-- n.e. blizzard...

[Bewheels]

Reporting from the Seacoast of NH.

18"-20" dumped so far.
Shoveled ~6 feet off the porch due to drifting...we have a little vortex that happens.
Snow still coming down heavy.
Wind is still howling.

I have spent the last 30 (of my total 52) years in various parts of northern New England. Primarily northern and western Maine where these storms happened about every 10 days. These 'historic' storms are all relative as I am sure our friends in all the northern tier states would attest to.

While they were fun when I was in my twenties, now they are just a PITA.

But end of the day, it is just a lot of snow. We are not talking about hurricanes, tornados, earthquakes, etc that cause massive destruction and lose of life.

I think Ronnie hit it squarely on the head -

"--- tammy & ronnie found out the real/hard-way after going through 3 major hurricanes.., 1 a direct hit.. "better to show up rehearsed and ready..," & play in the orchestra over that of auditioning..".

Until you live through a real natural disaster it is easy to dismiss things as hyperbole...and the media does not help.

[j44ke]

I love New England, my mother's from there, my sister lives in Maine, and I went to school in NH, but this sort of thing always reminds me that there are easier places to live.

You mean like Detroit or something?

[Mabouya]

You mean like Detroit or something?

Yup, either Detroit or, say, Santa Barbara.

[Matthew Strongin]

Until you live through a real natural disaster it is easy to dismiss things as hyperbole...and the media does not help.

Down here you can always tell the people who have been through a real storm and those who haven't by how they handle the warnings. Having grown up in Miami during Hurricane Andrew, and living in one of the worst hit areas, I'll take hyperbole and over-precaution every day of the week.

[Corso]

Pond hockey. Who does she suppose is going to clean off the ice?

Kids will shovel off a pond. Just not a driveway.

[Bewheels]

Down here you can always tell the people who have been through a real storm and those who haven't by how they handle the warnings. Having grown up in Miami during Hurricane Andrew, and living in one of the worst hit areas, I'll take hyperbole and over-precaution every day of the week.

Exactly.
I grew up in Miami as well, in that area. My parents were stilling living there when Hurricane Andrew hit (I had left the nest a few years before), effectively distroying the house/neighborhood/area...as you know. I was down there within 24 hours of the distruction to try to help. There are many things that Mother Nature is not to be f**ked with and it pays to pay attention.
However a bunch of snow dumped on areas that have snow equipment needs to stay in perspective.

[RIHans]

Shoveled at 2:00 when the wind was just brutal...35-40 mph gusts. Pictures are from the, around 18" of accumulation.

Just peeked out and it's still hammering and drifting like you read about. No work tomorrow...shovel workout.

[lukasz]

nada in nyc. Nice night last night. No urban skiing this time.

[Too Tall]

WOW the pics are amazing. Hang in there it's almost done.

[Mr B]

Local snow graffiti artist sums up the blizzard's impact on Brooklyn.

[Too Tall]

Hey Darren I have a great idea. Let's ride to Maglia Rosa from G'Wich tomorrow. Sweet eh?

[fortyfour]

7:45pm here in Lyndeborough, NH and it seems to have finished. I have to take an "official" measurement in the morning but I'm going to take a gander we rolled in with 20-24"? It's REALLY nice powder. Once the chores were finished, it was off for some play on the roads which hadn't been plowed for a few hours:



Then back into the shop to finish up a 100mm BB FATSink... Now it's time to crack open a bottle of wine. Not a bad day.

[j44ke]

Re: hurricanes - They are a big deal for birdwatchers because they sweep the ocean and push rare sea-going birds ahead, which means that species birdwatchers rarely get to see often come close to land or actually end up on land as the storm comes close to shore. I spent my childhood out in crazy weather with my father as hurricanes went by southeastern Virginia and the Outer Banks of North Carolina, looking for birds surfing by on 60-70mph winds. But that was all done with a close attention to weather maps, barometric pressure and the like. Crazy but not stupid or foolhardy. Great learning experience.

Anyway, there's an interesting article on Slate about the differences in accuracy between the National Weather Service forecasts and the Weather Channel forecasts. The NWS evidently relied on the European Center for Medium Range Weather Forecasting (ECMWF) model, while the Weather Channel relied more on the Global Forecast System (GFS) model produced by the National Weather Service (ironically.) The latter model was just rolled out a few weeks ago while the ECMWF model has an established record for accuracy, which is probably why the NWS relied on it, but the GFS predicted the track and intensity of this storm more accurately, which is why the Weather Channel forecasts were more accurate. And that's what I was wondering about most - as weather changes, there must be some lag time between new data accumulation and model development, but in this case, it seems like there is also a lag between development and acceptance of models. And then there is politics.

[bcm119]

Good article in Slate. The NWS was going with a sort of traditional rule of thumb that if the Euro (ecmwf) and the NAM models agree in the short term, that's a solid forecast. In this case they both agreed on a blockbuster storm for nyc. Turns out the GFS was right instead, which is unusual, as that model's output is usually disregarded inside 24 hours of coastal storms. The GFS was recently tweaked and upgraded so perhaps this is an indicator that it's improved in the short range for noreasters.

Just to illustrate how amazingly good weather models actually are: these types of noreasters are predicted days before they even form. Other parts of the world usually track existing weather systems for days before they arrive. In the northeast, these things form and intensify within 24 hours, usually first appearing as clusters of lightning over the gulf stream somewhere off the mid Atlantic coast. On Sunday morning when the forecasters were predicting a blizzard, the storm hadn't even formed yet. When it did, it did so about 100 miles east of where the models predicted. Pretty amazing if you ask me.

[s_curran]

Today was awesome. After venturing around by foot in the morning, finding a bar or two open were already pretty happy with it. We got somewhere over 2'. I decided I needed to check the surf, you know, just in case the office was closed tomorrow, its not. Lonnnng 12 mile round trip. Anyone who needs some cross skills, get out there now. There was some real power out in the ocean, some of the biggest I've seen in this particular spot.

Man, that was a fun ride.

[Lionel]

Too bad there is no mountains out there

[robin3mj]

Sean, that 3rd shot is awesome.

[Tyler Evans]

Car.

[j44ke]

Sean, you captured nicely the curse of cars in snow in the big city. Dig your car out, and then the snow plow comes along and walls it in. Good luck getting through that frozen berm, eh?

[dashDustin]

As a central Texan, I get a kick out of snow.

But FTS. Once all that starts melting...ugh. How do y'all keep your houses and car interiors clean?