brianc400

This is going to be a NowCast event.

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The temp gradient is pretty steep, as it started much colder IMBY. It was 30 and dropping at 8 a.m, and by the time the snow started it was already down to 27. Rates have picked up a lot now but the flake size is small.

LOT is sticking with their story tonight. I’ll be interested to see if a LES plume sets up over the lake near MKE and hangs over my area tomorrow or if it sets up east and hits Tom to the east. Better yet, both

Yes, it was really coming down nice up here. Visibility dropped to under half a mile for about 20 minutes. I did not measure anything, but it has gotten pretty wet since that heavy band passed through.

Nice! My brother in law lives at the south end of Lincoln Park. It’s a white out down there. This is overlooking the lake: no idea why it shows upside down here.

I finished here with another 0.8, so 2.5 total. Not bad. The final cleanup was much more powdery. Now let's see how much of it drifts back into the driveway overnight.

I’m up to 1.7 here so far. Maybe with what’s left to the west I’ll finish off over 2. It’s so heavy.

It was fun to watch the snow today, but I don't think I got more than an inch here. There were a few very narrow, heavy bands but for the most part the snow diminished as it approached the lake. Fine for me: I got hours of watching snow without the cleanup.

No way this plays out, but wouldn't that be something?

Updated totals tonight;

Cross country skiing in my backyard before lunch.

I’ve added another inch this morning thanks to lake effect. Up to 8 now.

It’s a bit drifty here but it looks like we have close to 7” on the ground. Like others said, it’s not wet at all. Dense, but not wet. Still, I’m not looking forward to digging out the plow pile. HRRR shows 3-4” more for the next several hours so maybe I can squeeze in another inch or two. I’m not buying the LES amounts in full.

I am in Hawthorn Woods. I did have some l lake effect dancing around here in the last couple hours. Hoping this latest finger works its way up to me in the next hour. I haven’t been out too measure yet but I’m hopeful I’ll find 7-8 by the time I get out. Let’s see!

The heavy stuff is really taking it’s time. These two frames are two hours apart. It’s barely moving.

It started up about an hour ago here. The wind is picking up and the snow is blowing already. This should be interesting in a couple hours.

From last night’s Twitter discussion:

The models always show lake effect being a lot more widespread than it ever really is. Especially on the west side of the lake, we get these short, narrow fingers of LES that move around. I might get 1-1.5" extra in my location if the snow ratio is high enough and the storm is slow enough. Interestingly, Skilling said Chicago's largest LES event (I presume non-storm-related) on record was only 5.5" in like 1992. Contrast that with the south and east shores where it can be significantly higher. Hard to say how much LES we get in blizzards though where there's a lot more going on.

The GFS will actually prove correct this time.

I’ve used by snowblower only once this year. For 2.5”.

I sure hope so. The last 6” storm at O’Hare was over two years ago, and the last 10” storm was way back in 2015. i think I hit 6 in one storm last year where I am but Chicago saw only half of that. It was tough to explain to my buddy in Texas last night that no, we do not really see big snowstorms in Chicago “all the time”.

Unfortunately, no. It was quite a show of constant lightning, but the good cell to my NW sank south as it approached and I got only 0.10". I also missed out on the Lake Co. storm just north of me the previous day. I've had barely a half inch of rain since July 15 despite several opportunities. I have 2+" crevices opening up IMBY.