From Science @ NASA.gov
The upper Midwest was hit by a powerful winter storm this past weekend as more than 17 inches of snow brought down the roof to the Metrodome football complex (link added by WUWT) in Minneapolis. NASA’s Terra satellite flew over the upper Midwest the next day and captured an image of that snowy blanket left behind.
When NASA’s Terra satellite flew over the upper Midwest on Sunday, Dec. 12 the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) instrument captured an image at 17:20 UTC (12:20 p.m. EST). The MODIS Image was created by the MODIS Rapid Response Team at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.
Have a look:
The image clearly shows the snowy blanket on the ground that covered South Dakota, southern Minnesota, eastern Iowa, northern Illinois, southern Wisconsin and Indiana. In the satellite image, northern Minnesota appears darker because there was less snowfall. The snow storm mostly affected the lower half of the state, which appears as a brighter white in the image.
The National Weather Service (NWS) reported that 17.1 inches of snow fell in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota on Saturday. Some of the suburbs of the twin cities reported as much as 21 inches of snow. NWS also noted that 60 mph wind gusts caused high snow drifts there and the Minneapolis airport was even closed for several hours on Dec. 11.
On Sunday, Dec. 12, the National Weather Service had issued blizzard warnings for northwestern Illinois, eastern Iowa, northern Michigan, and southeast Wisconsin. Wisconsin, Iowa, Illinois, Minnesota and South Dakota reported road closures due to snow and accidents this weekend. On Monday morning the cleanups continued.
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It is a La Nina cold PDO Driven winter- I’m not a forecater but simply experienced in life, closest I came was a NOAA weather observer back in the 70’s which this year is reminding me of. Hmmm…
I gotta go collect my check from Exxon. -haven’t got it yet…
The schools in the Twin Cities metro area are closed for the second day in a row. This is four days after the event. The main issue is that some of the streets haven’t been fully plowed yet leading to uncertain arrival times for the school buses. With the air temps during the early morning being sub zero F (~ -20 C) it’s hazardous for the kids to be waiting around the street corners for too long.
Personally have been digging snow for parts of the last three days and I am tired. First you dig out your paths and driveway, then the snow plows come to plow the streets and seal them off again with 3 foot high wall of compacted snow. Then you dig them out again then the snow plows come back to tidy up the street corners etc and shazam they seal them off again. Enough already and it’s only December…….
Actually, there is just about as much snow on the ground in northeastern Minnesota and northwestern Wisonsin as in the southern part of Minnesota (Duluth has 16 inches, Minneapolis 17 inches). The image shows up darker to the north because there are more trees.
I think Kaboom has taken the p!ss with a couple of you. I’m certain his tongue was planted firmly in cheek — the reference to teenage pregnancy as a result of increased ‘carbon pollution’ was my first clue. 😉
Isn’t a cold Eastern half of the US typical during a La Nina event?
La Nina puts a prevailing dip in the jet stream from the colder regions up north down to the southern states of the East, like Arkansas and Tennessee.
But for us here in Colorado, it’s been quite mild (except for the folks in the mountains, who have seen a couple of blizzards already).
Where’s Minnesota?
(Need to zoom in-out some. Don’t see anything I recognize.)
Nice snap,and with no Chem trails to obscure our view.
http://www.viddler.com/explore/Drewsick/videos/24/
Dave Wendt — Geez, thanks. Just what I needed another perspective on the Hi-Res view I’ve been enjoying out my front window.
Think it’s bad now? Just wait until Gore shows up to do a speech at the Metrodome. Meanwhile Shakopee got 22″ and my guess is that 25% of the renaissance festival site will need rebuilding (no code to follow there.)
Kaboom — teenage pregnancies,
ROFL!!
I’m thinking very few read that part.
I have a question about the image itself. What produces the long thin, very straight lines that run E&W and N&S? Are these grid lines imposed on the image or are they really some kind of man-made surface feature?
Some of you should look at what is going on , on the Canadian east coast for the past two weeks. Record highs, record high tides, millions of damage caused by record heavy rain and high tides. And the warm temps are spreading very far north. There’s no snow on the east coast . It’s mid december and there’s no ice – not even drifting ice blocks way up north.
If some of you are experiencing cold weather (by the way snow does not means it’s colder), elsewhere it is totally the opposite. Almost no ice on Hudson’s bay by mid december – that is very unusual. No ice at Kujjuak’s bay and Kimmirut’s Bay – that has never been seen for mid december. No ice fishing up in the northeast, still fishing by boat.
Last night and today, they got snow (at last) and normal cold weather, but the forecast is rain and warm weather again for the next few days. Tell me climate is not disturb.
Amino Acids in Meteorites says:
December 14, 2010 at 5:21 am
I thought “global warming” says winters will start later not sooner.
==============================================
Yep, the whole migrating sooner, longer growing seasons, etc
Chalk another prediction up to being wrong……..
alan says:
“I have a question about the image itself. What produces the long thin, very straight lines that run E&W and N&S? Are these grid lines imposed on the image or are they really some kind of man-made surface feature?”
The only lines I see on the image are wisps of thin cirrus clouds over the snow cover, rivers where there are no clouds, and lake effect clouds coming off Lake Superior and Lake Nipigon.
Regg_upnorth says:
December 14, 2010 at 7:25 am
It’s not disturb. This is all part of the extremely negative Arctic Oscillation, last winter and this one so far. Atlantic storms get pushed NNW into Canada and bring lots of heat and moisture. And lower heating bills. Yay! And less snow. Boo – I have a new snowblower that hasn’t been tried out yet.
Things get back to cold on the eastern side of Greenland.
Is that a circle I see ESE of Minneapolis/St Paul? Could it be a crater? On google maps it seems to be bounded by: Eau Claire on the north, Black River Falls on the east, and the Mississippi River on southwest.
This is why we Minnesotans are for global warming. Usually, the winters are very cold and snowless in Minnesota. This reminds me more of Michigan’s Upper Penninsula where there is a lot of lake effect snow.
The worst of it is that it isn’t even winter yet.
Note the bands of “lake effect” snow off Lake Superior onto the UP of Michigan. Lake effect can pile up huge snow totals. In ’95 (I think) Sault Ste. Marie, Mi got 60.1 inches of snow starting late Friday-Sunday morning. This storm put over 4 ft on London, ON.
“Regg_upnorth says: Tell me climate is not disturb.”
Yes the truth is that for all the fun with weather we have here it isn’t climate. The variation you cite (warm coasts and snow dumps in the middle) is not unusual in any way. It can happen and does. If you follow the jet stream you can see the massive cold blob down the middle of the continent and the coasts spared.
http://www.theweathernetwork.com/weathermaps/?ref=topnav_homepage_weathermaps
I highly suggest you check out the ice core and solar info on this site which is very informative about climate (not weather). For starters this one is one of my personal favourites
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/12/09/hockey-stick-observed-in-noaa-ice-core-data/
alan says:
December 14, 2010 at 7:16 am
I have a question about the image itself. What produces the long thin, very straight lines that run E&W and N&S? Are these grid lines imposed on the image or are they really some kind of man-made surface feature?
Aside from the black lines which are indicative of the state borders, there is a fainter grid of n/s and e/w lines which is actually the road network. It shows up particularly well in western Minnesota.
Pamela Gray’s next storm is due to hit Colorado Wed into Thurs and produce record snowfall in the mountains (you are very happy this winter if you ski). La Nina is keeping the Colorado plains warm and dry, yeah! We MAY get a couple of inches of snow Thurs night.
Snow in the mountains for skiers and the water supply with dry streets down here is the perfect combination.
alan @ur momisugly 7:16 am
I have a question about the image itself. What produces the long thin, very straight lines that run E&W and N&S?
State boundaries.
MORE:
alan @ur momisugly 7:16 am
I have a question about the image itself. What produces the long thin, very straight lines that run E&W and N&S?
State boundaries.
Review MODIS “rapid response system” here: http://rapidfire.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov/
Click on Gallery
For image #346 of 12/12 there is a smallish image (thumb-nail) and in it the state boundaries are apparent. Iowa is in the center. Bring up Google Earth at the same time and you can easily follow the “visual orientation” provided by Warren at 5:56 am.
HankHenry lowercasefred
impact crater?
Bring up Google Earth and center on 44.4184, -91.3886. Zoom until the Eye alt is under 200 km.
Also, search on “driftless area” and read about this area. This is part of an older surface [link below] than that left by the glaciers (drift) of the past.
Now zoom in on “Nelson” at 44.4206, -92.0085.
Follow the Chippewa River to the north and east.
Thus, the area in question is higher than the region of the circle and is not a crater. For more info, look here:
http://www.uwgb.edu/dutchs/GeologyWisconsin/geohist/wiosinp.htm
What is the point in reporting these cold extremes as counter-examples to global warming?
Global warming is GLOBAL!
These are just LOCAL or REGIONAL weather events, driven by a negative Arctic Oscillation (AO), a well known natural climate variability. Negative AO brings cold air to the mid-northern latitudes, but also warm air to the Arctic Ocean, Greenland, Northern Canada and Eastern Siberia, as is evident in this NOAA map:
http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/map/images/fnl/sfctmpmer_07b.fnl.html
Talking about the GLOBE , 2010 is so far the warmest year on record in the NOAA and GISTEMP dataset, and tied with 1998 as the warmest year in the satellite temperatures dataset (RSS and UAH). HADCRUT is in the lower range of warming, beacuse it has the flaw of excluding the Northern Arctic latitudes.
This a very warm year, completely consistent with the prediction from climate models.
I hope it is recognized Kaboom was being sarcastic – I’m sure even AGW supporters don’t purport AGW as causing an increase in teen pregnancies
Whiel I sympathize with Minnesotans (not really – they CHOSE to live there), we have already had 2 measureable snows here – and we usually never get any in this month (we had two big ones last year as well). Our area though is on a dividing line such that half the time (well over the past 30 years) we get sleet and rain, and the other half we get snow. So both snows were almost totally unpredicted! I say almost totally since they did forecast a possible flurry, not the 2 inches we got.
If Global Warming gets any worse, we will be snowed in next year from December to March!