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.
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?