• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

Winter Storm for NE/MA States Friday-Sunday (Up: Blizzard warnings)

Status
Not open for further replies.

Retro

Member
Looking at snowfall totals around me, it looks like we got somewhere between 10-13 inches. Too much blowing and drifting around here to get an accurate measurement myself.

This is funny as hell though; the heavy snow saw the Delaware border and, like everyone else, said "Nope!" and just went around the north side.

CZfxHHpUEAEdoaS.jpg
 

br3wnor

Member
Took about 2 hours but finally done (north shore Long Island). Had to dig out 4 cars and then shovel off the back roof. So happy this happened on a weekend, I really enjoyed yesterday, did nothing but watch Netflix all day. Think this was definitely worse than blizzard of 96 but it also could be that I didn't have to be an adult for the 96 storm.
 
This weather has made my job impossible. LGA, EWR, IAD, DCA and a bunch of other airports aren't moving shit. And my drivers are refusing work left and right.

#IACProblems
 

WedgeX

Banned
Not looking forward to it being 40 degrees during the day this week in DC and 20 at night. The ice is going to be horrendous.
 

ahoyhoy

Unconfirmed Member
Not looking forward to it being 40 degrees during the day this week in DC and 20 at night. The ice is going to be horrendous.

Ice covered snow is crazy as hell. When I went to Niagara Falls last year the entire area around the falls was coated in a thin layer of ice from the falls. Navigating off the paths was incredibly treacherous.

RIP Beltway commuters for the next week or so.
 

DedValve

Banned
That is literally nature entering your room, flipping your table then slamming the door in your face.

Just in an out to fuck your shit.
 

Mully

Member
Some really interesting insight into what made this storm one of the snowiest storms of all time from meteorologist Dr. Jeff Masters of Weather Underground.

http://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMasters/historic-snowstorm-takes-aim-on-midatlantic

What’s making this storm so powerful?

At Capital Weather Gang, Jeff Halverson has an excellent analysis of the factors leading into this remarkable storm, with the main player being a pronounced upper-level low over the Southeast that will trigger a surface low developing off the East Coast. The upper- and lower-level centers will align just east of the Delmarva in an occlusion, allowing the entire “stacked” system to slow down and prolonging the heavy snow. Also in the mix is a rich feed of moisture streaming up from the northern Caribbean, with pockets of as much as two inches of precipitable water (the amount that could be squeezed out above a given point). Temperatures are considerably warmer than average over the Northwest Atlantic, ranging from about 1°C above average near the Bahamas and northern Caribbean to 2-3°C above average off the Virginia coast northeast to the Canadian Maritimes. (Warmer-than-usual oceans are commonplace across the globe right now, as December was the warmest month in more than a century of global recordkeeping.)

sst-anoms-1.15-16.jpg


Figure 3.Departures from average sea-surface temperature for this time of year, calculated for the week ending on Jan. 16, 2016. Image credit: National Hurricane Center.

Which of the factors driving Jonas is most unusual? Joe Romm (Climate Progress) and Andrew Freedman (Mashable) point out the strong, important links between rising global temperatures associated with human-produced climate change and the observed tendency for high-end precipitation events to become even heavier. Many of the record U.S. rainfall events over the past year have benefited from vast amounts of precipitable water, often at record amounts for the time of year. Winter storms rely on ample moisture as well as strong temperature contrasts and large-scale dynamics. In the case of Jonas, a crucial factor is the extreme intensity of the low-level jet stream pulling moisture from the Caribbean and slamming it around the north side of the surface low into the snow-generating machine over the mid-Atlantic. These powerful winds will replenish the atmospheric moisture being used up rapidly in the snow-making process.

I asked Richard Grumm, science and operations officer at the National Weather Service office in State College, PA, what he saw as the most noteworthy aspects of Winter Storm Jonas. He replied in terms of sigma levels, which express how often you’d expect a particular situation to recur based on previous weather patterns. A 2-sigma event (two standard deviations) occurs about 5% of the time at any given point, while a 6-sigma event is far more rare--in theory, a one-in-500-million likelihood, although the exact recurrence period for such extreme events is impossible to nail down. Grumm calculated sigma levels for the imminent storm using output from the GFS ensemble system (GEFS). Grumm noted that the precipitable water flowing into the storm is in the 1- to 2-sigma range: high but not extraordinary. However, the winds flowing from the Atlantic into the Delmarva peninsula about a mile above the surface could exceed 80 mph (see Figure 4). The east-to-west component of this wind qualifies as a 6-sigma event. Such anomalously strong winds, said Grumm, are “about as good as they get.” He added that 2012’s Hurricane Sandy was the last East Coast event to produce such a high-sigma east-to-west wind anomaly. The intensity of the upper-level front is also apparent in the very sharp south-to-north drop-off in heavy snow depicted by most models. The contrast between cold air over the Northeast and the unseasonably warm waters just offshore may help to enhance the front even further.

850-wnds-sigma-24hr-valid12Z-1.23.16.jpg

Figure 4. Winds at the 850-mb level (about a mile above sea level) projected by the 12Z Friday run of the GFS ensemble system (GEFS) for 7:00 am EST Saturday, Jan. 23, 2016. The lines at each point are directed into the wind; barbs along each line show the wind speed in knots (see this NWS guide). The colored areas denote estimated sigma levels (see legend at left) corresponding to the rarity of the east-west wind component. Higher sigma levels correspond to especially strong easterly or westerly wind components. Image credit: Richard Grumm, NWS.


Also, here's a water vapor loop image of the storm just before it reached its peak 12 hours later.

IR-2015Z-1.22.16.jpg
 

Quixzlizx

Member
northeast_22-23Jan16_shd.gif


beautiful

I love how the storm started to rotate in place once it was over LI just to give us the maximum fuck you.

Thankfully, my landlord's neighbor let him borrow his snowblower, so the hours it would've taken me to shovel out my curbside parking spot ended up being around 10 minutes.
 

tw1164

Member
I got 24 inches in Harrisburg, PA. I'm glad I shoveled yesterday and not today like my neighbors. I'm too lazy for this shit. I made up my mind, I'm buying a snowblower at the end of the season.
 

skybald

Member
I live in Bethlehem PA they are saying something like 32 inches is the total. They originally called for like 6-10 at most. What the hell happened? This is ridiculous. I had to shovel two driveways because I was dog sitting.
 

georly

Member
Sigh

CZgVtz5WcAAIfcT.jpg:large


I had to shovel a path from my deck to my front door so I could even OPEN the front door (5 foot drift up against the door). Now I'm too tired to shovel a path to my car and clear it off.

Today is going to be not fun.
 

Mengy

wishes it were bannable to say mean things about Marvel
I live in Bethlehem PA they are saying something like 32 inches is the total. They originally called for like 6-10 at most. What the hell happened?

Yep, me too, down int the Reading area just south from you we also got 32" when they were only calling for 8-12" the day before. They were a bit off, LOL.


I got 24 inches in Harrisburg, PA. I'm glad I shoveled yesterday and not today like my neighbors. I'm too lazy for this shit. I made up my mind, I'm buying a snowblower at the end of the season.

I think I too am buying a snowblower, one with treads on it because I have a very long, steep driveway, and a snowblower with two wheels just wouldn't cut it.

I'm going to be digging out for at least a day or two....


 

crazyprac

Member
Got my car out but the tow trucks havent even touch my neighborhood. Now everyone is dumping their snow in the middle of the road creating 10ft hard packed snow... Great, see if the trucks want to touch that shit. But anyways I made some moolah shoveling elderly homes. I offer for free since its about 15-20 min job but they insist they pay. Have to use my body now while I can!
 
After 3 hours all i got was the side walks and some of the driveway done, I am done for the day, this is just too much, i have banks of snow reaching 4 feet, the Plow fucked me over every thing in that area gotta be 4 feet high and because my neighbor park his car right at the drive way, it 's probably 10 feet in length to dig out..
 

Kaako

Felium Defensor
So fucking glad I cleaned both our cars out last night till midnight and all around them. Also did the sidewalks for our entire block. This morning I went out just to help out with neighbor's car cause she has back problems and ended up helping a buncha others out as well. Feel fucking fantastic now!

Our street though is another story lmao. Almost everyone piled all their snow in the middle of the damn street lol; no one is getting out of here any time soon cause there are mountains of snow everywhere.

Edit: When I went out of the door this morning, one of my neighbors yells "I can't believe you out here again man! We were watching you nonstop last night from our window."
Thanks ya fuckin creeps, I thought to myself. So I just laughed and shoveled away.
 

msdstc

Incredibly Naive
Storm missed us almost entirely here, about 2 inches. So pumped. Still 2 months or so of bullet dodging left, but were progressing.
 

kess

Member
I live in Bethlehem PA they are saying something like 32 inches is the total. They originally called for like 6-10 at most. What the hell happened? This is ridiculous. I had to shovel two driveways because I was dog sitting.

Just north of you, luckily the snow is fairly soft and fluffy.

Weather Underground had a 5-8 inches forecast on Friday lol
 
Tried to clear my car out - it wasn't so much snow shoveling as it was strategic snow relocation. Hoping the plow comes through again before I do round 2. :(
 
A little over 2 hours and I'm finally done shoveling out the car, snow was as tall as the car itself thanks to the snowplowers pushing it all up.



My fucking back.
 

Snaku

Banned
Just finished shoveling out the driveway after 7 hours. Everything hurts. Fucking snow drift 6 feet high. I fucking hate snow. I miss Florida and hurricanes.
 

HStallion

Now what's the next step in your master plan?
Took my girl Kendra for a walk through the park across the street from my place. She is loving the weather obviously.

gTJVTZu.jpg
 

WedgeX

Banned
Its official. I've got a snow day tomorrow.

Which is good because despite having mostly cleared out from around my car, I doubt I'd find another parking spot in the city. And my back is so damn sore.
 
Finished a while ago (Mill Basin) but had to travel to Queens take care of another. Wasn't so bad but all roads except main ones were shit.

Dunno why people keep shoveling onto the street. Makes it really bad for drivers and others since it can block driveways after the plow comes through.
 

coopolon

Member
Spent a couple hours digging out the cars in the driveway. It might have been a mistake waiting until the afternoon, it was MUCH harder than doing the entry walk and sidewalk this morning. This is probably a combination of me already being tired from this morning and the snow being wetter and heavier.

Now just have to wait for the plow and then I can connect my driveway to the road. I pushed myself way too hard on the driveway though, by the end I was probably going a quarter of my initial speed. Going to be sooooooo sore tomorrow.

In hindsight I should have taken my single stage snow thrower out Friday night and two or three times on Saturday. By this morning there was no way my little thing was going to handle the 3 foot snow drigs.
 

Exis

Member
I went out shoveling today for three hours and did not wear sunglasses, now my eyes are broke. Currently my vision some lightsources (such as monitors) white being pink/purple. Apparently this does eventually go away, but wear sunglasses folks.
 
Went back out, 3 hours the first time, just added another 2 more hours of shoveling I am done, gonna have to go out there tomorrow when the cunt plow comes and fuck up my drive way, but every thing is good, now for the flooding from the massive thawing coming this week...
 
Knocked everything out in around 2 hours today. Entire neighborhood dropped their snow in the street since there was no other place to put it. Wonder exactly how the snow plow is going to handle it though.
 

gdt

Member
This storm just fucked me up completely. I've been through a goddamn Nightmare Walk this weekend. Both work and personal life got fucked by this storm.

People dipping at work all day. One guy mightve just up and quit on me. Its a disaster. I have to do 17 hours yesterday and stay overnight and now I can barely walk.

Fuck the winter. I'm buying a snowblower and a goddamn pick up truck.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top Bottom