Cool March...How About April Temperatures?

BIG QUESTION: WILL APRIL'S TEMPERATURES BE BELOW NORMAL?....

I love the NOAA Reanalysis site! Its interesting to look back at past year's weather and patterns.  I looked at the MARCHES that were COOLER than this MARCH and did a composite of the APRILS that followed (20 of them). What I found isn't too mild. 

The April's that followed were still below normal on average.
  NORMAL HIGH on APRIL 1st is 53; NORMAL HIGH on APRIL 30th is 65.

Keep in mind that this is only a STATISTICAL COMPARISON NOT A DYNAMIC ONE. I didn't weed out or add any atmospheric variables that exist this year versus in the past so don't take this too literally. that said, its an interesting map; one that we will need to watch in the upcoming weeks.

If this holds true, expect highs to stay in the 50s and 60s with some stretches of mid 40s throughout the month. Let's see what the actual pattern brings!

The Dates of Easter - Earliest and Latest

Who said there isn't math in The Bible.

The article is incorrect. Easter falls on a Sunday between March 22 and April 25 from 1753 to 2400. The article is below for you to check out

From "The Economist"...

"...The earliest possible date for Easter occurs when the full moon falls on March 21st itself, in a year in which March 21st falls on a Saturday. Easter is then celebrated on Sunday March 22nd, a rare event that last happened in 1818 and will next take place in 2285. The latest possible date for Easter occurs when there is a full moon on March 20th, so that the first full moon after March 21st falls a lunar month or 29 days later, on April 18th. If April 18th falls on a Sunday, then the special Sunday rule applies, and Easter is celebrated the following Sunday, or April 25th. This last happened in 1943, and will next happen in 2038. There is therefore a 35-day window in which Easter can fall, depending on the timing of the full moon relative to March 21st."

Got it...and that's just the Western Church...phew.

Cleveland March Year-to-Year Comparison

March 27th: FOX8 rooftop photo of Lake Effect clouds pushing south/Cleveland Skyline

I've mentioned several times how this March is almost a polar opposite to last March. Most of the country is seeing well below temperatures all month. Here are the difference between last March and this March comparing temperatures to the averages.

Just how different has the second half of March been compared to last March 15th through the 26th in Cleveland? The drop in temperature this March since the 15th is the greatest drop of any back-to-back Marches in recorded weather history!

Here are the Marches with the largest comparisons year-to-year. How about a 32 degree difference.

Diving into the numbers further, the 3 year comparisons so even more variation. 2011: 41 degrees, last year: 63, this year 31

Its looking better and better for this cold pattern to slowly moderate next week. Stretches of snow-producing cold will be replaced by temps in the 40s. By the way, normal high is 52

Where Does This Winter's Temperatures Rank? Snowfall?

Rittman Snowfall on March 25th

 

 ...not as cold as you might think.

The last several weeks of well below normal temperatures since that one Sunday on the 12th when we
almost hit 70 has skewed our perception of the winter. This is called the "Observational Selection Bias".  This is the effect of suddenly noticing things we didn't notice that much before — but we wrongly assume that the frequency has increased.  This leads us to the RECENCY EFFECT: This is the tendency to think that more recent trends and patterns we observe (which are more recent in our minds) are a very good representation of the entire period. We perceive these biased observations as excellent predictors of what the future will bring.  

How often has someone said to you that this colder trend recently surely means that the rest of the spring will be cold?  That is the RECENCY EFFECT at work .

We averaged the high and low temperatures of each day from December 1st to March 25th for each year since 1871.  Here is the list showing where this winter ranks...surprisingly, its far down on the list of 143 winters.

The 143 year trend is all over the place...

How about snow this year?  It falls somewhere in the middle of the list...

So while we perceive this winter as so cold due to the last few week's weather, this winter sits in the middle of the list both in temperature and in snowfall.