1/31/08-2/1/08 Winter Storm: OK/KS/MO/IL/IN/OH/MI

[Dan Robinson]

Beckley, WV stayed below 32F nearly all night last night, allowing the freezing rain to continue until dawn. I took a short drive up there to check out the black ice on bridges (and a few other places I didn't expect). Some photos and a couple of video clips here.

[url="http://stormhighway.com/blog/feb108a.shtml]

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[Robert Dewey]

We really got hammered here in southeast MI... Forecast called for 6-12 inches, and we ended up with 2-3 inches. LOL

 

[John Farley]

We ended up with seven and a half inches here in Edwardsville, Illinois. The 8.4 inches in St. Louis was, if the information in yesterday's Post-Dispatch was correct, the heaviest 24-hour snowfall in about 15 years in St. Louis (a sure sign of how mild recent winters have been). The storm remained weak and disorganized until around 11:30 last night, when snowfall over the STL area rapidly intensified, producing rates over 2 inches per hour for a while.

I have made up a Web page on this storm with my own observations, some photos, and some Web links with additional information on the storm as it affected the STL area. The Web page may be found at:

http://www.johnefarley.com/snow20108.htm

 

[rdale]

We really got hammered here in southeast MI... Forecast called for 6-12 inches, and we ended up with 2-3 inches. LOL

I did blow it for my eastern stations - I said 3-6" and only ended up with 2-4"... Not nearly as bad as other forecasts though :> Won't mention names, but some said Hillsdale/Branch region would get 10-15 inches and they ended up with 4-6

VERY surprised to see Chicago-land get the most out of this event.

 

[Joel Wright]

Yeah, it appears the whole system tracked further west than progged. Areas that were supposed to get dumped on ended up on the eastern side of the heavier snow, and areas to the west that weren't supposed to get much at all got quite a bit. That seems to be the trend this winter so far. Models seem to keep things a little too fast and hence further to the east. Usually the storm system ends up slower and hooking more to the left.

Of course next time we'll all be expecting a storm to track a bit further to the west and it'll end up tracking as progged lol.

 

[rdale]

NAM had the path right, but the QPF horribly wrong... GFS had the path wrong but better QPF. It's amazed me how HORRIBLE the NAM WRF has been this winter. Who could have imagined that just years ago it was gospel. Now it's pretty close to useless... MANY entities have busted repeatedly this winter on it, yet still rely almost entirely on the output?!?

 

[Danny Neal]

Snowfall started here hours before predicted. By the time the main synoptic scale snow was falling we had already accumulated 2 to even 3 inches in some places. Some of the areas directly near the lake (near north side) had lake enhancement, while the heavier band in the western suburbs was from that earlier heavy snow band that just seemed to persist through out the day. Got about 10 here on the south side while NW and NC IN really didn't get anything. I think Valpo only received 4.1 inches or something.

 

[rdale]

Still got a good half-foot in that area...

MICHIGAN CITY LA PORTE IN 10.0 MEDIA
1 N GRANGER ST JOSEPH IN 8.5 TRAINED SPOTTER
ROLLING PRAIRIE LA PORTE IN 7.9 TRAINED SPOTTER
8 ESE LA PORTE LA PORTE IN 7.5 TRAINED SPOTTER
1 N SOUTH BEND ST JOSEPH IN 7.5 TRAINED SPOTTER
2 WSW NORTH WEBSTER KOSCIUSKO IN 6.7 NWS EMPLOYEE
BENTON HARBOR BERRIEN MI 6.5 TRAINED SPOTTER
2 N NORTH WEBSTER KOSCIUSKO IN 6.3 NWS
1 E WARSAW KOSCIUSKO IN 6.2 NWS EMPLOYEE
2 NW GOSHEN ELKHART IN 6.2 COCORAHS
GIRARD BRANCH MI 6.0 TRAINED SPOTTER
BUCHANON BERRIEN MI 6.0 TRAINED SPOTTER
AUBURN DE KALB IN 6.0 EMERGENCY MNGR

 

[Joel Wright]

I agree about the NAM/WRF performing crappy this season. It used to be the model of choice within the 84hr timeframe. It has a tough time resolving important features up until about 48hrs out. Even then it's sometimes a little slow on the uptake compared to other models. Hell, even the NGM fairs better than the NAM sometimes lol.

As far as the GFS (operational), it has the wonderful habit of keying in on a storm system 150hrs out and staying fairly consistent. Then during a window between 72-96hrs out it'll forecast something completely different (often much weaker), only to re-establish it's previous way of thinking within the 72hr timeframe. Almost every major storm this season has been dealt this issue with the GFS. Overall though, it's been pretty good this season. For an operational model, it's performed pretty damn well beyond 100hrs. Much of the time the large scale features were nailed fairly early on.

 

[Heidi Farrar]

We could count AR in the winter storm activity from 1/31. We received two rounds (initial blast from between 8:30-11:00am and wrap-around beginning about 12 hrs later) totaling 6", with about 1/2" of sleet on top of the first round. We never did see 6" on the ground at once, though, due to the sleet and a warm-up mid-day.

I was pleased with the GFS, NAM & WRF's handling of this for us; they all seemed to come into pretty good agreement right toward the end, and so there were no huge surprises.

Here are a couple of photos from our woods; the wrap-around snow flocked the trees very beautifully: