The calendar says winter doesn’t start for 6 more weeks but that’s of wee comfort to the hundreds of thousands still without power from last week’s historic snow and rain storms throughout the Northeast U.S. 2011 has been a wild, record-breaking and oftentimes tragic year for weather. Will the upcoming winter prove just as turbulent? [...]
Another significant winter weather event is under way and will dive south and east across the Rockies, Plains, and portions of the Mississippi River Valley through the middle of the week. This will bring an increased risk of moderate-to-heavy accumulations of snow, some mixed wintry precipitation to the south, and gusty winds associated with the strong low pressure center.
Magnesium chloride (MgCl2) hydrate, the miracle liquid, has been in the news lately. In fact, it’s in the news every winter and you’ve likely already had some exposure to it today. Do you know what it is or what it does?
Flurries (northern Metro Houston) and sleet (coastal areas near Galveston) have already been reported this morning. This afternoon though is when the precipitation should begin in earnest with accumulations in some areas nearing five inches of snow by tomorrow morning and other areas accumulating 1/4-inch of ice or perhaps even more.
Rolling blackouts are what we awoke to this morning in Houston. The outdoor thermometer read 26° and the power companies are struggling to keep pace with demand. The house was still warm and it certainly wasn’t the end of the world — this New England Yankee can handle some cold! But my cats seemed to [...]
It’s all coming together in dramatic fashion today as record snowfall threatens not only such places as Chicago who are accustomed to heavy snowfall, but places like Houston and perhaps even Corpus Christi where measurable snowfall is a rarity. Accompanying the snow, strong winds and frigid temperatures where in the South especially, temperatures will not just dip low, they dip low and stay there for several days. Wind chill readings of -20 and colder will be common.
Snow, ice, wind, cold, prolonged cold. It’s all in the near future for many areas not used to seeing such weather extremes.
There are still lots of questions about what will happen when next week’s Arctic air mass pushes south across the Plains (when, how cold, where). And because substantial overrunning of warm, humid Gulf air is expected, additional questions muddy the situation (rain, snow, freezing rain, when, where).
Let’s talk about the South, where it’s about to get cold. Real cold. We first mentioned this a few days ago, but confidence was low as the event was still quite some time away. Although we’re still talking about next week, our forecast confidence is increasing and more computer models are starting to hint at the outbreak.
As I’m writing this, the snow is tapering off across New England and will continue to do so into the afternoon. The strong low pressure system, responsible for all the snow, will continue to move northeast of the area bringing snow/blowing snow today across Newfoundland Island. The past several days we’ve been bringing you updated [...]