We went through the whole of winter with very little snow, other than the surprise Christmas Eve storm, we’ve had it pretty easy with doom and gloom storms that ultimately resulted in an inconvenience and wet roads.  Not my idea of a good time, but hell, could have been worse. (I’m looking at YOU winter of 2009-10! Snowmageddon, my ass.)

But now we could get anywhere from 5-14″ across the region.  In other words, more snow than we’ve seen all season, in the next 36 hours or so.  Winter can seriously screw off after this one.

The TPIndex SNOWQUESTER2013 Update:

I was going to make an update last night before I went to bed, but there wasn’t really anything to change, and honestly, there still isn’t any dramatic difference between last night’s forecasting models and today, and as you see from the snow map, the accumulation seems to have settled into a clear picture.

Since the snowfall seems to be a bit less than originally thought, I’m dropping the TPIndex to:

12

Today is definitely going to be the best choice for stocking up.  SNOWQUESTER2013 will be arriving late tonight, and may start as a period of rain.  By tomorrow morning, the snowfall will be happening and could be pretty intense at times.

While you guys will hopefully be warm and safe at home, I’ll be splitting time between a motel and the radio station. Color me thrilled.

I’ll do another update, if things change, and will post weather stuff to our Facebook and Twitter throughout the day! I know we’ve had a few new people this week, so if you’re unsure what all this means, click here for a quick explanation of the TPIndex.

Be safe!

My immediate response to this is… fuck you weather!  I was more than happy to get through the entire season with virtually no snow.

The map shown here is the most recent ensemble forecast.  It combines a bunch of forecasting models and should be a pretty reasonable predictor of what happens with this storm.

The TPIndex for Snowquester is:

14

Time to actually stock up! Updates as needed… stay tuned!

If you’re new to the TPIndex, here’s a quick explanation!

#snowquester

Well, here we go again… first that kinda-sorta-not-really-a-surprise-gonna-be-mostly-rain-but-ended-up-being-mostly-snow bullshit storm on Christmas Eve… then sleet/freezing rain bullshit on Wednesday/Thursday…. and now THIS bullshit. Really?  Isn’t two storms in as many days enough?

Apparently not.  SO… here’s the TP INDEX for this weekend’s storm:

12

This National Weather Service map suggests 2-4″ for our area, but I’ve seen some models that suggest we could see as much as 6+” of snow before this one is gone.  We’ve only really had wintery weather for a week or so and I’m already bitter and over it.

The TPIndex for this storm is:

2

Pick up a couple of rolls… ’cause… well if I have to explain why you need TP… I really don’t think you can benefit from the kind of help I can provide.

Last year at this time  we had almost no idea that snow was coming for Halloween weekend… now we're getting ready for something worse than a few inches of snow.

This big storm is going to be a bit of a mess.  None of the scenarios in the current models are really great news for us. We're going to see a lot of wind and rain. Make sure you're prepared for extended power outages.

Here's what we know as of Noon:

Maryland and Virginia are now under a State of Emergency in advance of Hurricaine Sandy's arrival.

Sandy's track hasn't really changed that much with landfall happening somewhere between Ocean City and New York City.  The current track shows the center of the Cone of Uncertainty is over the upper Delmarva by Tuesday morning.

Winds will be intense at 40-50mph with gusts into the 60mph range possible.

There's a possibility of snow in the mountains of western Maryland, southern Pennsylvania and the eastern panhandle of West Virginia.

Hang in there… we'll get through it, I'm sure… just make sure your outdoor furniture, etc. are put away before the storm gets here.  Your neighbors will appreciate it if your shit doesn't bash into their house or car.

Anyway… here’s the TPIndex for tonight’s annoyance:

2

I know we haven't had any wintery precipitation of any meaningful amount in the last month or so, but it's officially spring now and winter needs to go the hell away.  Over it! DONE!

Here's the TP Index for this annoying "storm":

3

It looks like we can expect some wintery precipitation arriving late Saturday night and continuing into the day on Sunday.  Now the bright side of this is that it is late March, so daytime accumulations are pretty tough.  I think it will warm up enough to quickly eliminate any of the nasty overnight accumulation and leave us with a slushy mess in the morning hours and then just wet slop later in the day.  All things considered it's no big deal, beyond that fact that it has been SPRING for nearly a week, astronomically speaking.  It's been SPRING since March 1st as far as the meteorological types think.  Either way… late March snow… sucks.

Just when we thought winter had had it's last gasp and we were rewarded with 70-degree temperatures… I was wearing flip-flops and driving around with the top down on the TPIndex-Mobile… it comes back and says "bitch, it's winter!" It all comes down to how the storm tracks, so this will be a prelimnary TP Index:

 5 

It's going to be a rainy night tomorrow, starting during the afternoon commute.  But the fun begins around midnight-ish when the rain will transition over to snow.  Right now it looks like at least a couple of inches of snow will accumulate before it wraps up by mid-morning.  Expect the Tuesday morning drive to be a pain in the buttocks, but hopefully Tuesday afternoon's trip will be in decent shape.

I'll post a new update around mid-day tomorrow once there is a little more intelligence to be had.

WINTER IS NOT OVER!

Now, that said, it looks like the potential double-whammy we were anticipating for this week is a non-starter.  We will see some rain starting later tonight, which might wrap up with a bit of rain and snow mix overnight.  That's pretty good news, and it gets better!

The forecast models are currently suggesting that the "big" storm will remain well-south of us and we will skate by with no, to very little accumulation.  Of course these things can change, so we'll keep you posted!

Many forecasters think this week marks the turning point for the weather cycle and we should get into a more "March-like" cycle with cold days followed by warm periods as well. That doesn't mean that we won't get snow, indeed, we have had major winter storms and blizzards well-into March in the past, but this certainly feels like we can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel. 

And that is good enough for me.

Have a happy Monday!

Photo: Jobi Westhoven