The nation is rather abuzz over the huge snowstorm (which I dubbed Snowzilla) this week, and I thought I’d put together a collection of loosley related news items. In light of Krauthammer’s recent comment, I’m glad I chose Snowzilla for the name.
Refreshing sanity — It’s La Niña, obviously: Dr. Louis Uccellini, head of NCEP, winter storm textbook expert: “We are linking the storm tracks to the La Nina pattern which dominates the flow coming off the Pacific,” Uccellini explained to AP in a telephone interview. “This follows the pattern we would expect through the Ohio Valley and with heavy precipitation to the Great Lakes…You can’t relate climate change to individual storm systems. Clearly, there have been similar storms in previous decades. As intense as this storm is, it’s equivalent to other major storms that they’ve seen in past decades”
First the satellite image:
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The animation: showing Snowzilla forming, and stomping all over the nation east of the Mississippi:
From NOAA Environmental Visualization Laboratory:
Intense Blizzard Rolls Across the U.S.
A massive winter storm system is rolling across the Plains and Midwest U.S., headed for the New England Region. Snow amounts of up to three feet have been dumped in some parts of Illinois and Indiana, and more is on its way. Whereas the Midwest is plagued with snow, ice will be the danger in Pennsylvania. Temperatures are warming from Maryland south, which will bring only rain to the Mid-Atlantic and Southeast.
This animation shows GOES-East satellite infrared water vapor imagery from January 29 -February 1, 2011. The GOES satellites provide visible and infrared imagery of the U.S. every 15 minutes. The blue colored areas show the most intense, moist areas of the atmosphere that are responsible for these major precipitation events. Also included, at the end, is the snow precipitation amounts from Jan 31 – Feb 1, 2011.
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The snow cover map:
Source: http://www.nohrsc.nws.gov/nsa/
The snow and cold records:
The northern hemisphere snow:
The graph from Rutgers snow lab, and 2011 isn’t even on the books yet:
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The photos – Chicago on February 2nd:
Dallas: Fountain Place Fountains Frozen
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The Superbowl – now more about the weather than football:
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The there was the rolling blackouts: wind power shoulders some blame
More here
Plus, the embarrassing revelation that Texas had to get electricity from Mexico:
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Gore and the pundits:
Gore’s pronouncement about the “snow being caused by global warming”, so stupid even Jay Leno made fun of it.
The Goreacle: Snowstorms caused by global warming
Snow job: Gore channels liberal columnist as proof of global warming fueled blizzards
Here’s Leno:
And then there’s this Godzilla/Snowzilla moment:
Charles Krauthammer: ‘If Godzilla Appeared on National Mall Gore Would Say It’s Global Warming’
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And finally, the word on Gore’s imagined water vapor increase:
From Dr. Roger Peilke:
“Stratospheric water vapor concentrations decreased by about 10% after the year 2000.
From NOAA ESRL:
Click for a larger image
Note the second graph, precipitable water. How is it with global warming that in 1950’s we had so much more precipitable water than in the present? Notice the spike in 1998 – that’s the big El Niño that did that. If anything, if there’s a claim to more water vapor in 2010, it would be to the large El Niño that year. It will be interesting to plot this again in a few months to see if there’s a spike just like 1998
Only problem is, that we have a strong La Niña in the middle of Snowzilla now:
UPDATE: The original preciptable water plot from NCEP has been updated to be more current. Thanks to commenter “c james”. NCEP also provides a map of preciptable water in the near term. Here’s what it looks like during the Snowzilla event:
and here’s the zoom on the USA:
Dogs were likely domesticated and bread for that trait (loving cold weather) during the last ice age. Therefore, I would imagine that most dogs still similar in size, fur, and appearance would be most comfortable in colder, snowy weather. A miniature toy devoid of a thick fur coat and anything resembling legs wouldn”t be very useful guarding the parameter just outside the cave.
Richard Keen says:
February 5, 2011 at 7:08 pm
…..
Ok, I’ve read 5,6 and 7 again and my point still stands… The question isn’t with air above 0c , as everyone knows it requires freezing temps to cause snow… My point was that warming could cause an increase in atmospheric moisture and you backed that up by stating that the highest moisture content for snow would occur just below freezing and that the colder the air, the less moisture… Global warming dosent mean only temps above freezing, and a “warmer” air mass could still be below 0. So…. Do you agree that warming could lead to more snow? It appears you do…
Robb876 says:
February 6, 2011 at 9:14 am
Richard Keen says:
February 5, 2011 at 7:08 pm
…..
Ok, I’ve read 5,6 and 7 again and my point still stands… The question isn’t with air above 0c , as everyone knows it requires freezing temps to cause snow… My point was that warming could cause an increase in atmospheric moisture and you backed that up by stating that the highest moisture content for snow would occur just below freezing and that the colder the air, the less moisture… Global warming dosent mean only temps above freezing, and a “warmer” air mass could still be below 0. So…. Do you agree that warming could lead to more snow? It appears you do…
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It’s not clear to me whether your point is that there could be more precipitation or that there could be more snow.
When you talk about ‘warming’ do you mean “Warming” (global, average, .001 of a degree kind of a thing) or the temperature of the putative water source for a given dollop of precipitation at a given time?
Obviously, when a water surface warms there is an increase in evaporation, if the pressure doesn’t rise concomitantly. How, when and where it precipitates out is the point of interest.
The notion that ice storms in North Texas are rare is complete garbage. They happen every winter. Cheers –
From Scienceray:
Ice storms
One of the ones I least like, we get at least one of these every Winter. A cold front comes through dropping temperatures like a rock, and then a storm system comes through right afterward creating freezing rain. Ice on average is about 1/4 to 1/2 inch of ice, which is more than enough to cause problems on the highways (and there’s tons of those out here), and maybe even bring down some power lines and tree branches in some spots. Ice storms usually happen in the months of January or Febuary.
Read more: http://scienceray.com/earth-sciences/meteorology/north-texas-weather-weather-conditions-you-can-expect/#ixzz1DCgUv4XS
http://scienceray.com/earth-sciences/meteorology/north-texas-weather-weather-conditions-you-can-expect/
Minimal snow received here in Northern New Mexico, consistent with typical La Nina weather, but the temperatures were astonishingly low mid-week. The Albuquerque Journal ran a nice article today about how the convergence of weather conditions this past week was *nearly identical* to the last time we had such record-breaking cold snaps in this region… back in 1971.
Roger Sowell says:
February 5, 2011 at 8:51 pm
From “An Interview With the CEO of the Texas Grid,”
“I’m not aware of any specific issues with wind turbines having to shut down due to icing. I would highlight that we put out a special word of thanks to the wind community because they did contribute significantly through this time frame. Wind was blowing, and we had often 3,500 megawatts of wind generation during that morning peak, which certainly helped us in this situation.”
http://www.texastribune.org/texas-energy/energy/an-interview-with-the-ceo-of-the-texas-grid/
Lying CEO! everybody at WUWT knows that wind can’t work.
And the hits just keep on coming!
New from Minnesotans for Global Warming:
Girma says: February 5, 2011 at 2:01 pm
British children could have only virtual experience of snow. Via the internet…”
Darn, there goes my idea of selling “snow” shaved from ice rinks so kids could have snow parties. 😉
As for Chicago, in my brief time in Cedar Rapids IA (not so much affected by the big lakes) I saw that the city sure could clear snow, organized and effective (And of course having equipment, which is a major limitation in places that don’t get much. In the northwet US/southwet Canada it is common to have blade attachments for dump trucks, and of course press front-end loaders and such into service – less efficient when it does snow heavy but lower cost on average.
Speaking of the southwet [sic] of Canada, in December 1996 Victoria BC had the worst dump in several decades or more – two feet, stayed cold for several days. Cause was shift of major wind patterns – IIRC the area is between cold north Pacific winds and warm moist winds from further south, so quite vulnerable to a shift. 1996 was of course near the peak of the 6 decade temperature cycle. An alarmist from the local university ignored that year when giving as proof of AGW that someone had skated on a local lake in the 1930s and it had not been that cold since. But he was probably speaking of a year in the mid-30s which had both the coldest winter and hottest summer in a long time, in the hottest decade in years. And he also overlooked 1959 when people also skated on local lakes. But hey! he has faith. 🙂
“uno2three4 says: February 5, 2011 at 4:27 pm
And in an Albuquerque, New Mexico (USA) Zoo–They had to break out the space heaters for the polar bears. “
Durn beasts didn’t read the environmentalist memo that they aren’t supposed to be able to acclimatize? 😉
“Pamela Gray says:
February 6, 2011 at 8:19 am
…. Therefore, I would imagine that most dogs still similar in size, fur, and appearance would be most comfortable in colder, snowy weather.”
Keep in mind that finding shelter from wind is important, as is using snow as insulation. I presume that on the prairie/plain animals like wolves take shelter in small gulleys or river cuts, which may have semi-cave structures – otherwise they burrow into the snow. The problem animals have is finding food. Note “uno2three4 says: February 5, 2011 at 4:27 pm” comment about polar bears in Albuquerque’s zoo, indicating to me they have become accustomed to warmer temperatures – I suggest domestic dogs have as well. Of course some animals hibernate, like most bears (do polar bears hibernate? do wolves? wolverines don’t, though I have the impression they hole up and rest deeply).
NWS pulls a GISS: After initially downgrading last week’s Chicagoland hugh 20.2 inch snow storm by 0.2 inch on Friday 2/11/11, meteorologists at the National Weather Service (NWS) changed the totals again. After media meteorologists, such as Tom Skilling from WGN, got wind of the change they convinced the NWS to change the totals again, this time adding an inch to the original total. In addition, the NWS decided to increase the total snow accumulation from the blizzard of 1979 by a whopping 1.5 inches (32 years after the storm). According to Skilling, such a change of after the fact would open a Pandora’s box that might shake the public’s confidence in weather forecasts. “People will come to us now and say “My God, you can’t even measure the snow event that happened.” It’s a psychological thing. What are the people going to think?. We just had one hell of storm, states Skilling, I don’t know why we’re fiddling with anything.”.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-met-snowstorm-rage-20110211,0,1561329.story