2010: A Year in Review

Anyone who says that Minnesota or Wisconsin are boring must not have been living here in 2010. After what was a somewhat slow start to the year, things picked up dramatically and really haven't let up since late spring. To mark the end of the year, I decided to take a look back at the year, and rank what I think are the top 5 weather events of the year. I first thought of doing a top 10, but really a top 5 I think is more reasonable. So without further delay, my top 5.


Number 5 - Snowless March

While the other top events of 2010 will consist of weather actually occurring, this one was chosen due to the lack of weather. For the first time since weather data has been recorded, no measurable snow was recorded at the MSP airport, or at Eau Claire's airport. While some may not think this is much of a surprise due to it being March, and almost spring, it actually is a surprise because March is typically one of, if not the snowiest months that we see. This rare event, however, did help reduce the amount of flooding that is typically seen every year due to the snow melt into the Wisconsin and Minnesota rivers.

Number 4 - Record Low Pressure/Windstorm




On October 26, 2010, a low pressure system, with a cold front attached moved across the northern United States, while a secondary low moved up from the south and merged into one "megalow". The low moving from the south ended up becoming the main low, and rapidly deepened (or strengthened) bringing some incredibly strong winds along with it. The main low bottomed out around 28.20 inches of mercury (954.96mb) at Bigfork in Itasca County. This shatters the old Minnesota lowest pressure record of 28.43 that was set in the November 10, 1998 storm at both Austin and Albert Lea. The state of Wisconsin also broke their state record for pressure, with Superior recording a reading of 28.39 inches of mercury (961.3mb). That broke a record that stood for more than 28 years, dating back to April 3rd, 1982. The measurement was taken in Green Bay. The storm brought sustained winds between 20 and 30mph, with gusts of 40-60+mph. This caused power outages, trees to fall, and people's lawn furniture to end up in their neighbors yard. This low was also able to tap into some moisture from the south, and cold air from the north, creating the first decent snowfall across Minnesota and North Dakota. Blizzard warnings, High Wind warnings, and a whole slew of other advisories cover the area. The cold front extending from the low ended up causing problems across a good portion of the central and eastern United States.

Number 3 - Southern Minnesota/Western Wisconsin flooding

Beginning the afternoon/evening of September 22nd, a moist airmass moved into the area, and a slow moving warm front moved into southern Minnesota before stalling out to a stationary front. The combination of these two things created a long duration heavy rain event which ended up causing rivers to overflow, and farm fields to turn into lakes. The rain didn't stop falling until late in the day on September 23rd, but its effects were felt days, even weeks later. Below is a graphic of rain totals that were observed across southern Minnesota and western/southern Wisconsin, courtesy the National Weather Service in La Crosse, WI.



All of this rain, along with its eventual runoff, caused flooding for a couple weeks after the rain had ended. Fortunately, this rain was followed by a dry stretch that lasted nearly a month. This allowed the rivers to eventually fall below flood stage, fields to dry out, and farmers to make good progress on their annual harvest.

Number 2 - June tornadoes/record season

There was much thought put into whether or not to put this at number 1 or 2, and in reality, it could easily be put in the number 1 spot. But after all that thinking, the record year Minnesota had takes the number 2 spot. While the season as a whole was quite remarkable, one day in June covers a good chunk of the overall tornadoes that Minnesota saw through the year. A warm and extremely unstable airmass moved into Minnesota during the day of June 17th, 2010, setting up what would be the largest outbreak of tornadoes Minnesota would see during a 24 hour period. Three fatalities (2 from northwest Minnesota, and 1 from south central MN), as well as many injuries were reported as a result of the outbreak. 48 of Minnesota's record breaking 105 tornadoes were reported on the 17th of June. Although a majority of the tornadoes were rated EF-2 or lower, four of them received EF-3 ratings, and three of them received EF-4 ratings. Below is a storm reports map from the 17th.



Also, here is a link which contains info of each tornado for Minnesota. http://www.crh.noaa.gov/images/mpx/2010torlist.pdf

Number 1 - Blizzard of 2010

This years number one event actually happened closer to the end of the year. On December 11th, 2010, a large, slow moving area of low pressure moved across central IA and northern IL, strengthening and tapping into Gulf moisture as it trekked east. North of the low, a wide swath of snow formed, dropping snow at rates of 1+ inches/hour. Wind speeds increased as the low strengthened, creating whiteout conditions and making travel impossible. Many roads were considered impassible, and access to the I-94 was restricted across western Wisconsin due to those whiteout conditions, and large snow drifts that were forming on the road. What makes this storm such an impressive system is the fact that such a large area saw well over a foot of snow, and even those areas that initially saw a little mixing of freezing rain and sleet still saw 10+ inches of snow. Below is the snowfall map from that storm, over a 24 hour time frame, courtesy of the National Weather Service.



Although there were a lot of high totals of snow, some notable ones were from Osceola, WI with 23 inches of snow, Eau Claire, WI with 22 inches, and even the Twin Cities with 17 inches. In fact at the Metrodome in Minneapolis, the snow was so much that it caused the roof of the dome to collapse, forcing a game between the Vikings and the Giants to be moved to Detroit while repairs were done. Schools in Minnesota were closed for several days after because the snow removal process was slow going, and rightfully so. That storm, as well as several others in the Twin Cities, led to a record breaking December for snow totals on record. Here in Eau Claire, we are second snowiest on record at this point, but are less than 2 inches away from surpassing the top mark for the month of December. With at least 3 months of potential snow accumulating days it will be interesting to see how much actually falls over the winter, and how much of an impact it will have on the annual spring floods that we see. 2010 will be tough to beat when it comes to significant weather, but 2011 may be full of a few new surprises. You never know :)

Quite pattern, but trending colder

After an exciting week last week and the record breaking low (falling just short of breaking the U.S. lower 48 record for a non tropical system), we have fallen back into a quiet weather pattern. That quiet pattern will hold, at least for a little while longer. In the mean time, a shot of cold air looks to work its way down from Canada, covering a good chunk of the eastern U.S. This could spell trouble for the east coast as this trough digs south and interacts with a system working up the coast. Heavy rain and mountain snows appear likely with this system, but the models are having a difficult time coming to a common solution on the strength of that system. For around here, the week will start out decent, but a cold front coming through Tuesday/Wednesday will cool temps down to the 40's to end the week. Temps should moderate some to end next weekend as the ridge out to our west begins to work east. Could see some light precip forming along with the frontal passage, and maybe a little light mix on Thursday, but other than that, things will be quiet.

Just taking a peak into the longer range, the GFS has been hinting at a pretty good shot of cold air coming down. Riding along that edge of colder air could be a decent storm system, and potentially the first widespread snowstorm for somewhere close to home. It's a ways out, and plenty can change between now and then, but the GFS hasn't lost it yet, and even the ECMWF is hinting at something getting spun up. It is something to monitor, but keep in mind that most models really tend to struggle during the transition of the seasons. Forecasters have been calling for a snowy winter, so we'll see if things will get going in the next 10 or so days.

Record setting day across the Midwest

After what has been a slow, dull, boring (but actually kind of nice) October, mother nature quickly reminded us where we all live, and how quickly things can change. A low pressure system, with a cold front attached moved across the northern United States, while a secondary low moved up from the south and merged into one "megalow". The low moving from the south ended up becoming the main low, and rapidly deepened (or strengthened) bringing some incredibly strong winds along with it. The main low bottomed out around 28.20 inches of mercury (954.96mb) at Bigfork in Itasca County. This shatters the old Minnesota lowest pressure record of 28.43 that was set in the November 10, 1998 storm at both Austin and Albert Lea. The state of Wisconsin also broke their state record for pressure, with Superior recording a reading of 28.39 inches of mercury (961.3mb). That broke a record that stood for more than 28 years, dating back to April 3rd, 1982. The measurement was taken in Green Bay. Below is a graphic showing the progression of the low, courtesy of the NWS Office in La Crosse.




With this, the storm brought sustained winds between 20 and 30mph, with gusts of 40-60+mph. This caused power outages, trees to fall, and people's lawn furniture to end up in their neighbors yard. This low was also able to tap into some moisture from the south, and cold air from the north, creating the first decent snowfall across Minnesota and North Dakota. Blizzard warnings, High Wind warnings, and a whole slew of other advisories cover the area. The cold front extending from the low ended up causing problems across a good portion of the central and eastern United States. Severe storms containing damaging winds and tornadoes caused damage across parts of southern Wisconsin, Tennessee, Indiana, Ohio, Michigan, as well as a few other states. This is a link to a more detailed description of what happened, courtesy of the Minnesota State Climatology Office http://climate.umn.edu/doc/journal/low_pressure_101026.htm Below is a satellite image of the low, with the cold front extending south off of it.

Yawn....

Well, what a stretch of weather we have had here in Western Wisconsin. It has been at least 15 consecutive days of dry weather, and that trend looks to last another 4 days at least. This dry stretch, however, was needed after the flooding rains most areas received about a month or so ago. Farmers have been taking advantage of this stretch of dry, warm weather by getting their harvesting done before we see any more rain, or even snow. Yes, that dreaded "S" word will be being used more and more in the coming months, but it shouldn't be seen for a little while yet. However, what is good for some, can be bad for others. While the farmers and most of the general public has been enjoying this stretch of dry weather, it is now to the point that the things leaves and grass are getting too dry, leading to a high fire risk across most of the area. So, quite frankly, some rain wouldn't be the worst thing in the world right now. It does, however, look like we will have to wait until next week before any chance at some measurable rain reaches the area. First things first...

Today looks to be mostly sunny, with maybe a few clouds here and there, highs right around 58 degrees. Tuesday night, a few clouds, temps dropping to around 38 degrees. Wednesday will be breezy in advance of a cold front that will be coming through. Temps will be slightly warmer with highs getting to around 60 degrees.

Looking further down the road, a change will begin taking place over a good portion of the United States, however how that change will unfold is still uncertain. A potent system will be coming onshore over the Pacific northwest this coming weekend, bringing with it a much more active pattern, with some long range models spinning up some decent storm systems that could hit the area with rain, wind, and colder temperatures. In fact, looking wayyy down the road, the GFS is hinting at the potential for some accumulating snow a couple days before Halloween. Keep in mind that this is far in the model, and will likely change as time goes on, but there has been a trend that at least one decent system (likely rain) will hit the Upper Midwest sometime next week. Below is a look at the system, per the GFS, the morning of October 29th. Again, it is a ways away, but when you're bored, you grasp for anything.



I will continue watching next week to see how next week unfolds. Until then, enjoy this (likely) final stretch of nice weather, because this could honestly be it until next spring.

Wx Forecast Competition Day 4

Warm, dry temps look to continue for the Brownsville area on Friday, with temps similar to what they saw on Thursday. A frontal passage is expected late on Friday into Saturday, but it won't really affect temps all that much.

(06z Friday - 06z Saturday)
High Temp - 92
Low temp - 68
Wind - 10 knots
Precip - 0.00

Wx Forecast Competition Day 3

Two days down, many to go. Brownsville, however, is just about wrapped up. High pressure contiues to dominate Texas, bringing sunny and dry conditions to the Brownsville area. Thursday should feature near normal temps, with an ever so slight increase in temps expected from Wednesday. Below are my predictions for Thursday.

(06z Thurs - 06z Fri)
High temp - 90 (91 degrees)
Low temp - 66 (66 degrees)
Wind speed - 8 knots (8 knots)
Precip 0.00 (0.00)

Around Eau Claire, temps should continue to be near their normal values, before a sharp cool down arrives just in time for the weekend. A strong area of high pressure will sag down from Canada and settle over Wisconsin Saturday night, which should make conditions perfect for the first widespread frost/freeze of the year. Advisories and possibly warnings will probably be needed. For tonight, expect lows to drop into the upper 40's with light winds. Thursday, highs once again in the upper 60's. Winds will be out of the northwest at 5-15mph. No precipitation is expected.

High temp - 67
Low temp - 48
Wind speed - 10 knots
Precip - 0.00

Wx Forecast Challenge

Second day of the challenge, with a pretty close day 1 at this point. Temps appear to be a bit warmer for tomorrow. NWS is predicting highs in the low 90's, but I think upper 80's may be more appropriate. High pressure remains in control, so precip will be nil. This may be adjusted a bit before 7pm if I'm around...but if not, so be it.

(Wed 06z - Thurs 06z)
High temp - 88 (89 degrees)
Low temp - 62 (63 degrees)
Wind - 8 knots (9 knots)
Precip - 0.00 (0.00)

Wx Forecasting Competition

So a good friend of mine encouraged me to participate in a weather forecasting challenge over the next 10 or so weeks, and after some thought I agreed. I obviously don't have the training that others within the competition have, and since I don't go to any schools for meteorology, I can't even figure out what my scores are, but it still seemed like it could be fun, and maybe a chance to learn about forecasting in other parts of the country. The point is to come up with a high and low temp, wind speed, and exact precip amount. The time frame is 06z Tues through 06z Wed...then again from 06z Wed through 06z Thurs...and so on, until 06z on Saturday. The first place is Brownsville, TX.

(06z Tues-06z Wed)
High temp - 83 (85 degrees)
Low temp - 62 (63 degrees)
Wind speed - 10 kts (11 knots)
Precip - 0.00 (0.00)

I will try to come back and post the actual numbers recorded for each day, as long as I actually remember to. Should be an entertaining 10 (or so) weeks.

Around Minnesota and Wisconsin, high pressure appear to be in control through the week with a chance of some rain showers in Northern MN and Northern WI Wednesday afternoon and evening...and now an ever so slight chance at some drizzle on Saturday, but I'm not sold on that yet. This should allow the rivers to continue to drop to their normal levels and farm fields to dry out. First good chance at widespread frost comes this weekend (Oct. 2nd and 3rd), and a good freeze potential for the usual cold spots Saturday night into Sunday morning. Severe weather season appears to be done with for the year across Minnesota and Wisconsin, unless one of those unusual storms spins up and drops a ton of snow in the Dakotas and slams Minnesota and Wisconsin with one last burst of severe storms.

Storm chase of July 17th, 2010

The morning of July 9th, 2010, I woke up, rubbed my eyes and walked out to my computer, much like I do every morning. I opened my usual links, which includes Facebook, our weather chat page, and the Storm Prediction Center's page. As I looked through the SPC's page, I noticed something that I hadn't seen in a while...a risk for severe weather in their 4-8 day outlook. My eyes got a little wider after seeing that, and I quickly went to take a look at the forecast models to see what they were talking about. The forecast for severe weather on July 14th looked really good. I started chatting with some of my buddies in the chat about that day and considered taking the day off of work so I could go and chase. I debated for a while about this, thinking that most of the severe weather has stayed well south and west of here and it was the middle of the week, so I wasn't sure if it would be worth it. Soon the afternoon forecast discussions started coming out and forecasters were talking about a potential outbreak of storms on that Wednesday. I couldn't resist, so I put in for time off of work on that Friday. Come Tuesday of the following week, I find out my request is denied. I'm bummed, my buddy that I was gonna pick up and go chasing with was bummed. Soon I see a moderate risk for severe on that day, in which case I am really really bummed, but for once Western Wisconsin was potentially the target area anyway. I wake up that Wednesday morning to the sound of my weather radio. Storms are already firing at 9am and Tornado Watches are being posted...at 9am?! I thought, hmmm this is way too early and not even the main cold front...this is probably not good for chances of severe weather later this afternoon. That was exactly what happened too. Cloud cover and morning rain really prevented the atmosphere from destabilizing a lot, so it did lower the risk somewhat of getting our "outbreak". Western WI did see some smaller tornadoes that day, however, and I did get to chase one of them with one of our reporters. We didn't see the tornado but did come across some of the damage that it had done. Overall it wasn't what it was hyped up to be, due to the morning clouds and rain. Damage was done, but that day could have been a ton worse if we would have had the sun baking us through the morning and early afternoon. It was later that day, however that I was brought to the attention, once again, of the Day 4-8 outlook, with Saturday, July 17th being highlighted over Minnesota and parts of Wisconsin. Again, I chatted with my buddies, and decided right there that we are going to chase on that Saturday. The storms seemed to have been going around most of us for too long, so it was time for us to go to them. Ok, the intro was a bit long, but I thought it would be fun to include all of that. Now, down to business....

The days leading up to Saturday, I looked over the models trying to figure out a good chase target. Initially I thought Southern Minnesota was, once again, going to get rocked, as they had been over the past month of so. So I thought we would be making a drive down the I-90 corridor into Minnesota. However with each passing day the better upper level dynamics seemed to shift further and further north, aiming more towards Central Minnesota as well as parts of Northern and Northwestern Minnesota. My initial chase target on Friday was Willmar,MN but I was concerned that would be too far north, and if storms began to fire in far southern Minnesota, we wouldn't be able to get to them, so I shifted my target a bit further south to Olivia, MN. Early Saturday morning, the SPC put out their risk maps and they seemed to highlight Northwestern Minnesota with the highest probability of tornadoes, but a pretty significant wind threat across the southern 2/3rds of Minnesota into Western Wisconsin. Even the hail threat was fairly high, and all the risks were high enough to warrant a Moderate Risk. Below are the risks from the SPC, top to bottom, Categorical Risk, Tornado Risk, Hail Risk, and Wind Risk.









After this outlook was issued, and looking at the latest models, I changed my decision back to Willmar, MN. It was centralized enough to where we could zip south if it was necessary. After talking with others in that chat room, they all agreed that would be good, and in fact Jon had mentioned that he had thought about that location a few days earlier as well. I also chatted with Steph about this location, as she is the smartest and most educated when it comes to weather forecasting, and she had thought even further NW of there may be even better, but I thought that if we get there early enough, we can zip north fast enough to catch whatever is going on up there. Jon and myself were to meet at Rick's place in St. Louis Park, then head west towards Willmar, with Alex and Schultzy meeting up then heading north to meet up with us in Willmar. Our scheduled meet time was 1pm in Willmar, with convection expected to really get going around 4pm. Traffic and construction in the Twin Cities was a bear, so it took me much longer than I thought it would to get to SLP, but eventually I made it, and we still met up in Willmar pretty close to that 1pm mark. On our drive, we could see clouds already billowing off to the north and west, with sunshine plenty of heating going on around us, so we knew that things were already starting to come together. We met at a hotel (or motel...whatever lol) in Willmar, where they were nice enough to let us borrow their Wi-Fi so we could plot out our first course of action. After our little meet and greet with Alex and Schultzy, it was time to check out radar and see where to go. There was already a nice cell north and west of us, to the northeast of Alexandria, MN. The cell was moving generally southeast, so we debated whether or not to go after it. We continued to watch it on radar while enjoying a lunch of sammiches (lol Rick), chips, and other goodies provided by our den momma Sandy. After a little while that cell began to intensify and take a sharper southeast route than before. We thought, do we go after it, or do we wait until the main show later in the afternoon started. After a little discussion we figured we would have time to get back to the west if we had to later in the day, but we were there to chase storms, so that's what we were gonna do. We packed up the cars, Rick, Jon, and myself in one, and Alex and Schultzy in the other, and we hit the road and took Highway 23 out of town towards Paynesville, MN. We traveled for a while, and as we got closer we noticed a nice inflow tail on the storm, which is seen below.



We got about a mile from Paynesville when Jon thought we should pull over and take a look at the structure of the cell, as it was evident that this thing was looking like a very classic supercell. We pulled off onto County Highway 6 and looked towards the north as the cell was going by. This cell looked amazing. It overall just had a nice structure to it, big tops on it topping 50,000 feet according to radar, and was estimated at putting out hail over 2 inches in diameter. In fact in the clouds, you could see a turquoise blueish/green coloring, which is a pretty good sign that there is some decent hail falling below it. We later found out that hail over 4 inches in diameter (softball size) had fallen. Below is a photo of that cell, showing the overall structure of it, as well as a potential wall cloud near the left of the rain shield. Also below is a radar image of the moment that picture was taken, including hail size estimates and cloud top estimates.









After getting several photos there, we decided to stay on this cell to see what else it may produce. We continued southeast on Highway 55 out of Paynesville till we got to the intersection of where Highway 55 and Highway 4 split off. Again, we got out of the car and watched as a pretty wicked looking wall cloud passed by to our east. Radar showed some pretty good rotation going on in the cell, and we could see it as it went by. Below is the picture taken of this cloud, the radar image, as well as the Storm Relative Velocity, which helps to determine if there is rotation in the cell. The brighter greens and pinks notched up next to each other is a sign of strong rotation within the cell.







We then proceeded east on Highway 55 into the town of Eden Valley. Once we got into the edge of town, we again stopped to get out and watch as the clouds rotated overhead, with the stronger rotation passing to our east. Below, once again, is the radar image, SRV image, and a photo taken at that time frame.







After leaving there, we continued east, and wound our way south and east in an effort to keep up with the cell. However due to the roads only going north to south or east to west, bit became difficult to keep up. Several tornado reports were beginning to come in, however we did not spot any of these tornadoes. We did come across a few areas where tree tops were snapped off and twisted, possibly from a funnel that passed overhead and dropped to the top of the trees. We also saw lots of leaf and tree debris on the road, likely from the large hail that fell there earlier. Since we couldn't catch up with that cell, we decided to just pull off the road and get some pictures as it moved away.



While trying to figure out our next course of action, we noticed on the radar that the main show was just moving into Western Minnesota. We first began heading back towards Willmar when we noticed an awesome looking cell off to the northwest of St. Cloud. We decided, instead, to go after that one. As we passed northeast through St. Cloud, the cell was showing signs of bowing. It had a tornado warning on it for quite some time, with a few reports of some possible brief tornado touchdowns. We decided to stop once we got closer to try to get pictures, as this cell was showing an awesome shelf structure to it. We got out and quickly snapped a few pictures as the cell got closer, then moved further up the road to set up to get wind measurements as it passed by. We had a nice look at an open field, and could see the rain get blown across the field as the wind gusts approached. The anemometer on the car gave us a wind gust around 50mph, which wasn't too bad, however much weaker than a previous report of over 80mph on that same cell. Below you can see some lowering that has happening under that tornado warned cell.



We continued northeast on Highway 23 until we got into Milaca. There, the rain was so heavy that the water was starting to pond on the roads. We decided to pull off into a parking lot and maybe wait it out. However looking at radar, it didn't look like it was gonna let up anytime soon. After a few minutes, we again hit the road, this time to head towards St. Francis, as some strong cells were moving towards that area, causing some wind damage in its path, downing trees and powerlines, and knocking out power through the far northern parts of the Twin Cities metro. We eventually caught the back edge of the cell near Princeton and began seeing some sunlight peak through, creating a pretty cool looking double rainbow. It was near there that Alex and Schultzy decided to begin their long drive back to Southern Minnesota. All in all, it was a pretty fun day, as we got plenty of pictures, and no one was physically hurt by these storms. I'm really looking forward to our next chase day.

Boring....'nuff said

Seriously, what happened to the weather around here? No snow in March, and temps running well above normal to start out April. Should we expect this every year from here on out? Well, no. A snow-less March is so rare, that, well it hasn't happened before around here...ever. We absolutely shattered a high temp record the first week in April, reaching the mid 80's after a record of 73 degrees set back in the early 1900's. Shortly after, we were reminded that we do live in Wisconsin, and temps dropped back down to the 50's...still above normal, but somewhat chilly after such warm temps. So I guess we can't complain about the weather too much, as it has been very nice to be outside without having to sprint to the nearest heat source because your body is numb. However, we are still in desperate need of some rain. The lack of snow in March may have sparred some flood prone areas from seeing major flooding, but that snow provides moisture for farmers, which they need now since it is closing in on planting season. Some areas of Wisconsin, primarily north of Highway 29, remain in a drought, with areas of Washburn, Bayfield, Ashland, and Sawyer Co. in a severe drought. Any rain in the forecast? Well, it looks like we could see some very light rain/sprinkles on Saturday afternoon/evening. Southerly winds look to increase to start next week, which should bring some warmer temps to the area. GFS is only forecasting 60's, but I think this is too cool, and that temps shouldn't have a problem getting into the 70's Tuesday and Wednesday of next week. Chance of showers and thunderstorms for the middle of next week, but looking for some model agreement before I'm sold on those chances. We've received just over half an inch of rain so far this month, and are looking for much, much more. Fingers crossed!