March 2024 Observations and Discussion

[OttumwaSnomow]

9 hours ago, Hoosier said:

The period from January 20 to March 10 produced the 2nd lowest snowfall amount on record for Chicago.  Only 1.2" fell during that time.  The only other year with less during that stretch was not that long ago in 2017, when a mere 0.3" fell.

I have recorded 1.0" since Jan 20th. In my 17 yrs in snow business  here in SE Iowa. It was by far our worst February! After a  shocking  and most likely  a record of 38" in 11 days, 34" of which fell in 4 days!

[Black Hole]

It's probably too late for snow down here, but maybe up north? Either way, this is a cold pattern that looks to be setting up to close out March. 

[Minny_Weather]

10 hours ago, Minny_Weather said:

NAM is... Interesting for here. Of course the NAM should never be trusted at the very end of its run. 

Aaaaaand it's gone

[hawkstwelve]

We over-performed yesterday and hit 80 degrees. We ended up enjoying dinner on the back deck and went to the neighborhood park. It was quite pleasant out. 

Some models (GFS/NAM) have toyed with the idea of rain changing to snow on Thursday but I'm not buying it. The ECMWF has remained steadfast in showing just plain ol rain and until that changes, I'm not biting on any snow.

[Minny_Weather]

The trees are waking up.

[westMJim]

The official H/L yesterday was 61/29 there was no rain/snowfall. The highest wind gust was 44 MPH out of the SW. The sun was out 91% of the time. For today the average H/L is 43/26 the record high of 76 was set in 1990 the record low of 2 was set in 1948 and 1993. The most rainfall of 2.35” fell in 1902 the most snowfall of 3.2” fell in 1923. The most snow on the ground was 11” in 2014 and 1978. Last year the H/L was 32/26 there was 0.9” of snowfall.

The warm temperatures so far this spring has everything about a month ahead of schedule. I now have crocuses and daffodils in bloom. There are also many trees with buds on them. We will have to see how this will play out in the days ahead.

[Tom]

Looking into the LR , is there a Palm Sunday weekend storm system lurking?   The 500mb pattern is ripe for a GL's cutter...would be something if MSP "hooks" this one up!

 

 

[Tom]

This is the storm my buddy who lives near the Foothills of Denver, CO has been waiting for...Golden opportunity to score at least a Foot of powder that will be a fluffy type of storm.  The last one was a wetter variety.  Man, this would be a great system to track for the Breckenridge or a bit north near Silverthrone.  

 

[Timmy Supercell]

Got a little colder than forecast for this morning, 29 for a low at the airport.

It will be mid-upper 60's later today. More t'storm events possible Thursday into Friday towards this region.

[tStacsh]

High of 61 today,  It's 66 currently.  Once again temps far exceed forecast temps.       With the colder air possible the latter half of the month, this isn't good.  Another warm day tomorrow.   Growth will kick into overdrive, that's not good.  

[chescowxman]

I have been working with the great folks at the Delaware Environmental Observing System (Thanks to Chris!!) to add even more weather observation points and stations across Chester County PA. With the updated data and summer coming I thought I would run an analysis of Summer (June-August) temperatures across the County from 1895 through last summer (now with 25 Chester County Stations at least partially in the data since 1895 and 15 current observation sites included). Overall in the non-adjusted data there is only as expected normal cyclical warm and cool cycles but I thought I would show you a comparison of the post observation adjustment applied by the the National Center of Environmental Information (NCEI) who have applied 111 consecutive years of post observation adjustments to chill the actual observations to each and every summer from 1895 through 2005 and have every year since 2005 now applied a warming adjustment. As you can see in the trend lines the orange non-adjusted and blue adjusted paint a far different rate of our rate of warming.

[jaster220]

On 3/11/2024 at 1:07 PM, westMJim said:

In 1983 after a warm start to March, at Grand Rapids April had a departure from average of -5.0, May -6.5, June -1.3, July+1.9, August +1.1 and September -1.1. At Green Bay April had a departure of -3.8, May-7.7, June-1.9, July +2.1, August +2.1 and September -1.2. I am not sure what the water temperatures on Lake Michigan were that year. And this site does not go back that far.

https://coastwatch.glerl.noaa.gov/statistics/average-surface-water-temperature-glsea/

Perhaps we just caught the right conditions up there but clearly July and August were AN. May must've been very forgettable, yuck!

[jaster220]

5 hours ago, tStacsh said:

High of 61 today,  It's 66 currently.  Once again temps far exceed forecast temps.       With the colder air possible the latter half of the month, this isn't good.  Another warm day tomorrow.   Growth will kick into overdrive, that's not good.  

Yep, gonna be interesting. Sunday I saw 10 Robins on my street, grass noticeably green about 1 county south, and small leaves seen here this evening walking the dog. See May 1923 for "I guess anything's possible" or even late April 2005. But 04-05 was a pretty harsh winter unlike this one.

[Clinton]

Just missing out on some big storms producing torrential rains and large hail along the I-70 corridor in Missouri.  More widespread storms possible tomorrow along with some severe storms.

 

[Clinton]

The ski resorts in Colorado are going to love this.  This storm has produced in every cycle but the amounts this time look to be much larger.

[Clinton]

Warned cell getting ready to move overhead, quarter sized hail is possible.

[Black Hole]

CSU ML probs for the next two days. Tomorrow is one of those "well its probably not going to happen but if it does look out" type days. Accordingly, I'll assume nothing but keep an eye out. Probably a lot better risk in northwest KS and west-central MO for some action.

For the day 2 outlook it looks like I miss again as the best dynamics have moved east. Soundings look pretty good in southeast OK and northwest AR so I do expect some severe activity at that time. 

[Hawkeye]

It's entirely possible Cedar Rapids gets very little rain from this system Wednesday night/Thursday.  Pretty much all models show a wsw-ene swath through Iowa that gets jack squat.  The storms should mostly miss southeast while the defo zone misses nw.

[Black Hole]

ECMWF AIFS for the win! 

[chescowxman]

Yesterday was the warmest day (65.1) in East Nantmeal since the 66.3 degree reading on November 9th. Other Chester County high temps yesterday included Atglen 65.2 / Chester Springs 66.7 / Devault 67.2 / Glenmoore 65.0 / Longwood 65.2 / Marshallton 67.8 / Warwick 67.9 and West Chester 66.7. Both today and tomorrow should be even a bit warmer but nowhere close to record levels before showers Friday and a turn to much colder weather next week.

Records for today: 84 degrees at Glenmoore/Honey Brook / Chadds Ford and West Chester (1990) / Record Low 1 below zero Coatesville (1896) / Rain 3.24 Coatesville Airport KMQS (2010) / Snow 15.2" Coatesville during the Blizzard of 1993.

[westMJim]

Yesterday was another very warm day with a H/L of 70/44. There was no rainfall the sun was out 93% of the time. The highest wind speed was 39 MPH out of the SW. For today the average H/L is 43/26 the record high of 75 was set in 1990 the record low of 3 was set in 2014. The most rain fall of 1.06” fell in 2006 the most snowfall of 3.6” fell in 1998 the most snow on the ground was 11” in 2014 and 1978. Last year the H/L was 30/23 and there was 2.8” of snowfall.

[tStacsh]

Warm to cold to warm to cold.  Hate this time of year.   69 degrees here today full sun.  Feels much warmer than the 70 yesterday due to much less wind.  

[winterfreak]

Tornado Watch per EAX.

[Timmy Supercell]

I was just a few months old when this happened. That same winter also slammed the west coast with good snows in Dec '92 through January '93. 

There reportedly was over 20" in Ashland with this blizzard.

[Timmy Supercell]

4 hours ago, tStacsh said:

Warm to cold to warm to cold.  Hate this time of year.   69 degrees here today full sun.  Feels much warmer than the 70 yesterday due to much less wind.  

The evening cooldowns are also un-March-like.. 3 hours after the high occurred and its almost the same temperature outside.. 

Bring on tomorrow's storms!!

[Tom]

Our skies to the north…

 

 

 

Earlier in the day, I was out at the pool underneath blue skies with no chem trails…

This was a normal plane contrail…

 

[Minny_Weather]

Another day, another nearly bone-dry run for the global models.

But hey, at least the GFS is showing an absolute whopper 2 weeks out. I'd be VERY worried that the world is collapsing if it didn't. 

[clintbeed1993]

Man, this is the kind of night I love. One of those nights when you get round after round of storms, usually during late spring and summer. Many in Northern MO and Southeast NE are getting 2 to 3 or more inches of rain with training storms. These are areas that have been bone dry the last couple months and are in a pretty bad drought. Much needed. Last part of March also looks to hold more precip chances. Good to see things changing to a more active pattern in the plains

[Black Hole]

SPC and CSU ML forecast for tomorrow. I suspect the SPC may go moderate on account of the very high hail risk. I'm right on the edge of that.

[Black Hole]

Forecast soundings look loaded tomorrow with a long straight hodograph, but low LFC/LCL and very high CAPE. This should produce splitting supercells with very large hail, but also a decent wind threat. 

I added a couple of forecast reflectivity images showing the supercell potential in the early afternoon and then potentially convection firing along the dry line later in the day. Certainly will have multiple chances to see something. 

[Clinton]

Heavy thunderstorm atm with some cloud to ground lighting has managed to wake up the entire house lol.  I'm going to put the coffee pot to work today lol.

[Clinton]

0z Euro with a beast of a storm on day 10.  I can't imagine the outrage that would occur if the GFS was showing this lol.

[westMJim]

The official H/L yesterday at Grand Rapids was 71/40 there was a trace of rainfall. The sun was out 85% of the possible time and the highest wind speed was 19 MPH out of the SW.  For today the average H/L is 44/26 the record high of 80 was set in 2012 the record low of 0 was set in 1895. The wettest and most snow fall of 0.79” that fell as 10.5” of snow was in 1904. 1904 also had the most snow on the ground with 11” Last year the H/L was 37/21 there was a trace of snowfall and 2” was on the ground.

With yesterday’s high of 71 it was the 1^st time there have been back to back days of 70 or better in March since 2012. Here in MBY I recorded 0.06” of rainfall overnight and the low was a warm for March 50 that 50 is the current temperature here in MBY.

 

[westMJim]

Some weather history for southern lower Michigan

1904: A snowstorm drops up to a foot of snow across Lower Michigan with record daily snowfall of 10.5 inches at Grand Rapids, 10 inches at Lansing, and 8.0 inches at Muskegon. This snow would contribute to some of the worst floods on record in southwest Lower Michigan when it melts off during the last week of the month.

2019: Thunderstorms with heavy rain combined with snowmelt and frozen ground brought significant flooding across parts of central Lower Michigan. Newaygo County saw the worst flooding, with in more than 150 homes and 9 businesses flooded, as well as the closure of more than 100 roads and the complete washout of more than 30 roads. The flooding continued for several days with damage estimated at nearly 2 million dollars.

 2019, a tornado outbreak occurred across the I-69 corridor during the afternoon and evening hours. 4 tornadoes developed from a line of severe storms – an EF0 near Corunna, an EF2 near Vernon, an EF0 near Flushing, and an EF0 near Genesee Township. The Vernon EF2 tornado had max estimated winds of 125 mph, was on the ground for 20 minutes, and had a path length of over 18 miles as it tracked northeast. Thankfully no injuries were reported from these storms, but numerous homes suffered damage.

 1997, low pressure tracked across Southeast Lower Michigan. The storm brought widespread precipitation, mostly in the form of freezing rain, to Southeast Michigan from late on the 13th into the morning of the 14th. Total precipitation amounts ranged from around an inch to nearly two and a half inches. In the Detroit Metropolitan area, the ice storm resulted in power outages to over 425,000 homes and businesses; one of the largest outages in history. Several thousand residents were without power for as long as 4 to 5 days. In addition to powerlines, falling trees damaged dozens of cars and houses throughout the area.

Across the USA 

1933,  A deadly tornado outbreak affected the Middle Tennessee region, including Nashville, on this day. The outbreak, which produced five or more tornadoes, killed 44 people and injured at least 461 others. The strongest tornado, F3, cut a path through the center of Nashville. About 1,400 homes were damaged or destroyed. Windows were blown out of the State Capitol Building

1935,  Suffocating dust storms frequently occurred in southeast Colorado between the 12th and the 25th of the month. Six people died, and many livestock starved or suffocated. Up to six feet of dust covered the ground. Schools were closed, and tenants deserted many rural homes.

2008, An EF2 tornado moved through downtown Atlanta, Georgia, shortly before 10 pm, damaging the Georgia Dome where the SEC men’s basketball tournament was underway.

[Iceresistance]

This was last night

[OttumwaSnomow]

What a good system for parts of bone dry Iowa! This time a little further west in  south central Iowa did better. But  mby .94  is best event in 2024 with the exception  of the 2 giant  snows in mid January.  Even some runoff!

[Tom]

Some big time hail reports across KS...

[Tom]

Some whopping snow totals coming in across the CO Rockies/Foothills....it'll still pile up today...

[MIKEKC]

Had a big supercell thunderstorm hit the heart of the city yesterday evening between 7-9pm, large hail SW of my house, but the hail core weakened once it arrived. We had very heavy rain which all fell in about 30 minutes, so, it was a runner, not a soaker. Our biggest rain by far in the last 52 days as I saw 1.57 inches. North side counties of KC have entered back into the moderate drought headline. So, last nights rain was good but we'll need much more as we are in full swing with growing. Plants/grass will be using the moisture much faster. 

Maybe 25 degrees here Monday morning. That just might nip some of the color on the blooming trees. 

Hopefully we miss the deep cold the last 7 days of March. Again, we are too far into bloom for long duration cold nights. 

[Tom]

4 hours ago, Clinton said:

0z Euro with a beast of a storm on day 10.  I can't imagine the outrage that would occur if the GFS was showing this lol.

Palm Sunday whopper  BLIZZARD....lets go!