January 31, 2008

Forecast Faceoff

It's supposed to snow here today. We can expect anything from a coating to 10 inches, depending on which forecast you read. So, I'm going to post the forecasts and see who comes the closest to being right. These forecasts are from 12:40 am.

Feel free to make bets, if you so desire.

Weather Channel - A wintry mix in the morning will transition to mainly snow in the afternoon. Cold. Temps nearly steady in the low to mid 30s. ESE winds shifting to N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of precip 70%. Snow accumulating 1 to 3 inches.

Accuweather - High: 36°F RealFeel®: 27°F Breezy and colder with rain mixing with, then changing to snow, accumulating a coating to an inch

NOAA- SNOWFALL ACCUMULATIONS OF 4 TO 6 INCHES WILL BE COMMON NORTH OF INTERSTATE 40. A BAND OF 8 TO 10 INCH AMOUNTS APPEARS LIKELY WITHIN THIS AREA...THE MOST LIKELY LOCATION FOR THE HEAVIEST SNOW AT THIS TIME APPEARS TO BE NEAR A PAWNEE TO TULSA TO FAYETTEVILLE LINE.

Weather Underground – Cheated and copied from NOAA.

Intellicast - A wintry mix in the morning will transition to mainly snow in the afternoon. Cold. Temps nearly steady in the low to mid 30s. ESE winds shifting to N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of precip 70%. Snow accumulating 1 to 2 inches.

The NOAA forecast is actually the most entertaining to read. They're so dramatic about our possible 4-10 inches of snow, and they use ALL CAPS and everything. They warn that with the wind, we could be facing snow drifts of 2 - 3 feet! Jesus Tap Dancing Christ! If you live in northeast Oklahoma or northwest Arkansas do NOT go outside tomorrow, or you will get stuck in a massive snowdrift and you will die.

NOAA is also warning that this avalanche of wintry precipitation from the sky could break tree limbs, and they could take out power lines. I'm sure after that happens, the looting and rioting are sure to ensue. I'd hate to think of the pandemonium should we ever get a blizzard.

The really amusing thing is that on Friday, the high is supposed to be 40º, then 53º for Saturday and 58º for Sunday. Which means we could possibly have snow on the ground for up to 48 hours. I don't know how we'll make it through this disaster.

UPDATE: 12:10 PM CST - This morning I braved the elements and drove to the store. There was snow on my car. Roughly 1/25 of an inch. The roads were WET. I don't know how I survived. The roads are still wet. There is nothing falling from the sky. I still have electricity. No one has died in a snow drift. But, all of the area schools have been closed. I'm not making that up, either. They closed school with absolutely no snow on the ground. Amazing.

UPDATE: 1:53 PM CST - There is something falling from the sky. It appears that it may be snow. Roads are still VERY WET! Still no drifts. Still have electricity. The suspense is killing me.

FINAL UPDATE: 12:38 AM CST - We had snow accumulation of almost one inch. No one died in a snow drift. I never lost power. It's over. Accuweather was actually accurate. Who knew?

Take Care,
Babs

19 comments:

  1. Good luck with the snow. Here in in PA (northeastern) we expect snow, sleet and freezing rain Friday into Saturday. I'm very scared about it because yesterday was my daughter's birthday, and Friday night there are 10 fourteen to sixteen year old girls spending the night. If we get snowed in and the roads become impassible . . .

    ReplyDelete
  2. You say the word and I'll send the legion of St Bernards with their casks of whiskey for your ultimate survival.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Anonymous10:57 AM

    We get similarly dramatic weather forecasts here in the Washington, DC area too. Two weeks ago, my company sent all the employees home at 3 PM because it was snowing really big, chunky flakes that were sticking on the ground and coloring everything in sight like a big white crayon. That dreadful storm finally ended after inundating us with 1.5 inches of snow that melted the following day.

    ReplyDelete
  4. That same storm front is supposed to make its way up north to me and we're supposed to have 5" by 7:00 a.m. Friday and then another 5" throughout the day ending in the afternoon.

    Maybe if you get 10" we won't because the clouds will have dropped their load on Arkansas.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Babs, start praying. It's the only thing that will save you for the horror of...ummm...weather.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Billy - The horror! Is there no way for you to escape? Maybe you could build an igloo in the backyard.

    Carla - Your thoughtfulness is very touching. I love St. Bernards.

    Chap - I just love how the meteorologists get SO excited about their forecasts which are wrong 90% of the time.

    Kat - I wouldn't get your hopes up about the storm expending all of its energy over Arkansas.

    SI- I have been praying, and so far...it's working!

    ReplyDelete
  7. NOAA probably gets some kind of kick-back if it gets you to build an ark.

    I want to know why every fucking section of the country has an "Accuweather." Are we supposed to say to ourselves: "Hey, that's like a combination of Accurate and Weather, so it's got to be right!" Here's what we need more of: Maybweather.

    Right now, where I live, it's either raining or it's not. And it will either continue to rain, start to rain, stop raining, or continue to not rain later in the day. I think I'll go toss the I Ching to see if I need to take an umbrella with me when I go out.

    ReplyDelete
  8. I'm just amazed that Babs can tell the difference between 1/25 of an inch and, say, 1/10th of inch!

    L.A.

    Today
    Jan 31 Sunny
    64°/44°

    ReplyDelete
  9. Ex - I like the idea Maybweather. It'd be more honest, anyway.

    Evo - You should be amazed. I take pride in my ability to measure things without a measuring device.

    ReplyDelete
  10. We got 1/10 of an inch this morning around 9:00 and then it melted. Nothing since then.

    And it *was* 1/10. Pssht! SI, how can you not tell the difference between 1/25 and 1/10?

    ReplyDelete
  11. Well, SI isn't as skilled as "the rest of us".

    .......do di do di do

    ReplyDelete
  12. Anonymous8:41 AM

    I was stationed in southeast Alabama in 1973, and this was the year it actually snowed as much as two feet some places. This was the first real snow they'd seen in over sixty years, so they were not really set up to deal with it. (There were often flurries, sometimes enough to cover the ground, but it was always quickly gone most years.)

    Electricity went, traffic was really bad, and I had a car that had positraction and for some reason had brought my tire chains with me so we were in pretty good shape as we had a kerosene heater and lamps. Drove a lot of people a lot of places for a couple of days.

    At the time I was working at a radar facility about thirty miles from post, and we used to go down to the little store and get drinks and snacks. The old gentleman who ran it know some of were northern boys and asked if this was what it was like up north in the winter.

    We said yes, we had months of it. He shook his head. Told us that he didn't know how we stood it.

    He then told us that he was sixty one years old (last snow had been sixty four years before), he'd never been out of the state in his entire life, the farthest he'd been away from home was Birmingham and Montgomery. He's seen pictures of snow, seen it on TV, always wondered what it was like, always wanted to experience a good snow. Well, now he had, and that was enough for him for a lifetime.

    ReplyDelete
  13. Oh... and I am betting on 1 inch.

    ReplyDelete
  14. In London is cold but sunny, no snow.
    I find Accuweather quite accurate, although their widgets I put in my blog sometimes send it berseck in a loop. Speaking of which, I like your blog and just given you a link: visit me and see if you want to reciprocate

    ReplyDelete
  15. You know what's funny? Up here around Philly we haven't had too many instances of serious snow in some years yet people have been conditioned there whole lives on how to deal with snow so even if there's a report of 1"-3", you still see the mad rush to the supermarkets. Ridiculous.

    Personally, I feel totally ripped off if I go through all this cold with no reward of snow. Wtf?

    ReplyDelete
  16. LOL! You have words like 'coating' in your weather vocabulary? That's too funny. We don't get coatings here. We measure snowfall in terms of "work from home" or "fire up the emergency generator"

    Wet roads! The only time we talk about wet roads is in the spring when they clean the roads and haul away the winter's accumulation of the salt and sand we'd deposited.

    ReplyDelete
  17. Babs:

    Enough ice to close the schools on Friday morning. Not enough to cancel the sleepover. Wasn't as bad as I expected. The music (if you can call it that (here's how I can tell I'm getting old: not only do I not recognize the music, I'm not even sure it IS music)) was off by 1:00am and they actually went to sleep at around 3:00am. All were out of the house by noon on Saturday. My headache has almost gone away.

    ReplyDelete
  18. Sarge - I was visiting Florida one year, and it snowed. By snowed, I mean there were flurries. It was a lot of fun to watch the local kids who had never seen snow before.

    Evo - Nice try.

    Miss Welby - Thank you so much for stopping by and for the link. I'll be sure and reciprocate.

    Philly - I agree that cold weather without the snow is useless. It pisses me off.

    Fwig - Yes, we have coatings. Tonight we could have a cold front and warm front "interact" and then tomorrow night we could see a "dusting" of snow. Reading NOAA's forecast is rather humerous.

    Billy - I am thrilled that you survived. I also determine my age by the music my kid's listen to. Fortunately, both of them like Johnny Cash, which lessens the aging blow.

    ReplyDelete
  19. Anonymous8:48 PM

    Babs said, "Tonight we could have a cold front and warm front "interact."

    Arkansas weather sounds like it's much sexier than Virgina weather.

    ReplyDelete