Topic: Official Meteorological Winter Thread 2017-2018

[dupreezd]

Sorry, couldn't resist this one...

Good one 
At work our network test lab is called "Al Gores Internet' as he claimed he invented it.

[dupreezd]

We had rain overnight (.23). Currently we have sleet with 32.2F and dropping. Winds average 2.2mph with gusts over 6mph.
Tonight it is going to be even colder and the big concern is ice on the roads because of the rain.
People are urged to work from home.

[ValentineWeather]

This is what we are dealing with. Sheets of ice everywhere, it's really adventurous just going to the store. And nobody here puts anything down like sand or salt.

[Bunty]

At least ice is sticking to the ground and not on trees and power lines.  Meanwhile, it will be interesting to see how close to zero temperatures will get to here this morning.`

[ValentineWeather]

Looking at RAP you are very close 1-4° range in the area.

[waiukuweather]

re the global warming quips/A gore quips,
guys remember that the USA is not the globe
ie there are other parts of the globe that are having record heat waves (i.e places in the southern hemisphere where it is summer time)
(and so the globe is still warmer than normal overall)
and even in the USA, western states (i.e CA) are having record winter warmth, to balance things out

[ValentineWeather]

So close in Stillwater 4am. Just checked Houston down to 22° at Hobbie.
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[ValentineWeather]

Here in northern Nebraska we've had 16 below zero days in last 26. Lowest was -26° (-32 C). We are looking above normal to normal next 10 days. Normal is 36°-10° range. 

[dupreezd]

It is 17.2 at my place with calm winds, which is good  I am closer to Conroe, which is always a bit colder.
Slush in my driveway all frozen.
Predicted to be 70 on Sunday

WOW, go me. This is MY personal lifetime coldest temp ever.

[Bunty]

So close in Stillwater 4am. Just checked Houston down to 22° at Hobbie.
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No surprise it would be there.  The airport is usually the coldest place in town.  I got down to 5.  My location tends to be one of the not so cold wu report stations.  Maybe because my location is more urban.

This map shows northeast Oklahoma got down as low as -8 on Wednesday morning. Snow on the ground probably explains that.  It didn't snow any here.   From the forecast, single digit lows look to be gone for the rest of the month.

[ValentineWeather]

I lived in Laverne where my first daughter was born in 1976. Also home of Miss American the sign coming into town said.  I would drive through Woodward every day and worked at a gas refinery outside of Mooreland.

Anyway looks like it was in the -6 area up near the panhandle.

[alexstaar]

Set all time record lows on my station for temperature (5.4ºF/-14.8ºC), apparent temperature (-3.1ºF/-19.5ºC), and wind chill (-9.2ºF/-22.9ºC) this morning (records date back to Jan. 2015). We had about a half inch of snow yesterday (which obviously didn't melt). Also will set an all time record lowest maximum temperature today... only made it to 22.5ºF/-5.3ºC this afternoon. Temps expected to fall to near 10ºF/-12ºC tonight.

Graph from earlier this morning.
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[CW2274]

At least you folks in the south and east will finally get some much needed relief as this impressive trough of Washington state starts to dig. I'll be the cold one and y'all will warm. Come Tuesday the flow looks much more zonal instead of the highly amplitude pattern we've been in, so at least the country should be a little more "normal".

[gwwilk]

At least you folks in the south and east will finally get some much needed relief as this impressive trough of Washington state starts to dig. I'll be the cold one and y'all will warm. Come Tuesday the flow looks much more zonal instead of the highly amplitude pattern we've been in, so at least the country should be a little more "normal".

Emphasis mine.  I feel that this term is problematic when discussing statistically derived numbers.  I don't think there is such a thing as "normal" weather, just 'average' weather, which rarely occurs.  Using average rather than normal to relate current conditions to past conditions eliminates the immediate inference that anything that deviates from average is abnormal.  A "normal" day vis a vis the averages is extremely unlikely.

This is a bone that I will pick with the NWS at each and every opportunity.   That's one reason the NOAA radio feeds turn me off because they always describe the averages for the day as 'normal'.  It's like they never went to college or ever heard of statistics

[CW2274]

At least you folks in the south and east will finally get some much needed relief as this impressive trough of Washington state starts to dig. I'll be the cold one and y'all will warm. Come Tuesday the flow looks much more zonal instead of the highly amplitude pattern we've been in, so at least the country should be a little more "normal".

Emphasis mine.  I feel that this term is problematic when discussing statistically derived numbers.  I don't think there is such a thing as "normal" weather, just 'average' weather, which rarely occurs.  Using average rather than normal to relate current conditions to past conditions eliminates the immediate inference that anything that deviates from average is abnormal.  A "normal" day vis a vis the averages is extremely unlikely.

This is a bone that I will pick with the NWS at each and every opportunity.   That's one reason the NOAA radio feeds turn me off because they always describe the averages for the day as 'normal'.  It's like they never went to college or ever heard of statistics

Jeez, sorry I upset you as wasn't trying to imply anything, just impart so info. Enjoy your semantics.

[ValentineWeather]

I'm bad using average, normal term loosely also. I think in modern time but don't limit myself thinking this is the way its always been.

Unfortunately lots of evidence we haven't seen anything yet. Hope it doesn't get this bad but current drought is nothing compared to what could/has happened.

Arizona State University Quote: Paleoclimatic evidence suggests drought in the mid-12th century far exceeded the severity, duration, and extent of subsequent droughts. The driest decade of this drought was anomalously warm, The convergence of prolonged warming and Tree ring evidence shows the southwest has endured much longer periods of drought than we currently have experienced:

Its also believed long spans of drought was the demise of the Anasazi tribes which thrived throughout the region.

[gwwilk]

At least you folks in the south and east will finally get some much needed relief as this impressive trough of Washington state starts to dig. I'll be the cold one and y'all will warm. Come Tuesday the flow looks much more zonal instead of the highly amplitude pattern we've been in, so at least the country should be a little more "normal".

Emphasis mine.  I feel that this term is problematic when discussing statistically derived numbers.  I don't think there is such a thing as "normal" weather, just 'average' weather, which rarely occurs.  Using average rather than normal to relate current conditions to past conditions eliminates the immediate inference that anything that deviates from average is abnormal.  A "normal" day vis a vis the averages is extremely unlikely.

This is a bone that I will pick with the NWS at each and every opportunity.   That's one reason the NOAA radio feeds turn me off because they always describe the averages for the day as 'normal'.  It's like they never went to college or ever heard of statistics

Jeez, sorry I upset you as wasn't trying to imply anything, just impart so info. Enjoy your semantics.

You simply adopted the accepted but imprecise and utterly misleading common abuse of a very useless appellation. I apologize for choosing your post to vent my pent-up irritation.

[CW2274]

At least you folks in the south and east will finally get some much needed relief as this impressive trough of Washington state starts to dig. I'll be the cold one and y'all will warm. Come Tuesday the flow looks much more zonal instead of the highly amplitude pattern we've been in, so at least the country should be a little more "normal".

Emphasis mine.  I feel that this term is problematic when discussing statistically derived numbers.  I don't think there is such a thing as "normal" weather, just 'average' weather, which rarely occurs.  Using average rather than normal to relate current conditions to past conditions eliminates the immediate inference that anything that deviates from average is abnormal.  A "normal" day vis a vis the averages is extremely unlikely.

This is a bone that I will pick with the NWS at each and every opportunity.   That's one reason the NOAA radio feeds turn me off because they always describe the averages for the day as 'normal'.  It's like they never went to college or ever heard of statistics

Jeez, sorry I upset you as wasn't trying to imply anything, just impart so info. Enjoy your semantics.

You simply adopted the accepted but imprecise and utterly misleading common abuse of a very useless appellation. I apologize for choosing your post to vent my pent-up irritation.

No apology necessary, I spent my entire career using precise phraseology and didn't truly think about it, but I hear you.

If I may suggest, take care of that irritation.

[ｓｐｃ ｆｒｅｓｎｏ]

Personally, I think "normal" temperatures should be defined as a range (such as 52-62), rather than just one number (57). This could be easily figured out using the closest 25th or 20th percentile of temperatures to the so called "normal". On any given day, a temperature could be considered above or below normal ("abnormal" ), even if it is quite usual. Usually where I live, and probably everywhere else, "average" or "normal" weather only occurs during pattern shifts from cooler to warmer weather and vice-versa. What do you guys think?

[gwwilk]

Personally, I think "normal" temperatures should be defined as a range (such as 52-62), rather than just one number (57). This could be easily figured out using the closest 25th or 20th percentile of temperatures to the so called "normal". On any given day, a temperature could be considered above or below normal, even if it is quite usual. Usually where I live, and probably everywhere else, "average" or "normal" weather only occurs during pattern shifts from cooler to warmer weather and vice-versa. What do you guys think?

I absolutely agree that "normal" when used in the context of weather is best defined as a range and not as a single number.  No self-respecting psychologist or educator would define normal intelligence as an IQ of exactly 100 and thereby immediately relegate all others to above or below normal intelligence. Our imprecise language allows 'average' as a synonym of 'normal', but no self-respecting scientific discipline can embrace such sloppy usage in their work.  Even a "normal" body temperature is defined by a range around 98.6°F so that recorded oral temperatures other than 98.6°F can still be normal.  In fact, most recorded oral temperatures on normal patients I saw in my 50 years of medical practice missed that 98.6°F mark. 

An example of abnormal body temperature:  last month a friend of mine's dog got trapped in a freezing cold irrigation canal in central Nebraska and the man's natural response was to attempt to rescue his dog.  Both were trapped in the icy water, and 45 min. later when they were rescued by emergency responders the man's temperature was 84°F.  He's lucky to be alive because prolonged hypothermia to such a degree is often fatal.  Miraculously both man and dog survived.

[ocala]

Man I am so pissed.
Console batteries took a dump last night on the coldest night in more then a decade.
Note to self. Don't use cheap batteries.
Looking at the stations around me they ranged from 21F-23F so I'll split the difference and go with 22.
For some reason I was hoping the data logger would keep storing the data from the ISS but I guess with no power it can't do that.
This is really depressing.

[ValentineWeather]

That stinks...

[ｓｐｃ ｆｒｅｓｎｏ]

Personally, I think "normal" temperatures should be defined as a range (such as 52-62), rather than just one number (57). This could be easily figured out using the closest 25th or 20th percentile of temperatures to the so called "normal". On any given day, a temperature could be considered above or below normal, even if it is quite usual. Usually where I live, and probably everywhere else, "average" or "normal" weather only occurs during pattern shifts from cooler to warmer weather and vice-versa. What do you guys think?

I absolutely agree that "normal" when used in the context of weather is best defined as a range and not as a single number.  No self-respecting psychologist or educator would define normal intelligence as an IQ of exactly 100 and thereby immediately relegate all others to above or below normal intelligence. Our imprecise language allows 'average' as a synonym of 'normal', but no self-respecting scientific discipline can embrace such sloppy usage in their work.  Even a "normal" body temperature is defined by a range around 98.6°F so that recorded oral temperatures other than 98.6°F can still be normal.  In fact, most recorded oral temperatures on normal patients I saw in my 50 years of medical practice missed that 98.6°F mark. 

An example of abnormal body temperature:  last month a friend of mine's dog got trapped in a freezing cold irrigation canal in central Nebraska and the man's natural response was to attempt to rescue his dog.  Both were trapped in the icy water, and 45 min. later when they were rescued by emergency responders the man's temperature was 84°F.  He's lucky to be alive because prolonged hypothermia to such a degree is often fatal.  Miraculously both man and dog survived.

Ummm... were we talking about body temperature or air temperature? 

[ocala]

Still a while to go in the month but so far the mean temp of 48.8F is well below the average mean temp of 58.1F.
Been a cold one for sure.
This week looks to be about average so that number should come up.

[gwwilk]

Still a while to go in the month but so far the mean temp of 48.8F is well below the average mean temp of 58.1F.
Been a cold one for sure.
This week looks to be about average so that number should come up.