The "Storm of the Century" is a prime example of a major East Coast winter storm. This storm devastated the East Coast from 12-15 March 1993, dumping record amounts of snowfall as well as setting record low pressure readings all along the coast. In addition, gale force winds, large tidal surges, and extremely low temperatures accompanied the storm. In this investigation, the "Storm of the Century" was studied as the prototypical example of a major explosively developing cyclone. The conditions during a less severe ice and snowstorm which occurred from 1-5 March 1994 were compared with those of the "Storm of the Century". The 1994 storm showed similar development and followed a track similar to that of the 1993 storm. These two storms were compared and contrasted at different levels of atmosphere to determine why one storm developed to produce historically significant weather conditions while another achieved conditions considered to be typical for winter along the East Coast of the United States. A larger cold air surge was primarily responsible for the greater intensity of the "Storm of the Century" over the 1994 ice and snow storm. Additionally, temperature and moisture advection played a role in the deepening of the 1993 storm at an earlier stage in the cyclone's development -- Author abstract
snowstorms along the Northeastern Coast of the United States: 1955 to 1985 documents 20 of the most crippling snowstorms that have affected the heavily populated coastal region of the Middle Atlantic states and southern New England over the last four decades. Heavy snowfall and high winds associated with storms often referred to as "nor'easters" can maroon millions of people at home or in transit, severely disrupt human services and commerce, and endanger the lives of those who venture out doors. Paul J. Kocin and Louis W. Uccellini provide answers to questions of how these important storms develop, what factors delineate snow/no snow situations, and what weather patterns provide clues that foretell such events. The book provides a comprehensive overview of this phenomenon from historical, climatological, and dynamical perspectives, using many illustrations, maps, tables, and color schematics. The introduction describes the major effects of such storms, the complex physical interactions that fuel their development, and the problems they present to forecasters trying to predict their fickle behavior and progress. A review of the great northeastern storms of the past three centuries follows, along with a climatology of the heavy snow events over a 30-year period. Descriptions of 20 major storms supply a framework for understanding the dynamical and thermodynamical processes that contribute to heavy snowfall. A summary of the physical processes that contribute to the storms concludes with issues that remain to be resolved. The case-study approach presents a great deal of material contained in hundreds of synoptic analyses in a well-organized and useful layout, allowing case-by-case comparisons of common features and differences. Extensive tables, diagrams, and photographs show weather patterns at the surface and aloft, emphasizing cyclone tracks and deepening rates, the contributions of cold surface anticyclones, cold-air damming and coastal frontogenesis, upper-level processes, jet streak circulations, satellite imagery, and three-dimensional air flow. It is hoped that this book will provide a foundation for researchers and students interested in investigating the processes that interact to produce major winter storms. The weather patterns described here provide a first step in the generation of conceptual models, and also serve as an easily referenced guide for forecasters concerned with predicting heavy snowfalls along the northeastern coast of the United States.
The regular phenomenon of heavy snowfalls in the North American cities of the `snow belt' has had a marked influence on the communities affected; individuals and city authorities have both sought for ways to cope with the influence of snow storms on daily life. Making use of both official records and private and newspaper accounts from as far back as the Colonial period, the author traces the reactions heavy snows have provoked over the centuries, showing how communities have found increasingly sophisticated ways of dealing with the problems. He shows how the research prompted by the staggering costs have led to improved strategies, and details the moves towards the establishment of annual conferences on snow and its removal to pool experience and to find technological, fiscal and administrative responses to this regularly recurring phenomenon.BLAKE McKELVEYis former City Historian of Rochester, New York.
"The past winter was an extraordinary one, weatherwise, for most residents of the Upper Midwest. There were numerous heavy snowstorms in various sections of the area during the winter and more especially within the 75-day period beginning in mid-December and running through February. Some of these heavy snowstorms were widespread. A number of them were accompanied by strong winds and much drifting and blowing of snow resulting in blizzard or near blizzard conditions. Several were interspersed with ice storms in some localities. One of the cumulative effects of the numerous heavy snowstorms, accompanied by persistently below normal temperatures, has been the development of an unusually deep mantle of snow with a very high water content over much of the area. This has resulted in the imminence of severe flooding on many streams in the area of the Upper and Central Midwest as the spring snowmelt period begins to come to the area. The following sections and the accompanying figures and table point up the nature of the past winter's weather in the Upper Midwest and the seriousness of the flood situation that exists and is even now rapidly unfolding from the snowmelt"--Introduction
Author: United States. Congress. House. Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure. Subcommittee on Economic Development, Public Buildings, and Emergency Management
Blizzards bring blinding snow, major wind gusts, and treacherous ice to many parts of the world. All of these create dangerous challenges and demonstrate nature's power. This book introduces readers to the conditions that cause blizzards to form and will familiarize students with the most extreme blizzards in history. Safety and survival techniques are explained. With striking photographs of record snowfalls and engaging facts about the incredible destruction blizzards cause, this book will captivate readers as they explore Earth science curricula content.
Winter storms cause significant damage to the power infrastructure system each year in the United States. These storms leave millions without power for an extended period of time, resulting in substantial economic losses. Utility companies seek to lower restoration costs and better prepare for such events. Therefore, many are investing in decision-support tools such as predictive models. These tools, coupled with industry experience, can aid in pre-storm planning and post-storm restoration activities, thus lowering costs and reducing outage extent and duration. This research developed winter storm impact models for FirstEnergy, an investor-owned utility company headquartered in the Midwestern United States.Specifically, three main objectives were addressed: (1) development and validation of a service territory winter storm impact model for FirstEnergy, (2) development and validation of regionally-defined winter storm impact models for FirstEnergy, and (3) a comparative analysis of the service territory and regionally-defined winter storm impact models.Results from objective 1 revealed that winter storm impact models can be successfully developed and validated using a number of environmental and dynamic covariates. Results also showed that reducing the initial covariate set resulted in similar predictive accuracy as the full model, thus allowing for faster model runtimes and easier maintenance. In addition, it was found that meteorological variables are the most important for predicting winter storm-related damage.Results from objective 2 showed that regional models could be developed with reasonable accuracy. Similar to objective 1, reduced versions of the models performed better in many cases, indicating that a large number of covariates could be removed. In addition, meteorological variables such as ice, snow, and wind parameters were found to be the most influential for predicting winter storm related damage. Lastly, it was found that for most models, medium-scale and large-scale events (i.e. orders > 50) were predicted better than small-scale events.Lastly, objective 3 compared the service territory and regional models using a case study approach. Results showed that for most operating companies, the service territory model performed better. This was likely due to the large sample size when using data from all operating companies. In addition, the varying sizes of each operating company further limited sample size, thus resulting in lower accuracy for regional models. Despite the service territory model performing better in most cases, this comparison did shed light on the importance of regional models, and their future refinement to increase model performance. Expanding the study period could improve regional models. Overall, results showed that the winter storm impact models developed performed well and that the regional models performed better in many circumstances. In addition, these results showed that a large number of covariates can be removed, thus lowering computing time and model maintenance. The results from this research can provide FirstEnergy with a decision-support tool that can be implemented prior to a winter storm event to inform decision makers within the company, thus lowering costs and reducing restoration times.
Designed with researchers, students, and weather observers and enthusiasts in mind, Northeast Snowstorms takes the unique approach of utilizing conventional weather charts and detailed descriptions of individual storms to analyze storms in a multi-disciplinary way. The most comprehensive treatment of winter storms ever compiled, this two-volume set includes case studies, insights, historic photos, and 200 color figures. The extra material on the SpringerExtras server contains five days of complete reanalysis data at 35-km grid resolution and 64 vertical levels for each of the cases. This allows everyone from enthusiasts to students to conduct their own diagnostic studies or research projects for any of the 70 historic cases, from a PC or workstation environment. Instructors take note: this is an excellent tool for creating classroom exercises.
