Friday, October 29, 2010

2010-2011 Winter Weather Outlook

..Coming up tonight at 10PM.



Here is a hint:  THIS WINTER WILL MIRROR THE WINTER OF 2008-09.  LOTS OF ALBERTA CLIPPER SNOWS "NICKEL AND DIMING" US EARLY ON.

CHECK OUT FOX8.COM FOR MORE

Tuesday, October 26, 2010

Strongest Great Lakes Storm in Years!

Late October and Early November are considered a second severe weather period after April, May and June.  This is due to the leftover warmth of the summer still lingering across the south clashing with the first real pushes of winter air across the upper midwest.  What lies in between both air masses is usually a strong cold front and a deepening low which produces bursts of high wind and often times, a line of severe storms.





Tuesday, October 26th, a deepening low over the western Great Lakes was evolving into a severe weather producing machine.  Note the "L" at the top of the map taking up 50% of the country.  But this storm is different.  The pressure is lower than ANY great lakes storm since 1978 acording to the National Weather Service office in Chicago


Moisture (warmer colors) feeding into the storm aided in the development of severe storms.





HIGH WIND WATCHES and WARNINGS shown with tan watch boxes stretched from Montana to eastern Tennessee.




Early morning tornado watch boxes were issued from Chicago, south to St. Louis and east to Cleveland. 





Northern Ohio was under a "high risk" for severe weather for the first time in years.  This designation is typically reserved for tornadic weather in tornado alley, not Ohio.




Expect power outages through early Wednesday across northeastern Ohio through early Wednesday. 

Monday, October 25, 2010

How about a 70 degree day in November?

Monday and Tuesday offer, more than likely, the last "real" decent chance of a string of 70 degree weather this year. Granted, this time of year promises rapid fluctuations in temperature and overall weather.  Rain one day and potentially snow the next?  Its happened before. 

October is pretty much in the books.  So what does November look like?  Have we hit 70 alot historically in November.

Since 1980 (last 30 years) I counted up the 70 degree days and plotted them on the graph below.

Charting Software

You can see that most of the 70 degree days happened early in the month with only a few scattered by mid-month.  Little to no chance by Thanksgiving.

By the end of the week, daytime highs will be back to normal--57 by late afternoon--then the countdown will begin to when the first snowflakes will fly.

Friday, October 15, 2010

Fall Foliage UPDATE - Ohio DNA

The fall colors are almost reaching peak across Ohio.  The Ohio Department of Natural Resources has a weekly fall foliage video update from Casey Burdick.




CLICK ON THE PICTURE BELOW FOR FALL COLOR UPDATES FOR SELECT PARKS ACROSS THE STATE





Friday, October 01, 2010

Cleveland Summer 2010 vs 2009 vs 2008.....

Across the state of Ohio, this summer ranks 4th all-time warmest since record keeping began in the late 1800s.  Nationally, this summer was also 4th all-time.  It wasn't too long ago--last summer in fact--that summer temperatures were cooler than any summer in recent memory.  Let's compare this summer's ranks nationally to 2009 and 2008.

 This summer was very warm across the eastern half of the country while the west was cooler.  Last summer, more than 65% was much below averages.  2008, although not super-cool by any stretch, was near average to slightly below average.  Here are the ranks of the summers between 2008 and 2002 in Ohio:

2008:  50th warmest
2007:  26th warmest
2006:  41th warmest
2005:    5th warmest
2004:  98th warmest (13th coldest)
2003:  78th warmest (31st coldest)
2002:    4th warmest

What does this mean?  Are the temperatures across the state trending warmer in recent years or cooler?

Here is a graph of Ohio temperatures from 1951 to 2006.  it shows a negligible increase in overall temperatures.


Keep in mind that this is not a snapshot of what is happening globally.  My previous post illustrates the global increase which also note the discrepancy in the data.