Thursday, February 07, 2013

North American Snow Cover Shifts East

This 30 day java powered image loop of snow cover data over the past 30 days, distinctly shows Montana and southern Alberta drying up as the north-eastern American states begin to get fully covered by snow:

Animation of North American snow cover for the past month









Here on the Canadian Prairies, the depth of snow is shown in this graphic:

        As of 01/02/13, snow depth appears to be greatest in a line from Estevan to Edmonton, east central Alberta, central and south east Saskatchewan. Surprisingly, the data for around the cities of Regina and Saskatoon seem to be opposite of what appears on the map. The city of Regina clearly has much more snow than Metro Saskatoon, yet the graphic suggests north west of Saskatoon has the largest snow depth. This is always a very important detail to factor in when predicting severe weather in the spring and summer as it can point out areas of major pooling of ground water below the surface than will not show up in computer meteorological forecast models. I'll be checking this data as it becomes available, likely once a month until full melt and spring flooding begins.

 Jared Mysko


 Images provided by Canadian Cryospheric Information Network - University of Waterloo and www.polardata.ca Credit: A. Silis, Environment Canada, 2013.

Wednesday, February 06, 2013

The Next Big One: Winter Storm "Nemo"

As the northern wing of "Winter Storm Nemo" hits Regina, Saskatchewan, one forecast model is suggesting up to 60 inches of snow for Boston beginning on Friday! So far, "Winter Storm Nemo" has dumped nearly 3 flakes of snow in Regina, much less than the originally forecast 2 to 6 cm. Seriously though, radar indicates that a few more flake will fall here tonight. It sounds a bit silly to be trying to warn people about an impeding disaster when The Weather Channel names the storm after a Disney character. Naming storms after Disney characters seems to be a guaranteed fail for storm enthusiasts. #Nemo Alternatively, storms could be named by way of auctioning to prospective companies and the funds collected given to residents affected. Not to replace government disaster assistance funding but to immediately lend relief #StormNamingAuction For example (with a bit of tongue and cheek): "Tropical Storm McDonald's 100% Pure Beef is going to hit but everyone gets free cheeseburgers after :D Save all of that for the next storm because this is a serious situation setting up for the east coast Friday and Saturday. One model suggests 50 inches of snow for Boston and anywhere between Toronto, Montreal and Boston will see this massive system come together. The Alberta clipper currently over southern Saskatchewan is expected to merge with another system from the south to drop record amounts of snow over Michigan, southern Ontario, Quebec, New England and New Brunswick. The city of New York and parts south should miss the bulk of snowfall as precipitation turns to rain. Naming this winter storm "Nemo" has certainly got people talking about it, which is a good thing, however it may change the way we think of poor little Nemo forever, some may wish they never did find Nemo. :p Jared Mysko

Saturday, January 12, 2013

Regina Snowstorm - January 10-11, 2013

Here a playlist of video footage of the snowstorm that hit Regina this week: Heavy snowfall warnings were upgraded to winter storm warnings for Regina and both Moose Jaw and Winnipeg got Blizzard Warnings on January 10th as it became clear that a major storm was beginning to affect the prairie provinces. After a foot or 30cm of snow fell, not including totals much higher in drifts, extreme temperatures dropped to -29C on Saturday, January 12 with the windchill reaching -40C in the city of Regina.