet at the tail end if the rain that came through last night. It’s 30 outside right now as well.
Skies are clearing now and it looks like it will be a heck of a nice day. Snow wan’t last long.
The high temperature for yesterday was about 30 degrees. The low’s last night dipped down into the teens. Currently, it’s in the high-teens now and supposed to get colder before the morning arrives. Tomorrow, the forecast high is in the 30, as was today’s high temperature.
If we were still in January or February, none of this would even register as interesting. Even early March can be a bit dicey. But were only a few days removed from the official start of Spring and right now, to call it a “cold” start doesn’t do it justice. We’re basically seeing Winter temperatures still.
Astoundingly, we’re supposed to continue to see these temperatures. We get an occasional warm-up into the 40 and 50’s, and then the temperatures head right back down into the 30’s. So I wasn’t surprised to see this.
Spring will get here eventually, but evidently not before Winter has had its fill.
Looks like the majority of the rain has passed us by. It was coming down in buckets earlier. Given the heretofore unrelenting cold, this could have been a real back breaker.
The cold returns tomorrow, but not for long and we won’t be getting any snow with it. Which is nice since we can finally see the stone of our driveway for the first time in a couple months.
Where we live, we haven’t had a “big one” for a storm this year. If memory serves, we haven’t topped 10 inches yet in any single storm.
With the consistent cold though, none of the snow has melted between storms. We’ve had 3 or 4 that have dumped anywhere from 4 to 8 inches and the cumulative toll has added up to about the same as a single big one.
There’s supposed to be a warm up over the next few days with temps consistently above freezing. If that pans out it, this will likely be the high water mark for snow.
So, starting some time after midnight, our local NBC weather forecast is for 4-8 inches of snow with a changeover to sleet and freezing rain; our local CBS forecast, last I saw, was for 8-12 inches of snow with no word on a changeover; and my weather app indicates 6-10 inches with a mix of sleet.
So I’m prepared for 2-20 inches of crap to fall from the sky starting any minute now…
UPDATE:
School is already cancelled for tomorrow. Forecasts haven’t really converged much though, other than that something will be falling from the sky tomorrow.
As I type this, it’s 7 degrees outside with wind chills below 0. Tomorrow’s high is supposed to be around 10 before the bottom falls out and we go below 0. Oh, and it’s snowing too. Lovely weather this time of year.
Fortunately, we’ve got fire and warmth in the house. The kids are sleeping after a half-day of school after their 11 days of Christmas vacation. School has already been cancelled for tomorrow, which makes for 2 weeks with only 4 hours of schooling or so. With the cold it’s hard to say how much they’ll be able to enjoy the snow though. The boy is already grousing that the snow will fall but then it will melt before he can have any fun in it. He’ll be right eventually, of course but for the moment the snow won’t be going anywhere.
This particular storm is getting a lot of attention because of the cold. Most of the news has been wall-to-wall storm, with what seems like minute-by-minute updates. It would be easy to forget we live in New England- you know, an area of the country somewhat renowned for it’s cold weather. Stories about the predictions and the Governor’s plans and the road crews and the weight of the snow and every other conceivable detail.
Anyway, it’s cold outside.
When I woke up this morning, it was 1 degree outside. An hour later, it was 2 degrees. The high today topped out at a whopping 20 degrees and it was in the teens most of the time the snow was falling.
Winter in New England can be pretty harsh at times. The thing of it is, it isn’t Winter yet. Usually, this kind of cold is reserved for January. We’ve had a number of days already where the high didn’t get out of the teens. Frankly, it’s getting to the point where I’m happy to see temps break the freezing mark.
For the moment, it looks like we might get a little relief sometime into next week. That can be a long time away though and, as they say, if you don’t like the weather in New England, wait 5 minutes.
Our first real snow of the new Fall and Winter. School was cancelled as a result, before it even started actually, and the kids are downstairs killing each other. Better that than video games.
First snows are always the nicest for some reason:
It won’t last long, but we’ll enjoy it while it’s around.
Ugh. My understanding is November was way to the cooler side of the scale, with temperatures almost 2 degrees below normal. My woodpile can attest to that.
As the saying goes, though, “Past performance does not necessarily indicate future performance.” Right now, it’s 50 degrees out there tonight and I’m seriously considering letting our fire die out for the night. By the looks of things, it’ll cool down a smidge tomorrow into the mid 40’s and stay there. The house isn’t like to cool off much with those kinds of temps.
The cool is supposed to return this weekend along with some kind of messy storm. Joy. The messy storm part anyway. I don’t mind the cool.
Ugh.
I’m sweating just walking around the yard. Enough already. I’m ready for Fall now.
Pretty sure this isn’t what was meant by “climate change.” However, this is the first time I can ever recall a frost this late in May since I’ve been in New England. Just sayin’.
The local weather guy is bragging about hi’s getting near 80, some time next week after the cool off from the rain passes. It’s going to be mid-May shortly. I’m having a hard time remembering the last time we had a May this cool. Usually we’ve had numerous 80 degree days by now.
I’m beginning to wonder if we really are experiencing “climate change”, just not in the way expected.
It’s late April and we’re about to sink below freezing for the second night in a row. I’ve been running the fireplace in the evenings to keep the house from getting too cold. Checking the local forecast, looks like we’re gonna stay this way for another day or so.
The temptation to make a snarky “climate change” reference…
Ah hell- it’d be nice if we could just get some seasonal warming at the moment.
UPDATE: When I originally posted this, at the end I noted updated accumulation forecasts for 6-10 inches, which was incorrect. They are 4-8 inches as noted in the weather statement I quoted. We’re already sitting at 9″, so even the update was incorrect.
I never took down the measuring stick after the Blizzard of 2013.
For everything the forecasters got right about the Blizzard, they seem to have gotten this storm entirely wrong. First, it was supposed to start snowing on Wednesday and last into Friday. We were going to get 6-10 inches of snow. Then, it was supposed to start Thursday and last into Friday and we were only going to get 3-6 inches of snow. We started with a “Winter Storm Warning” and were downgraded to a “Winter Weather Advisory.”
Here’s the latest:
…WINTER STORM WARNING IN EFFECT UNTIL 1 PM EST THIS AFTERNOON…
THE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE IN TAUNTON HAS ISSUED A WINTER STORM WARNING FOR HEAVY SNOW…WHICH IS IN EFFECT UNTIL 1 PM EST THIS AFTERNOON. THE WINTER WEATHER ADVISORY IS NO LONGER IN EFFECT.
- LOCATIONS…NORTHERN CONNECTICUT…INCLUDING CENTRAL AND WESTERN PORTIONS OF
- MASSACHUSETTS AT LOWER ELEVATIONS IN THE CONNECTICUT RIVER VALLEY.
- HAZARD TYPES…HEAVY SNOW.
- ACCUMULATIONS…STORM TOTAL SNOW ACCUMULATION OF 4 TO 8 INCHES.
- TIMING…HEAVY SNOWFALL TO CONTINUE INTO MIDDAY FRIDAY.
- IMPACTS…UNTREATED ROADS WILL BECOME SNOW COVERED AND SLIPPERY. ANTICIPATE
- IMPACTS TO THE FRIDAY MORNING RUSH HOUR.
- WINDS…NORTH 10 TO 20 MPH WITH GUSTS UP TO 25 MPH.
- VISIBILITIES…ONE QUARTER TO ONE HALF MILE AT TIMES.
- TEMPERATURES…AROUND 30. PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS…
A WINTER STORM WARNING IS ISSUED WHEN AN AVERAGE OF 6 OR MORE INCHES OF SNOW IS EXPECTED IN A 12 HOUR PERIOD…OR FOR 8 OR MORE INCHES IN A 24 HOUR PERIOD. TRAVEL WILL BE SLOW AT BEST ON WELL TREATED SURFACES…AND QUITE DIFFICULT ON ANY UNPLOWED OR UNTREATED SURFACES.
Here’s a radar snapshot:
So, back to a “Winter Storm Warning” and accumulations of 4 to 8 inches. It’s 9:15AM as I type this and we’re sitting at 9 inches or so and, looking at the radar, the block of moisture doesn’t seem to be letting up. We’ll be lucky if the upper limit is what we end up with.
Obviously, the kids have no school today. The boy is happy about this because it interrupts the standardized testing they’ve been doing this week. But this is one more day to makeup and the Governor may have to decide whether to allow for a shortened school year.
Winter isn’t giving up without a fight.
Would this be considered adding insult to injury?
The temp this morning at 7:20.
As of now, I’ve cleared our driveway (most of it anyway- there’s only so much room to put that much snow) and front walk. It took me 3 hours to get that much done. Part of that is because are driveway is fairly long, part of it is because there was a lot of snow. And, frankly, part of it is because CONN DOT plowed the top of our driveway in and I had a very dense 3 foot tall, 30 foot wide wall of snow to push through. I wasn’t happy with that but I understand the plow guys have the same problem I do- there’s only so many places to put the snow.
There really aren’t words to adequately describe the scene here. I’ve seen a few references to the tried and true “Winter Wonderland” but that’s only true until the clearing starts, then it’s more like “Hell frozen over.”
As I type this, skies are clearing and the Sun is poking through a bit. The temps have warmed to the mid 20’s and the house is nice and warm with the fire running. My soaked clothes from my earlier snow-clearing are drying so that I can go out and clear our deck next.
Speaking of which, here’s what it looks like:
That’s our Weber Smokey Mountain on the left and our Weber gas grill on the right. The WSM stands about 4 feet tall, normally. It’s boosted up a bit by a large flat rock I have under it to protect the deck from the heat. For that matter, the top of the deck railing measures 42 inches from the deck surface.
Of all the pics in this post, this one probably gives the best idea for how much snow there is. That’s the path I kept clearing so I could take pictures for my Blizzard of 2013 page here on the site.
I mentioned our driveway up above. Here we go:
The before shot is snow that’s basically a foot deep or so for the main portion of the driveway. I’d already cleared it once last night to make today’s clearing a little easier. I’m glad I did. That ridge in the snow on the left of the first picture is the unplowed snow line. It matches up with the wall of snow on the left in the after picture.
Speaking of our driveway, it has a rather unique feature: a large rock set off to the side. It stands about 3 feet tall. Here’s a picture of it:
That’s the rock in the foreground, smack in the middle of the picture under the tree that’s bent over due to the weight of the snow on its branches. The covered portion of the rock is at about 3 feet. Not the biggest of drifts, but impressive none the less.
Here’s our front walk, before and after:
The piles on the right and left are probably 4 feet high.
If you look closely in the Before picture, there are some twiggy things sticking out of the snow. Here’s a slightly better shot of them:
See them? Those little twigs in the foreground? Those are the branches of a Japanese Maple. It’s a little over 2 feet tall.
Here’s a shot of the front of the house:
That lower roof over the front porch looks like I might need to do something about. The upper roof doesn’t look nearly as bad though. I assume that’s because it was exposed to the wind more and didn’t pile up to quite the same degree up there.
Finally, something fun. Here’s Dog2, our male German Shepherd. He’s leaping up at snow the boy has tossed into the air. As many times as someone will toss snow in the air, he’ll leap to snap at it. Just don’t stick your face in there.
We had similar conditions a couple of years ago, believe it or not. But in that case, we had 2 storms come through and dump on us on consecutive weekends. While both storms then were pretty impressive, they weren’t this one.
It’s not unusual for us to have rain come through that dumps 2 or three inches on us. I’ve often wondered what such a storm would be like if it fell in the form of snow. Now, I know.
The snow started falling about 8:30 this morning. I was headed out to the car to run some last minute errands and was just climbing in when I saw the first flakes. Driving around town, the roads had all been pre-salted so there wasn’t any accumulation on them. It also wasn’t coming down that hard, though that’s clearly supposed to change.
As far as prep goes, I’ve loaded up plenty of firewood, got fresh gas for the snowblower, went grocery shopping and picked up a power inverter. I’m not overly concerned about losing power, but in the event we do we need a way to run the fan on our wood stove. Using the car to power the inverter should work nicely. It can supply 500W continuously, though I should only need a fraction of that for the blower.
Accumulation predictions are for 2 feet plus, which is unprecedented in my memory for any storm I’ve gone through. I’ve seen predictions for 18-24 a few times, though none of them actually managed that. We’ll see how things go with this one.
Since it’s supposed to be such a hum-dinger of a storm, I decided to create a page to document it’s progress here at the house. That page can be found here. I’ll get around to putting up an appropriate main page link. Look for updates about the storm’s progress on that page as well. I’ll try to do so hourly. One of the pictures is of a yardstick, which I’ve lashed to one of the posts on our deck. With all the project wind to come, I don’t know how accurate it will be, but it might be fun to watch it get covered. At least, the boy thought it was a good idea.
Now I have to get to the other things I haven’t got to yet. Back later.
Who doesn’t love them some extreme weather?
Right now, as I type this, the thermometer reads 32 degrees. That’s the first time it’s reached that threshold since last Sunday, January 20th. Since then, it hasn’t managed to got out of the 20’s. The only bummer, as it were, is that we never had any negative lows. We did have one night where it was 0, though. We’re supposed to hit 50 tomorrow, according the to the last local forecast I’d seen.
I have no ulterior motive behind this post. I just wanted to note the extent of a pretty cool patch of weather. Cool both figuratively, for me, and literally for everyone.
Today is Day 2 of the most recent cold snap, or deep freeze or whatever it’s called. It occurs that a “heat wave” is defined as 3 consecutive days with highs of 90 degrees (F) or higher, but as a far as I’m aware there is no equivalent for stretches of cold.
According to the short range forecast, temps won’t get above freezing again until next Monday- meaning 7 consecutive days with highs below freezing. Should this be a “cold wave”? Or perhaps we can come up with something catchier sounding for at least 3 days with temps below freezing, like…well, nothing clever comes to mind at the moment.
But surely consecutive days below freezing are worthy of some kind of moniker, right? I mean, water phase changes! That doesn’t even happen in a “heat wave.” Arguably, it’s more impressive.
As in degrees, right now. It was actually warmer an hour ago, a whopping 5. I think it might start warming from here, but it’s been awhile since its been this cold.
Cool stuff, er, literally.