The storm is over, the totals and reports are in.
Here’s the lowdown on the snowfall records from the Baltimore NWS:
NOUS41 KLWX 070328 CCA PNSLWX DCZ001-MDZ003>007-009>011-013-014-016>018-501-502-VAZ021-025>031-036> 042-050>057-WVZ049>055-501>504-071100- PUBLIC INFORMATION STATEMENT...CORRECTED REAGAN NATIONAL INFO NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE BALTIMORE MD/WASHINGTON DC 1030 PM EST SAT FEB 06 2010 ...PRELIMINARY SUMMARY OF TWO-DAY STORM TOTAL SNOWFALLS EXCEEDED IN THE BALTIMORE-WASHINGTON AREA... THE 32.4 INCH TWO-DAY STORM TOTAL SNOWFALL RECORDED TODAY AT DULLES INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT EXCEEDS THE PREVIOUS TWO-DAY STORM RECORD OF 23.2 INCHES ON 7-8 JANUARY 1996. THE 24.8 INCH TWO-DAY STORM TOTAL SNOWFALL ESTIMATED TODAY AT BALTIMORE/WASHINGTON INTERNATIONAL THURGOOD MARSHALL AIRPORT EXCEEDS THE PREVIOUS TWO-DAY STORM TOTAL SNOWFALL RECORD OF 24.4 INCHES FOR BWI AIRPORT FROM 16-17 FEBRUARY 2003. THIS WOULD ALSO BE THE 2ND HIGHEST TWO-DAY STORM TOTAL ALL-TIME SNOWFALL FOR BALTIMORE RECORDS WHICH DATE BACK TO 1871...BEING SECOND ONLY TO THE 26.3 INCHES WHICH FELL 27-28 JANUARY 1922. THE 17.8 INCH TWO-DAY STORM TOTAL SNOWFALL RECORDED TODAY AT RONALD REAGAN WASHINGTON NATIONAL AIRPORT IS THE SECOND HIGHEST TWO-DAY STORM TOTAL RECORD...SECOND ONLY TO THE 18.7 INCHES FOR NATIONAL AIRPORT FROM 18-19 FEBRUARY 1979. THIS WOULD ALSO BE THE 4TH HIGHEST TWO-DAY STORM TOTAL ALL-TIME SNOWFALL FOR WASHINGTON RECORDS WHICH DATE BACK TO 1871...BEHIND ONLY THE 27-28 JANUARY 1922 KNICKERBOCKER STORM WITH 26.0 INCHES...THE 12-13 FEBRUARY 1899 STORM WHICH PRODUCED 19.0 INCHES...AND THE 18.7 INCHES WHICH FELL 18-19 FEBRUARY 1979. AS WITH ANY MAJOR CLIMATE RECORD ACHIEVEMENT...THESE PRELIMINARY RECORDS WILL BE QUALITY CONTROLLED BY NOAA'S NATIONAL CLIMATIC DATA CENTER OVER THE NEXT SEVERAL WEEKS.
Arctic Oscillation Index going deeply negative again.
http://www.cpc.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/daily_ao_index/ao_index.html
And I wonder whether by Feb 12 will the Winter Olympics finally get their snow….only it’d be too much? Be a nice bit of karma there.
See, global warming is true! What else can explain earth turning into a snowball!?
One year ago, we had 30 inches on the ground from a single storm event in Spokane. Had over six feet in two weeks. Nearly 100 inches for the season.
Our blizzard barely warranted a mention in the cross state Seattle media.
Now, the east gets less than that and the whole world is about to end with round the clock saturation news coverage. Bunch of wimps!
Uh Oh.
THESE PRELIMINARY RECORDS WILL BE QUALITY CONTROLLED BY NOAA’S NATIONAL CLIMATIC DATA CENTER
Where’s the raw data?
Anyone have contours software?
But all of this has been foretold in the book of Global Warming. Repent now, ye sinners.
While watching a scroll across the bottom of the Weather Channel (I think it was) I saw a list of the maximum recorded snow fall for each state. Of those I saw, Pennsylvania had the highest but I do not remember the town. I recall about 40 inches. I’ll see if I can find a site that doesn’t stop at the Mason-Dixon Line.
The difference, Eric (20:21:02), is that it is supposed to be cold and snowy in Spokane, which is almost in Canada for those not aware of the Lilac City.
Link to raw data long lat amounts stations etc…
http://www.erh.noaa.gov/lwx/events/20100206/WBCRRMLWX_20100206.txt
Here in north Michigan that is just a another winter Day!!!
Looks like they might get a touch up next week Tue/wens.
http://www.accuweather.com/video-on-demand.asp?video=21670159001&title=Blizzard%20#2%20to%20Take%20Shape
I say again that these are running south more.
Enjoy
Luke Skywarmer!
Fluffy Clouds (Tim L)
List of snowfall amounts no lat long…
http://www.erh.noaa.gov/lwx/events/20100206/WBCPNSLWX_20100206.txt
Eric (20:21:02) :
“Now, the east gets less than that and the whole world is about to end with round the clock saturation news coverage.”
Eric, in comedy, timing is everything.
“AS WITH ANY MAJOR CLIMATE RECORD ACHIEVEMENT…THESE PRELIMINARY
RECORDS WILL BE QUALITY CONTROLLED BY NOAA’S NATIONAL CLIMATIC DATA
CENTER OVER THE NEXT SEVERAL WEEKS.”
Yes, I’m sure they will…
National data
http://www.hpc.ncep.noaa.gov/discussions/nfdscc5.html
STORM SUMMARY NUMBER 07 FOR MID-ATLANTIC WINTER STORM
NWS HYDROMETEOROLOGICAL PREDICTION CENTER CAMP SPRINGS MD
1000 PM EST SAT FEB 06 2010
…HISTORIC SNOWSTORM HAS ENDED ACROSS THE MID-ATLANTIC STATES…
ALL BLIZZARD WARNINGS…WINTER STORM WARNINGS AND WINTER WEATHER
ADVISORIES HAVE EXPIRED ACROSS THE AFFECTED REGION.
FOR A DETAILED GRAPHICAL DEPICTION OF THE LATEST
WATCHES…WARNINGS AND ADVISORIES…PLEASE SEE http://WWW.WEATHER.GOV
koko (20:11:56) :
Arctic Oscillation Index going deeply negative again.
Why does the graph cut off at -4, is that an instrument ‘zero’ value?
If not, where can we see the actual value?
If this global warming continues, our property values here in Florida may go back up. Of course that also involves an influx of cold northerners to the neighborhood, you have to take the good with the bad I guess 🙂
Tom in Texas (20:22:35) :
Uh Oh.
THESE PRELIMINARY RECORDS WILL BE QUALITY CONTROLLED BY NOAA’S NATIONAL CLIMATIC DATA CENTER
Where’s the raw data?
Anyone have contours software?
My reply;
I have Surfer 8 but the data is space delineated somewhat and imports parsed into only 5 columns, would need to do a lot of cut and past trimming of the data to present in contour map form, or a conversion to a comma delineated format.
NYT called ‘no record set in D.C.’ early yesterday afternoon. Funny, everything else pointed to a record. Preliminary records will now be quality controlled by National Climatic Data Center. Drum roll please. (I though this was weather, not climate, well, NCDC has the ball and they called time out.)
On a side note…
New sunspot 1044 is unleashing M-class flares now. Latest appears to be an M-4 flare.
It’s possible this one could produce an X-class flare for the first time since Dec ’06 iirc….
http://www.nohrsc.noaa.gov/snow_model/images/full/National/ruc_snow_precip_24hr/201002/ruc_snow_precip_24hr_2010020605_National.jpg
Wowzers, there’s going to be a few heart attacks happening in area over the next few days… shoveling themselves out.
Another gate left open? That makes 3 in one day.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/environment/climatechange/7177230/New-errors-in-IPCC-climate-change-report.html
Found this on Bishop Hill.
The more we examine this nonsense the higher the trail gets.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1249035/How-Met-Office-blocked-questions-mans-role-hockey-stick-climate-row.html
With Washington shut down, Obama will be able to hunker down in the Oval Office with Holdren and Chu – to solve that nasty global warming problem.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1249035/How-Met-Office-blocked-questions-mans-role-hockey-stick-climate-row.html
oops !
I was living in Ashburn, VA during the 1996 storms. I’m pretty sure it was more than 23.2 inches near Dulles. We supposedly got 18 inches one day and at least another 12 the next. I still had to go to work. My Toyota 4×4 got quite the workout for the next few days.
Andrew30:
http://www.cpc.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/daily_ao_index/ao_index_ensm.shtml
Shows AO down to -6 and the forecasts.
Off topic, but perhaps an important development in the surface temperature record issue in one of the previously discussed regions, New Zealand:
http://www.climateconversation.wordshine.co.nz/2010/02/niwa-loses-opts-for-fresh-start/
“Where’s the raw data?
Anyone have contours software?
For all the wonders of computer graphics, hand drawn contours are still by far the best. Few people still know how to do them, but it doesn’t take much of a brain to out interrpolate the machines.
Good start to the Warmest Year In History. (My prediction by the morons that have left science behind and adopted witchcraft instead)
It was so cold today that I saw Democratic senator with his hands in his own pockets.
TH, I assure you sir they were teleconnected to your pockets.
I like Steve Goddard’s perspective,
I grew up in the northeast and had to dig out of these storms. And so did everyone else. As a kid 12 + I created a business. I was always happy to oblige at $20 per single driveway for a 3 foot storm.
That was a long time ago. I worked through the day until I couldn’t do anymore. There was always another driveway that needed to be cleared. I was always very satisfied that I earned my money that day.
Maybe that’s happening today?
hmmm… Nice peace of information. So cold 🙂
Phil Jones:
‘Climate-Gate’ Scientist Contemplated Suicide
Times of London
The scientist at the center of the “climate-gate” e-mail scandal has revealed that he was so traumatized by the global backlash against him that he contemplated suicide.
http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2010/02/06/climate-gate-scientist-contemplated-suicide/?test=latestnews
No need for that, Phil. Just tell us what happened to the raw data.
Come clean.
rbateman (23:20:22) :
That is either manipulation or a genuine cry for help.
I would go with manipulation because there is the reference to multiple times and also the very public admission. An admission this public may seem to play into the ‘cry for help’ scenario, but it is actually anathema. In a cry for help situation, only the trusted circle finds out unless the actual attempt is the publicized event.
That said, I also hope that I am correct, and that Dr. Phil did not actually contemplate or try to go through with that, because I have lost friends to suicide, and I don’t wish that sort of feeling on anyone, anywhere, anytime. Phil, my advice is the same in either situation.
Knock it off and get well. 🙂
Excuse me for being ironic but as a Siberian I cannot help it: comparing a bit of warm snow with the Armageddon? That’s not even an exaggeration, it’s stupid, plain and simple.
My wife’s father, an old tough mountaineer used to all kinds of weather, is complaining from Central Siberia (Krasnoyarsk): while rather extremely low temperatures are not a novelty there, this winter is exceptional in that the temperatures in Krasnoyarsk are constantly below -30 deg. C, mostly about -36, and often going down to -40. This is no joke: I remember going to school while it was -40 deg. C. You spit, it hits the ground as ice!
OT but this is worth a read:
THE recent climate science scandals have been revealing. For those of us who have had the experience of environmentalists accusing us of being “deniers” and “doubters of The Science”, as if science is a gospel truth that you question or ignore at your peril, they have also been enjoyable.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/opinion/a-vatican-of-the-laboratory/story-e6frg6zo-1225827280390
I was halfway through writing a comment and BANG, I was kicked back to the main page. This has happened before and not at any other sites.
I was about to say th
So far I have gotten every thing I’ve wanted. A dead Cap-and-Trade bill. A dead Obamacare bill. A UN being discredited beyond belief. A nation being completely bankrupt, mathematically and statistically, Bankrupt beyond belief so the bad people will have to stop the bad things they are doing to us because they have no more money left to keep doing what they are doing. I was orchestrating this day for myself for a long time now. Many foreign countries going bankrupt today like Greece and Spain. Iceland is done but giving a big FU to their international banksters. Ireland and Portugal are but a stones throw away from financial collapse. Will this bunch do the same as Iceland?
Next, I want a collapse of the entire EU. No more Codex Alimentarius, no more Agenda 21, among other things, and then a withdraw of American troops from the Middle East.
I usually get what I want.
Oh, that Codex Alimentarius, and Agenda 21are from the UN, by the way.
Michael (01:49:34) :
“I usually get what I want”
Hey Mick, could you please ask for a parrallel inquiry into AGW in the US, UK and Australia with at least one scientist indicted? Just one from each will do. Pleeeaseee!!!!
http://www.dailyexpress.co.uk/posts/view/156703
Sorry cant find the notes etc section. This is an article about the bbc pension fund being heavily investe in climate change areas.
Baa Humbug (02:09:42) : wrote
“Michael (01:49:34) :
“I usually get what I want”
Hey Mick, could you please ask for a parrallel inquiry into AGW in the US, UK and Australia with at least one scientist indicted? Just one from each will do. Pleeeaseee!!!!”
Exactly!
I am going to see perp walks. I am going to savor those moments.
I agree Michael and Baa Humbug. We need to see some of these clowns in court, even if they are not found guilty, although I can’t see how they can escape such a verdict given the mountain of evidence against them.
.
Sorry, are we talking about those ‘inch’ thingys?
.
Denis Hopkins (02:11:44) :
http://www.dailyexpress.co.uk/posts/view/156703
Sorry cant find the notes etc section. This is an article about the bbc pension fund being heavily investe in climate change areas.
Another “Gate” in the making. Is there any end to the this AGW corruption?
The last time a British scientist in the spotlight “committed suicide” there was a massive cover up. Beware, Phil.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Kelly_(weapons_expert)
Does anyone know if Al Gore was in DC this weekend for the DNC winter meetings? Could you see him, surrounded by his teary eyed AGW zombies , reading global warming poetry while there is a MAJOR BLIZZARD taking place outside outside their convention?
This just gets better and better…
OT.
The Sun is at it.
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/img1.htm
Michael (01:49:34) :
Agenda21? Are you in France?
PiperPaul (01:29:56) :
It happens to me a lot. Touching the wrong key, usually. I put it down to being old and stupid : )) what’s your excuse : ))))
The map shows 28.5 inches for where I live which seems very accurate, but I wouldn’t put much faith in any snow depth measurement unless it is the melted version or a measure of “precipitation” and not some person using a yard stick to measure. We had some compaction and at least a few inches of snow melted on contact at the beginning of the event, all lost to the ruler. We also had winds and thus some drifting.
I had my own little imaginary UHI going on my driveway. After removing 24 inches of snow, we had another 5 inches which was able to still thermally protect the driveway until late afternoon. Every shovel full at driveway level revealed melted snow so there wasn’t the need to chisel a base layer of ice. (this morning, my little urban heat island will have given up its heat)
So, is a ruler the only way to measure show?
“The Day Of The Blogger
I believe this to be a pivotal day. It has been coming for some time, but, as ever, it has taken a seminal piece of writing to bring the necessary focus.
As I said earlier, Matt Ridley’s article could well become a classic in pin-pointing the moment when the democratic internet wrested elements of legitimacy from both the mainstream media and from science itself.
This is truly the Day of the Blogger. It is precisely why I have blogged: “to ensure that the mainstream media cannot exclude critical voices which deserve to be heard.”
It now appears that bloggers are becoming a Fifth Estate, a new, and vital, balance in the realm of politics, correcting and curbing the failures and excesses of the Fourth Estate, the press, which is too frequently subservient to the forces of the State, and of their wealthy, and often ruthless, proprietors.
This is why it is absolutely necessary that the internet remains free and open to all. This is why some newspapers need to apologise, such as The Times for its shameful editorial on “village idiots”. Above all, this is why Gordon Brown and Ed Miliband should be ashamed of, and apologise for, their recent attacks on the critics of climate-change science.”
urlm.in/ecqt
…-
“The global warming guerrillas
Matt Ridley salutes the bloggers who changed the climate debate. While most of Fleet Street kowtowed to the green lobby, online amateurs uncovered the spin and deception that finally cracked the consensus
Journalists are wont to moan that the slow death of newspapers will mean a disastrous loss of investigative reporting. The web is all very well, they say, but who will pay for the tenacious sniffing newshounds to flush out the real story? ‘Climategate’ proves the opposite to be true. It was amateur bloggers who scented the exaggerations, distortions and corruptions in the climate establishment; whereas newspaper reporters, even after the scandal broke, played poodle to their sources.
It was not Private Eye, or the BBC or the News of the World, but a retired electrical engineer in Northampton, David Holland, whose freedom-of-information requests caused the Climategate scientists to break the law, according to the Information Commissioner. By contrast, it has so far attracted little attention that the leaked emails of Climategate include messages from reporters obsequiously seeking ammunition against the sceptics. Other emails have shown reporters meekly changing headlines to suit green activists, or being threatened with ostracism for even reporting the existence of a sceptical angle: ‘Your reportage is very worrisome to most climate scientists,’ one normally alarmist reporter was told last year when he slipped briefly off message. ‘I sense that you are about to experience the “Big Cutoff” from those of us who believe we can no longer trust you, me included.’”
http://www.spectator.co.uk/spectator/thisweek/5749853/the-global-warming-guerrillas.thtml
http://stevejanke.com/archives/297856.php
Another story in a major UK national broadsheet http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/environment/climatechange/7177323/Climate-change-research-bungle.html.
And lampooning is a good sign http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/matt/?cartoon=7170649&cc=7131751
Any snowfall south of the Manson-Nixon line?
“Now, the east gets less than that and the whole world is about to end with round the clock saturation news coverage.”
Legitimate complaint in part, but how many people are affected by such events in the Spokane area, as comapred to the 20 million or so affected in the swath from northern Virginia through central New Jersey that bore the brunt of this storm?
Ralph (02:48:58) :
Sorry, are we talking about those ‘inch’ thingys?
I’m sorry, but you’ll just have to get used to the US refusing to go metric.
Our children have been regularly traumatized for over a decade to make them worry about a coming thermageddon, to frighten them into getting their parents to do stupid things like using curly humming light bulbs. Now we have to explain to them how adults have systematically lied to them for power, money, and fame, which will further erode any trust they still have about adult authority.
Thus we are in no hurry to engage in discussion with the small ones about whether or not those are centimeterworms while having a few quarter-liters of hot chocolate.
This sounds like a one-liner from a standup routine at the Climate Comedy Club.
“THESE PRELIMINARY RECORDS WILL BE QUALITY CONTROLLED BY NOAA’S NATIONAL CLIMATIC DATA CENTER OVER THE NEXT SEVERAL WEEKS.”
(Rimshot, cymbal crash, laughter.)
G. Varros (04:27:29) :
Measuring melted snow (or weighing snow cores, which I do) gives you the liquid equivalent. That can’t give you snowfall, as the ratio snowfall to liquid ranges between 5 and 30, “normal” snow is 10 – one inch water gives you 10 inches of snow.
Snow depth is “officially” done by several representative samples and averaging though fixed “snow stakes” in good spots are unaffected by layers of freezing rain events.
Snowfall is very different and while I dislike some of the official rules, it’s done by periodically measure snow on a snow board and then clearing it. How well it is followed is unclear. Our raw temperature records are much better than our raw snowfall measurements, but at least the data isn’t abused as much afterwards.
See http://meteorologyclimatology.suite101.com/article.cfm/how_to_measure_snowfall_correctly
My main quibble with snowfall measuring is that the NWS says to measure and clear the snowboard every 6 hours, I think it should every 6 hours or when 6″ has accumulated. Beyond that compaction can start. I suspect every measurement has a small bias on the high side as people measure the top of the snow, which is not a perfectly smooth surface.
Completely OT, but worth a mention. I see that over on RealClimate they are discussing a piece of research, which attempts to “empirically estimate the distribution of gamma, the temperature-induced carbon dioxide feedback to the climate system.”
Part of their “empirical approach” involves the use of…
“an experimental (“ensemble”) calibration approach, by analyzing the time courses of reconstructed Northern Hemisphere T estimates, and ice core CO2 levels, from 1050 to 1800, AD.”
They go on make this assumption…
“ …most of the source reconstructions used in the study show, there is no time period between 1050 and 1800, including the medieval times, which equals the global temperature state we are now in; most of it is not even close…”
Despite that, their conclusion indicates that: from looking at historic temperature and CO2 data, when temperature rises the amount of CO2 fed back into the system suggests an insensitive response.
Good news – and that’s using Had CRU’s questionable temperature reconstructions, which probably suppress the temperatures associated with the MWP.
I agree: Bloggers and the Weather also brought us this hurried news release about NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory: The ‘Variable Sun’ Mission.
http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2010/05feb_sdo.htm?list1073366
The news report includes surprising comments from the National Academy of Sciences (NAS), the Naval Research Laboratory (NRL), NASA Headquarters, NASA’s Goddard Spaceflight Center, and the University of Colorado.
From NASA Headquarters: “The sun,” explains Lika Guhathakurta of NASA headquarters in Washington DC, “is a variable star.”
From NRL: “Understanding solar variability is crucial,” says space scientist
Judith Lean of the Naval Research Lab in Washington DC. “Our modern way of life depends upon it.”
From NRL: “‘Solar constant’ is an oxymoron,” says Judith Lean of the Naval
Research Lab. “Satellite data show that the sun’s total irradiance rises and
falls with the sunspot cycle by a significant amount.”
From NAS: According to a 2008 study by the National Academy of Sciences, a century-class solar storm could cause twenty times more economic damage than Hurricane Katrina.
From Boulder, CO: “If human eyes could see EUV wavelengths, no one would doubt that the sun is a variable star,” says Tom Woods of the University of Colorado in Boulder.
From Goddard Spaceflight Center: “Understanding the inner workings of the solar dynamo has long been a ‘holy grail’ of solar physics,” says Dean Pesnell of the Goddard Space Flight Center.
Now the Department of Energy (DOE) scientists need to get involved and admit or deny that neutron repulsion is the energy source that powers the Sun and generates the cycles of solar magnetic activity that are empirically linked with changes in Earth’s climate.
I am grateful to everyone here for encouraging NAS, NASA, and NRL to re-examine old dogmas. It would be great if we could also get DOE scientists to reconsider their dogma about N-N interactions.
With kind regards,
Oliver K. Manuel
Former NASA PI for Apollo
Oh, I should point out I measure snow depth with both a snow stake and a 4 foot yardstick. Before anyone (else) points out a yard is only 3 feet, let me point out that since I use it to measure snow depth in my yard the length can be anything.
Also, while I have a pitiful 3″ today, two years ago today I had 21″ On March 1st that year I had 39″, so a 3 foot yardstick would have been pretty silly.
Hmm, last year today I had 20″. Clearly global warming has taken its toll on New Hampshire.
G. Varros (04:27:29) :
Yep. The depth can be arbitrary. As you said there are a number of factors. The initial part of the storm here had some sleet. All of my NE windows are covered in ice.
I live on the other side of town which would indicate somewhat less if following the BWI-IAD gradient but today I had to remove the NE facing storm door because I couldn’t open it and a recent visitor waded through snow in the street that came up to nid-thigh. The snow in front of the door was mostly drift but the street wouldn’t have had much. Strangely the deepest drifts are all situated upwind. Wonder why.
The pseudo religion has hedged it regardless of what happens. If its colder than average they blame Anthropogenic global warming. If its warmer than average they say it Anthropogenic global warming.
If my eggs cook in the pan thaey’re being cooked. If they are put in the freezer they’ll also be cooked by the freezing radiation above absolute zero.
I’m sorry but their logic is just nonsense, and they know it. (Unless the pudding headedness is as degenerate as that of Prince Charles)
What’s up with the weather channel’s record high’s and low’s? This time of year I usually start to look at the Average temps listed on the weather channel website so I can see the progress of the coming spring. Along with the average they also list the record high’s and low’s. Many of the records used to be from the early 1900’s to 1940’s but now I don’t see any record High’s or Low’s from earlier than the 1950’s. Did they decide those temps weren’t reliable enough and ditch them?
Drought and forrest fires.
And more of it.
OT:
Obama cancels Moon return project
President Barack Obama has cancelled the American project designed to take humans back to the Moon.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8489097.stm
Hope blizzards will freeze all the members of the Club of Rome, their employees, servants, silly followers and their dreams of absolute power.
How can anybody explain such a desire for power?, it is simply illogical, it reveals, in any case, a grave mental impairment.
An amazing 35″ here in western MD. Snow up to my waist. The snow level on my roof concerns me — must be tons of weight on it. Any additional snow might bust it.
Despite that, I’m not screaming about global cooling or “climate change”. The rational explanation is a moisture-laden El Nino jet-stream colliding with cold, dry Canadian air to the north.
22:03:43
“Anyone have contours software?”
Raw data rearranged into a bit more convenient CSV file is here: http://dplot.com/wuwt/dc_snow_06feb2010.csv
Contour plot, raw data: http://dplot.com/wuwt/dc_snow_06feb2010.png (a bit chunky because of the triangulation)
Contour plot, smoothed: http://dplot.com/wuwt/dc_snow_06feb2010_smoothed.png
maz2 (04:29:15) :
I am thinking now that the usual conduct of the people who secretly realize themselves inferior makes them protect what they consider will avoid them the pain of being discovered in their real nature; that is why they tend to form gangs among “peers”, so, as it has been discovered in “Clima – Gate”, the same can be surely found in other areas of established and consensual science.
Just stir it up and it will emanate all kind of odours, and a lot of people will be exposed as it happened in Climate-Gate.
There are more GATES to be opened for the sake of science and humanity.
Here’s a new controversy for you. It seems that there are two snow totals for BWI airport 24 and 28 inches. Why? There’s more than one way to measure: at the end of the storm or hourly (and other periods). There going to have to kick it upstairs to the “Weather Court” to decide which is the total for Baltimore.
Rob N (06:37:08) :
I was wondering when someone else would notice.
Part of that answer has to lie with Media nuggets. You can’t exactly have a whole lot of new records to yak about on the Nightly Forecast if your base goes back over 100 years.
This is one area where printed media can and still does do a far better job of keeping things in perspective.
On the other hand, telemedia these days often goes over the deep end with sensationalism, and as such opens itself up to abuse.
RFK, Jr. 15 months ago: Global warming means no snow or cold in DC!
By: David Freddoso
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/RFK-79834057.html
See that VA county west of DC and just east of the tip of the WVA panhandle?
That one with all the little red thirty-somethings overlapping?
No wonder my neighbors and I are so sore today! lolol
O/T
@chris H (21:40:00) :
Thanks for the link to the Daily Mail story on the Met Office – I’m not a great conspiracy fan but this article clearly suggests that multiple government agencies colluded together, along with CRU, to prevent disclosure of embarrassing and, by any standards, important information. Whether it’s against any FOI law, I don’t know, I’m not a lawyer and no doubt that struggle will come next, perhaps with the Info Commissioner raising his hands in horror and saying there’s sadly nothing can be done about it (again). What it does show is how deeply embedded and ingrained the AGW myth is throughout our society. Getting the stain out is going to need an awful lot of thorough washing.
Orig linK
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1249035/How-Met-Office-blocked-questions-mans-role-hockey-stick-climate-row.html
…THESE PRELIMINARY RECORDS WILL BE QUALITY CONTROLLED BY NOAA’S NATIONAL CLIMATIC DATA CENTER OVER THE NEXT SEVERAL WEEKS
Always a little suspicious of NOAA’s “QUALITY CONTROL”. Cant trust lying, theiving “Climate Scientists” anymore.
P Wilson (06:23:40) :
The pseudo religion has hedged it regardless of what happens. If its colder than average they blame Anthropogenic global warming. If its warmer than average they say it Anthropogenic global warming.
Which is why it is very important not to lose sight of the many changes they have made to their PR campaign.
For the longest time, they exclusively proclaimed AGW with forecast barbecue summers/droughts, disappearing snows/glaciers/Polar Ice, catastrophic Hurricanes and deadly rising sea levels.
The last few years, when it became painfully clear what was going on (and I assume that is what the Phil Jones erasure emails are chiefly about) the message changes to “Climate Change”. From Climate Change the newer spin of “Global Warming causes Global Cooling”.
The latest concoction is an absurdity by nature. It is deeply insulting to the commoner, to the point of boiling rage. A marketing failure no doubt spun by desperation. It worked at first, but then the damage started to roll in.
To make it work, one has to prop up ‘Xth warmest month” statements with maps that depict areas that have been modified into climate cooking insanity.
Running out of land masses to manipulate (news travelling by internet) we are down to the oceans. That game will not go on forever. Someone will find a way to debunk it, and that will throw the final shovel of dirt into the face of AGW and it’s proponents.
Cavalier & flippant quips about “Snowmageddon” will not let the deceptive out of the corner they have typecast themselves into.
“AS WITH ANY MAJOR CLIMATE RECORD ACHIEVEMENT…THESE PRELIMINARY
RECORDS WILL BE QUALITY CONTROLLED BY NOAA’S NATIONAL CLIMATIC DATA
CENTER OVER THE NEXT SEVERAL WEEKS.”
Does “quality controlled” mean “adjusted”? If so, which way will they adjust it? Will they adjust the numbers up to 50 inches, making it the worst snowstorm in history and blame it on global warming? Or will they adjust it down to zero and say because of global warming we don’t get any snow any more?
RFK Jr. lamented the lack of snow in Virgina last year, and blamed it on Sarah Palin.
http://www.robertfkennedyjr.com/articles/2008_sep_Los_angeles_times.html
From the map… are there really that many weather stations?
“the_Butcher (06:45:31) :
OT:
Obama cancels Moon return project
President Barack Obama has cancelled the American project designed to take humans back to the Moon.”
Seems we are turning ever more inward. One thing that may jar us out of navel gazing is if the Chinese eventually establish a moon base. It would perhaps have the same effect as sputnik.
Obama promised to bankrupt the coal industry and Hansen wanted to shut down the Capital Power Plant.
I’m guessing that Obama’s daughters and Hansen’s grandchildren are happy to have a warm, well lit home to warm up in today.
“barbarausa (07:32:08) :
See that VA county west of DC and just east of the tip of the WVA panhandle?
That one with all the little red thirty-somethings overlapping?
No wonder my neighbors and I are so sore today! lolol”
Loudoun County? I’m there as well. And yes, I am quite sore.
By the way, that 17.8″ at DCA (Reagan National) is creating an angry little stir in the local weather community. Most other area reports measured at least 20″, but, of course, DCA is the *official* site, and they measure markedly less snow. Hmmm….
homogenize the data. you easterners will all feel warmer.
“My wife’s father, an old tough mountaineer used to all kinds of weather, is complaining from Central Siberia (Krasnoyarsk): while rather extremely low temperatures are not a novelty there, this winter is exceptional in that the temperatures in Krasnoyarsk are constantly below -30 deg. C, mostly about -36, and often going down to -40. This is no joke: I remember going to school while it was -40 deg. C. You spit, it hits the ground as ice!”
Mr Feht: I was in Winnipeg recently at -40C and spit does not freeze in the air before it hits the ground , it is I’ll grant, rather chilly, and if you have too much water in your whiskey it can even turn to slush while you smoke your cigarette outside. Irritating, but easy to cure with a little more warm whiskey, or going indoors.
And -40C, especially with windchill on top does result in schools being closed for cold days ( a concept akin to snow days) there, and just like snow days the kids rush out to play. (in their spacesuits, I presume.)
Meanwhile, tropospheric temps are spiking well over previous record highs. Go here:
http://discover.itsc.uah.edu/amsutemps/
And look at 14,000, 25,000, and 36,000 ft. Huge spike in Feb. temps over the already high January records (Jan. 2010 as the warmest on record)
All this and the sun is really waking up now. Irradiance going up up up, x-ray flux, m-class flare today. Wow. It will be hard to keep 2010 from being the warmest on record. What might have caused this? Hmmm…just natural variability I suppose…
When snow hits 30 inches on a roof, it’s time to consider using manpower to clean some of it off.
Consider a 40″ snow accumulation, which should have 4 inches of contained water. A 1600 sq ft home will have a roof (with eves) of about 1800 sq ft. With water weighing 62.4 lbs/cf, 4 inches of water would apply a weigh of ~20 lb/sq ft. 1800 * 20 / 2000 = 18 short tons of water. That’s almost what a loaded semi truck carries and now that’s perched on your roof!
I doubt it will cause the roof to collapse–generally what happens is stress cracks form in plaster and paint which never go away. But you just never know, considering what structural imperfections were there to begin with, and what has happened since.
Just be dadgum careful up on the roof while clearing it!
@ R. Gates (09:03:28)
‘… the sun is really waking up now. Irradiance going up up up, x-ray flux, m-class flare today. Wow. It will be hard to keep 2010 from being the warmest on record. What might have caused this?’
Hm.
At a guess I’d say emissions of CO2 by man would be highly unlikely to have caused the sun ‘waking up’.
But perhaps you have hitherto unpublished data showing the enormous influence of terrestrial CO2 concentrations on the waking or sleeping sun?
Would sure be nice to see them.
*******
BarryW (07:07:06) :
Here’s a new controversy for you. It seems that there are two snow totals for BWI airport 24 and 28 inches. Why? There’s more than one way to measure: at the end of the storm or hourly (and other periods).
*******
As you say, there are different ways to measure. One way & prb’ly the most consistent way is simply take a number of depth measurements in open areas after the snow stops, and avg them. I think this is the “official” number.
Another way is to accumulate snow in a rain gauge (typically 6″). When it fills, replace it w/an empty rain gauge, continuing until the snow stops. There prb’ly won’t be any melting at ground level this way, and no compaction at the bottom as in a ground-depth measurement, so this method will give higher amounts.
Even another way is to measure on an open, insulated cold surface like a roof or car. Again, this will give somewhat higher amounts.
My 35″ was measured on my roof. The ground depth is somewhat less, around 32″, so some melting/compaction occurred on the ground.
Funny about the above contour maps David Hyde posted — look at the hot air in downtown DC melting some of the snow.
Good chart here showing just how weak the northern polar vortex is at the moment. Lots of cold air spilling down across the NH, so keep those thermals handy.
http://www.cpc.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/daily_ao_index/hgt.shtml
The controversy with the BWI measurement is that some contractor screwed up the measurements and didn’t empty the snowboard every 6 hours (sorry, I can’t remember where I read that). The new total is a reconstruction taking into account compression of the snow under its own wieght and what not. It would be nice if they publish the method. However, the surrounding stations have markedly more snow. Nobody believes the BWI result. Our neighborhood got over 2′.
Compared to the 2003 blizzard, this one is not as bad, because, we already had snow on the ground before the 2003 one struck. What gets interesting is that we may get another foot of snow on Wednesday. Just this morning, one of our local weathermen, Justin Berk, refused to say on-air what he thinks the snow total will be from the coming storm. But from the diagrams & models (including the UK MET model), we should be getting a bunch more.
Downtown Baltimore main roads are passable but not great. Many restaurants and supermarkets are open. The Eddie’s supermarket stayed open during the 2003 blizzard with no resupply for 3 days. The downtown Superfresh was also open. I had a beer & dinner at the Brewer’s Art last night during my bike ride. Special props to Potbelly’s downtown for staying open during the entire event. They didn’t even change the store hours. We’ve had massive tree damage but only one building collapse has been reported. BGE (Baltimore Gas & Electric) only has 15k customers without power as of 9 hours ago. That’s not bad.
The real story is that we are going to smash the previous record for snow during a single season. The Wednesday storm, if it drops more than 4″, will put us over the top.
UAH only goes back 30 years or so-satillite era. Meanwhile Nino’s croaking
which warmist were hanging on to as the worst ever:
http://weather.unisys.com/surface/sst_anom.html
Also February appears to be repeating December I will bet on the ground,
that it will be cold in the west-like December.That AO’s got me worried..
As I can’t post on Tips & Notes so sorry it’s ot
Anthony, Re
Dave McK (17:30:19) :
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/christopherbooker/7176262/Climate-makes-money-move-in-mysterious-ways.html
“Contemplating the impenetrable maze of payments made by various ministries to the UN, the EU, banks, research institutes, teams of academics, NGOs, environmental and industrial lobby groups and “charitable foundations” – often through chains of “funding vehicles” which may give only the most nebulous idea of their purpose – we can get little idea what is the total amount of taxpayers’ money flooding out from all our different branches of officialdom.”
This Article by Christopher shows that the British Government are complicit in the IPCC Scam, they knew that the Himalayan glacier statement was wrong back in 2004.
“R. Gates (09:03:28) :
[…]
What might have caused this? Hmmm…just natural variability I suppose…”
It’s the El Nino, Gates.
The negative AO has the flip-side effect of course of keeping temperatures warmer near the polar region as the cold air streams down and warm air is brought up on the backside, and with this action we could continue to see record warmth over the N. polar regions as we saw during the December negative AO event. The record tropospheric global warmth could indeed take a pause due to the negative AO event, but more likely, will only flatten, as global tropospheric warmth measures the total energy in the troposphere, the negative AO simply mixes the cold air futher south, but does not decrease the total tropospheric energy.
O/T
Utah legislative panel digs its heels in against EPA’s CO2 regs; passes resolution mentioning ‘flawed climate data’, and critical of $7B ‘climate change gravy train’
http://algorelied.com/?p=3680#more-3680
Things are about to get A LOT worse.
The new operational computer model guidance is showing ANOTHER
10 to 20 inches of snow, blizzard conditions, and EXTREME cold for
Washington/Baltimore this week.
Nature wins(again).
Maybe this should be called “anecdotal” but according to this article from the Detroit News the greatest snow record was 3 feet:
“The heaviest on record was 28 inches in January 1922. The biggest snowfall for the Washington-Baltimore area is believed to have been in 1772, before official records were kept, when as much as 3 feet fell, which George Washington and Thomas Jefferson penned in their diaries. “
From The Detroit News: http://detnews.com/article/20100206/NATION/2060373/-Snowmageddon–blankets-Mid-Atlantic#ixzz0esRKdKYE
HAMweather
past 7 days, record snow
http://mapcenter.hamweather.com/records/7day/us.html?c=maxtemp,mintemp,lowmax,highmin,snow
Ray (08:36:51) :
From the map… are there really that many weather stations?
My reply; Yes and usually very unevenly dispersed, each little village adding another, except in a couple states where they had the foresight to set up automatic reporting stations of even spacing to fill in gaps, in the station distribution in rural areas.
There are many more raw station sites than “Official sites due to ???”
As the Utah Legislature “digs in its heels” again CO2 regulations…Arctic sea ice remains well below two standard deviations under it’s long term averages:
http://nsidc.org/data/seaice_index/images/daily_images/N_stddev_timeseries.png
Just like the negative AO really mixes up the troposphere with spreading cold air further south, lot’s cross currents of information and sentiments out there right now related to AGW. Undoubtedly, this website provides the single best clearinghouse to sift through views from all sides. Thanks Mr. Watts!
Al Gore calls Obama:
http://factsnotfantasy.blogspot.com/2010/02/al-gore-calls-obama.html
TH (22:10:41) :
“It was so cold today that I saw Democratic senator with his hands in his own pockets.”
LOL. Outstanding!!!
R Gates, you still haven’t explained the UAH anomaly of .003 in June. Still waiting for your informed response.
Richard M –
Truly missed that…I assume you’re talking about the June 09 anamoly displayed in this chart:
YR MON GLOBE NH SH TROPICS
2009 1 0.304 0.443 0.165 -0.036
2009 2 0.347 0.678 0.016 0.051
2009 3 0.206 0.310 0.103 -0.149
2009 4 0.090 0.124 0.056 -0.014
2009 5 0.045 0.046 0.044 -0.166
2009 6 0.003 0.031 -0.025 -0.003
2009 7 0.410 0.211 0.609 0.427
IF this is what you’re referring to, I see no anamoly at all. The trend from previous months to later months is consistent, going from a cooler ocean, La NIna, quiet sun period to a El Nino period and more active sun that we are seeing now. One of my favorite simple sites to instantly get the big picture of how solar cycles, el nino/la nina cycles are overlayed upon the background of steadily increasing GHG levels can be found here:
http://www.climate4you.com/Sun.htm#Recent solar irradiance
Lot’s of simple “one stop shopping” excellent reference stuff here…
King Declares State Of Emergency Due To Weather
Curfew In Place, No Sale Of Alcohol Or Firearms
POSTED: 5:18 pm EST February 6, 2010
UPDATED: 5:33 pm EST February 6, 2010
Email Print
Comments KING, N.C. — A state of emergency has been declared in King due to severe weather that started Friday morning.
There is a curfew in place for the duration of the state of emergency. Unless a person is a member of the King Police Department or the Emergency Management Program, everyone located within the city must be inside a house dwelling from midnight to 5 a.m.
There will be no sale, consumption, transportation or possession of alcoholic beverages, except for possession of consumption on a person’s own residential premises.
There will also be no sale or purchase of any type of firearm, ammunition, explosive or any possession of such items off a person’s own premises
http://www.wxii12.com/news/22487153/detail.html
R. Gates (09:03:28) :Don´t you see the snow?
About who brought up the Sun waking up, watch the crazy train of spots move across the surface, and it looks like there’s more spots about to come around the corner.
Solar Minimum should be officially over by now by the looks of it. I’d also suggest to go to Tallbloke’s site and read up on how the relationship between the sun and the climate really works, you’ll see him talk about how it works which is not what a lot of people think of how it works.
About the snow we may be getting up to 7 inches (at the max) here starting today and ending late Monday, will probably not be as much as in D.C. though.
Kennedy, then:
In Virginia, the weather also has changed dramatically. Recently arrived residents in the northern suburbs, accustomed to today’s anemic winters, might find it astonishing to learn that there were once ski runs on Ballantrae Hill in McLean, with a rope tow and local ski club. Snow is so scarce today that most Virginia children probably don’t own a sled. But neighbors came to our home at Hickory Hill nearly every winter weekend to ride saucers and Flexible Flyers.
In those days, I recall my uncle, President Kennedy, standing erect as he rode a toboggan in his top coat, never faltering until he slid into the boxwood at the bottom of the hill. Once, my father, Atty. Gen. Robert Kennedy, brought a delegation of visiting Eskimos home from the Justice Department for lunch at our house. They spent the afternoon building a great igloo in the deep snow in our backyard. My brothers and sisters played in the structure for several weeks before it began to melt. On weekend afternoons, we commonly joined hundreds of Georgetown residents for ice skating on Washington’s C&O Canal, which these days rarely freezes enough to safely skate.
Meanwhile, Exxon Mobil and its carbon cronies continue to pour money into think tanks whose purpose is to deceive the American public into believing that global warming is a fantasy.
From robert f kennedy. I guess he read and predicted in major error.
Notice how he has to toss in Exxon.
My local newspaper, The Philadelphia Inquirer, was delivered today — i.e., both yesterday’s and today’s, because the roads were impassable yesterday.
Phila was having its second worst winter since records were started over 100 years ago. The Inquirer featured a table of snowfall depths ranging from 28.5 inches for Phila to 26.5 for Wilmington, but made no mention of Baltimore or its nearby neighbor, Washington, DC.
I have a private report of 30 inches for Annapolis, near Washington, DC., and our TV weatherpersons, at last report, said Baltimore had 26.2 inches, but DC had only 20+ inches. Is this because there are so many AGW-brainwashed politicians living nearby there was fear they could suffer apopoplexy if exposed to the facts, so the facts had to be censored?
R. Gates (11:46:55) :
IF this is what you’re referring to, I see no anamoly at all …
Which pretty much sums up your entire message. Ignore the science and cherry pick anything you believe supports your view.
As for those who claim 30 years of sea ice records is meaningful … Oh, never mind, just feeding a troll.
You never know what global warming may cause until it happens. Every major weather event is now attributed to global warming. This is why we need a carbon trading system to take away everyones wealth and give it to a few slight of hand criminals. After all science is now about reporting what the highest bidders want reported in order to turn the world over to a pack of criminals who control the UN.
Fred2,
It all depends on how far do you spit…
Steve J, fellow Loudouner!
National always has screwy looking totals, IMO. I think it’s the combination of being downtown and right on the river. They always seem a bit warmer and a bit shorter than what anyone around that official site is experiencing.
I often believe we are the same with proximity to Dulles–they always seem an inch or a degree off to me, but I’m not official–lolol.
Fun work today clearing out again after the plows, eh? I’m sore all over again.
Stay safe and warm!
Latent heat, (which themometers can’t measure,) is released when H2O turns from gas to liquid, and then again when it turns from liquid to solid.
Therefore, when a storm like this one takes a great deal of Gulf of Mexico moisture, scoops it north and up to as high as 50,000 feet, and turns it all to snow, it is actually releasing heat into the atmosphere.
So…..how do we do the math? Figure out how much latent heat is released when a kilogram of H2O is turned from gas to liquid, and also how much latent heat is released turning a kilogram of water to ice. Then just figure how many kilograms of water were involved in the last storm. (Hmmm. How to do that? Figure out what a square meter of snow, 25 inches deep weighs, and then figure out the area covered by snow?)
At any rate, I wonder if all this heat, released up betweeen 5000 and 50,000 feet, has any effect on the UAH temperature data. I’ve noticed it is usually warmer in the northern hemisphere winter in their graphs, and wonder if there is any connection between that and the fact the northern hemisphere has a larger land area than the southern, and therefore a larger snowcover.
In the end all the snow will have to melt in the spring. And that will suck all the heat back out of the system and turn it back into latent heat.
More heat should be subtracted because the snowstorms release heat up where it is more easily lost to outer space, and one should also subtract the heat lost due to the abedo effect of the southern snowcover, while it lasts.
Hmmm. Look at how swiftly world temperatures crash after the 1998 El Nino.
Hmmm. We’ll see.
Richard M.,
I’ll ignore your rude comments (even if the adminstrators will not edit you out),
but I hardly think that looking at years of weather data is cherry picking. January 2010 was the warmest on record, and this follows after a period cooler tropospheric temps due most likely to La Nina and a quiet sun. The La Nina peaked about the time of the anamoly in June 2009, and the solar minimum bottomed out about the same time. How is this cherry picking? You asked for a repsonse and I gave it…but it seems you weren’t happy with the answer.
You seem to like to resort to name calling when you don’t like people’s answers, or the data presented to you doesn’t agree with your apparent belief that AGW is bunch of nonsense. Please don’t post any replies to me that include name calling, or from now on, I’ll ignore you.
Caleb (17:36:24) :
As always….very cogent observations, Caleb.
And the UAH is having to account for these stratospheric (and tropospheric) warmings….which suppress the Arctic tropopause, forcing Arctic air down and out from the poles.
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/daily_ao_index/hgt.shtml
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
It might be interesting to do some rough calculations concerning how much latent heat becomes “available” during a winter like this one, which has many “southern branch” storms, and compare it with a winter with a more northerly storm track.
Also roughly calculate the differences between storms where most of the snow falls on land and sits around, as opposed to storms where most of the snow falls out to sea and immediately melts. It seems the heat required to melt the snow would largely come from the air in the former case, and largely come from the ocean in the latter case.
The more I ponder latent heat becoming “available,” and “available” heat becoming latent again, the more I think it is a rather neat way the earth has of shifting heat about. If you are going to attempt to calculate the earth’s “energy budget,” (to figure out if it is warming or cooling,) it seems important to take in to account latent heat, which seems like a sort of “balance transfer.”
From Elliot Abram’s site at Accuweather:
” FYI, In Philadelphia, we estimate that about 39,582,867,456 pounds of snow have fallen, and on each 10 foot by 10 foot section of driveway, the snow weighs 1,044 pounds.”
OK all you math whiz-kids. If all that snow was 39,582,867,456 pounds of water vapor over the Gulf of Mexico just three days ago, how much latent heat was released over Philadelphia?
You have 45 seconds to answer.
Oh Snap!
Another 18″ in store for Baltimore area.
http://wxcaster4.com/gfs/CONUS2_GFS0P5_SFC_ACCUM-SNOW_78HR.gif
Caleb (06:54:53) :
“FYI, In Philadelphia, we estimate that about 39,582,867,456 pounds ”
How deep was the snow in the 10 foot by 10 foot area? I want to know just how sore I am and this might be the way for me to make the calculation!
Denis Hopkins (02:11:44) :
That fact alone goes a long ways towards explaining the stubborn adherence of the BBC towards AGW. After all, what would happen to their investments if the underpinning were pulled out?
R. Gates (10:57:15) :
R. Gates:
First off, no one knows the centuries long trends of icecap extents. No records.
Second, no one has demonstrated a link between CO2 levels and icecap extents.
Thirdly, no one has demonstrated any harm to the environment or mankind from icecap extent extremes.
Fourthly, no one has demonstrated that cutting back on CO2 production will have any impact on global temperatures.
Fifthly, even if CO2 emissions on the part of mankind are having any impact on the climate, Utah’s attempt to do so will have no impact at all. Chine and India will continue to put CO2 into the atmosphere at accelerating rates. The great experiment continues. We will know for a certainty whether CO2 rates in the next few decades have any significant impact on the climate.
So sit back and relax.
The “Capital Weather Gang” at the Washington Post has an interesting article on the 7 year periodicity of the snow onslaughts:
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/capitalweathergang/
It shows the heavy snow years in 95-96, 02-03 and now 09-10. I also recall (about 15-20 years ago) an analysis of rain and drought in the southwest showing a 7 year cycle as well as defined by tree ring patterns in bristlecone pines.
Yea, we only got 8 inches (2 whites below bottom center widows peak).
To ,
I note your amusement at how much fuss this major snowstorm on the USA East Coast has generated. A lady I used to work with was an emigrant from Russia who had spent time as a schoolteacher in Siberia. Her tales of school not being canceled until the outdoor temperature was -67 degrees C., the dangers of exposure of skin to the extreme cold, and of piles of snow reaching the height of a 5-story building, give me a little appreciation of your amusement.
It’s all in what you’re used to, I suppose. For Baltimore, the all-time record for the snowiest winter is something like 62.5 inches. After this past weekend’s snow, Baltimore is at 60.4 inches for this winter. We are poised to receive another 5-10 inches tomorrow night, therewith obliterating the old record. A typical winter in Washington. DC, 44 miles south of Baltimore, has 16.6 inches of snowfall, so to receive more than that in a single fall twice in the same winter is quite an anomaly.
Now if only this would cause the assorted politicians haunting the USA’s capital to wake up and question the idea of global warming….
Arrggh. Lack of edit for comments!
My previous comment was supposed to be addressed to Alexander Feht.
We gotta stop stopping global warming, its making the world too cold
I really, really hope that the comments I’ve read here pointing to the snowfalls in Maryland and Virginia as evidence against global warming are simply intended to be ironic and aren’t serious.
There is a world of difference between climate and weather. Saying that global temperatures are increasing doesn’t mean that every location will always be warmer all the time. In fact, changes in global temperature are likely to cause changes in weather patterns that in some areas may mean cooler average temperatures, more or less precipitation, and other changes.
I find it absolutely absurd that news conglomerates like Fox, Fox, and, say, Fox have repeatedly insinuated that these snowfalls somehow contradict the theory of global warming.
Americans desperately need to be educated about simple climatology. Somewhere in between Fox’s deceitful sniping and Gore’s alarmist exaggerations stands the truth that the planet IS warming on a global scale, and that we’d be wise to take personal actions to make a lighter impact on the planet. Global data concretely support a warming trend in the last century, and CO2 and global temperatures have been positively correlated in investigation after investigation. Furthermore, looking at simple carbon budgets and data from collection units all over the planet shows that humans are releasing enough CO2 to cause substantial increases in global concentration. Finally, CO2 is KNOWN to function as a greenhouse gas. The only small link that can be disputed is whether or not what we are doing is enough to imbalance the climate. I don’t feel like gambling our climate on the odds that it isn’t.
There is no way around it: it is pathetic for people to say “well, I guess we’ll find out,” rather than taking even simple steps to not HAVE to discover whether we can send our climate spiraling out of control. You may not intend to be here in 50 years, but I do.