A meteorologist friend of mine, Jan Null, has been keeping tabs on Winter Storms for some time. He’s developed something called the Bay Area Storm Index (BASI) which he uses to calculate the intensity of the storm by combining susatined wind, peak gusts, and rain totals. By his reckoning, this storm today rates a 9.0 on a scale of 1-10.
This is based on:
SF Downtown Rainfall = 2.01 as of 2 PM (see http://www.wrh.noaa.gov/mesowest/getobext.php?wfo=&sid=SFOC1&num=48 )
SFO Max Sustained Wind = 46kts at 1559Z = 53 mph at 7:59 AM (see http://www.wrh.noaa.gov/mesowest/getobext.php?wfo=mtr&sid=KSFO&num=48&raw=1&dbn=m)
Max Gust Below 1500’= Angel Island 76 kts at 2009Z = 87 mph at 12:09 PM (see http://www.wrh.noaa.gov/mtr/versprod.php?pil=OMR&sid=DAR)
That makes this the strongest storm since a 9.0 December 16, 2002 and only the 12th storm of 9.0 or greater since 1950. See the BASI archive http://ggweather.com/basi_archive.htm
Locally in Chico as of 3PM we have 1.74 inches of rain from this storm, sustained winds of 41mph, and a peak wind of 66mph.
In Redding, Shasta Dam had 4.92″ of rain, with Redding Fire Station at 1.56 inches. Peak wind gust was 82 mph!
Above Paradise, Stirling City got 6.82 inches of rain in the last 24 hours and its still coming down. They’ll likely see it go beyond 7 inches in 24 hours with a storm total about 10 inches.
Since no one predicted the true intensity of this storm…perhaps a little weatherman humour might be appreciated!
Hopkins, a TV meteorologist, ran up a terrible forecasting record. He was so bad that a newspaper tallied his miscues. In a single year, he was wrong 300 times. That kind of notoriety got him fired. He moved across country and applied for a similar job. In the interview, he was asked the question he dreaded: “Why did you leave your last job?” Hopkins replied, “The climate didn’t agree with me.”
(g) Thanks for all your good work!
No comments?
Come one fellas. You’re making it look like we are living in a disaster area.
I can’t be the only Californian here who, has power, running water, full use of utilities, mail service, newspaper on the doorstep, internet, telephone, telegraph, excetera, excetera, excetera, …
If you don’t comment then the CNN “any weather is proof of AGW” mongering goons win.
Ah posted the above before George appeared on my screen.
An Emily Latella moment brought to you from Sacramento.
Yup we’re still here. That storm was cool. Lets do it again huh?
If this had happened in NATL (especially down in the Gulf) during the “season” it would have been named and claimed. A number of the named storms during the 2007 season were not warm core, and were birthed in mid latitudes via polar jet eddies. The NHC went through all sorts of contortions to name mid latitude cyclones, cut off lows, occluded fronts and merged lows formed by inside slider type systems crashing into tropical waves. What a scam.
Actually the January 4th storm earlier this year rated 9.0, too.