34°, sunny, windy. Supposed to go to 45° this afternoon. Forecasts seem to be struggling on what’s on tap here for Tuesday, freezing rain, sleet, snow or some combination of all three. As far as I can tell, Houston and points a little to the north are going to get some significant snow amounts, but little of the other stuff.

rxkeith wrote: ↑Sat Jan 18, 2025 10:13 am going arctic here,

after a rather balmy high 30s day yesterday, we will be getting some below zero degree days
where the HIGH, might be zero. won't start warming up again until later next week.
currently around 11 degrees with light snow. we will be getting snow over the next few days too.
not a lot at one time, just every day. we have had 120 inches of snow to date. about an average
year for us if we reach 200 inches for the year. wood stove is cranking.


keith

What do you see happening with Lake Superior and the other great lakes with this current extra cold stretch? Any significant ice formation/coverage expected?

I suppose a lot of ice shuts down the lake effect snowfall. How much does the weather change in years when the lakes are mostly covered in ice?

There is no curse strong enough in Elvish, Entish, or the tongues of Men! With no snow pack I'm worried about my garlic and the other perennials. Both home and pantry garlic have been covered at least but a nice layer of snow would be better. My new furnace is getting a workout for sure!

@JayneR13 -11˚F here at the airport in Southern Colorado, slightly warmer at the house. Got an additional 3" of powdered snow, on top of what we received a week or so ago. Quite a drop from the 55˚F on Friday. And it's only going to get colder by Tuesday morning.

So far, I've been lucky, as it's stayed above freezing, and only started snowing around 4 pm, after the rain was coming down since 1 pm. It might keep snowing until 8 pm, but time will tell how much melts.

UD - The snow stopped at about 2", around 8:30 here, and I went out with some spikes on my shoes, and shoveled the steps and walks off, and pushed most of the snow off my car, then sprinkled some calcium chloride on the cleared areas. Then I came back inside, in less than 20 minutes! I was actually hot, by the time I came back in. I saw that it is supposed to get much colder (in the teens) in the morning, so I had to do this tonight. Only saw one other person doing this.

regarding the cold snap and the effect on lake superior, what can happen
short term is not too much. one needs to understand that superior is the
largest by volume fresh water lake in the world. it takes awhile for it to
warm up or cool down. you can have a hot week of weather in june, and
the water temp might be 47 or 52 degrees. that makes a really quick dip
in the lake.
this winter we have had a lot of days with temps
in the 20s. that's not cold enough to form anything more than shore ice.
in order for the lake to freeze over, it would take several weeks of severe
weather like this to have significant ice formation on the lake. last time,
the lake froze over was about ten years ago. it was snowing every day
for weeks. we were getting slammed with snow. then the lake froze, about
94%. only part not frozen was the deepest part where its over 2,000 ft deep.
that shut the snow down, but then the temperature plummeted to minus 10,
minus 20, and minus 30 degrees. the unfrozen lake has a warming effect on the
land. you would rather tolerate the snow than experience that kind of cold.


keith

37C/98F here today, the warmest of this run, cooling down to about 25C/77 F tomorrow. Glad we missed what the west of Oz copped a day or two ago, with one report showing Geraldton getting to 49.6C/121F.

28° and a Wintry mix here, with sleet being the dominant species. Kept the fire going overnight just in case. The electricity has bounced on and off a few times now. Might (you think) be related to the very blustery conditions and icy weather.

The yard has a coating of icy stuff. Don’t see a lot of ice on the trees, but it’s still dark out.

Probably won’t freeze to death if the power goes off for good as both neighbors have whole house generators.

We had a balmy high of 9C here yesterday, which took away the scanty snow on ground.
Really nice in the garden, but then it started to blow hard. Still fairly high, gusting 60-70 kph but the temperature has dropped to -4C and windchill is -12C as the polar edge pushed this far east. Snow squalls expected, so those will leave a few cm here and there. Some cold days ahead this week.

We don't get this often and it's still coming down.

Here in east central Georgia the low this morning was 24F/-4C, heading to 17 by Thursday morning. Wind chills below 15F/9C are forecasted for today and tomorrow. Snow coming in this afternoon and overnight, expecting 2" or less. Thankful it's not ice.

Not much here. Beaumont and points to the east are supposed to get the most snow.

woke up to minus 9 degrees with a wind chill of minus 31.
about 3 inches of new snow on the ground.

its cold


keith

-15˚F (-26˚C) here this morning with another cold front expected tomorrow. Thankfully no wind to make it feel much colder. And nighttime temps will stay above zero the rest of the week. (Hopefully)

I'm not sure I want to do the ham club gathering today. Wiser minds don't go out in this unless they absolutely have to. OTOH if we pulled in the sidewalks every time it got cold in Wisconsin we'd never get anything done! Brrrrrrrr It's a delicate balance between pragmatism and insanity.

Mother nature didn't care that this is zone 9, lol. When we rarely get snow, it's usually a few flakes. This is being called a once in a generation storm (for here).

Tate the dog enjoying the snow.

Sitting at -9F at home now. The thermostat in our N Wisconsin cabin says it's -27F out and a toasty 55 inside. Trailcam pictures near the water show 2 ice fishing shelters over the many brush piles I've sank over the years. There is a full size truck nearby on the water, so they're being used now. I hope the bite is good, but even so... tooooo cold.

I hope all you southerners enjoy the magic of snow cover, and every plant still green and recovering upon the melt, as if it was just a cool drink!