Snowing in Houson

[Stephen Pinn]

[Nova]

At noon yesterday (Friday 12/24) I was looking at nothing but grass on the lawn. By 8 PM there was 2' of snow.

Merry Christmas to all.

-- Jack Novak Buffalo, NY - USA (Remove "SPAM" from email address to reply)

[Duane Bozarth]

Tom wrote: ....

I saw picture on the TV news last night of Victoria...but they didn't say anything about the actual low temperatures...I'm assuming (all that's probably naive) that a lack of mention means it didn't actually get cold enough long enough for the citrus to be severely damaged...

[Tom]

We're right down the street (Jones - 1960) and got very little. We had to make a quick run to Sargent to drain the pipes at our place down there and hit heavy flurries on the way back - wife was thrilled. Actually had pretty good snowfall until we passed 290. We had snow on the roof and cars in the drive but snow was over by the time we got home.

[Swingman]

I don't recall hearing anything on the news the past two days about the recent cold snap affecting the South Texas citrus crop. I doubt there was much of an impact as the temperature didn't seem to get below the mid twenties for very long, with little precipitation and no high winds. IIRC, in the past, with most citrus damaging freezes, the temperature were in the teens, with a lot of wind and precipitation that caused advective freezing.

Besides, anything that would have justified the MBA's raising citrus prices at the big corporate retail grocery stores would certainly have been repeatedly mentioned so that we would feel better about paying more today for oranges from Chile.

[Duane Bozarth]

...

:( Yeah, that's a bummer for sure...but surely do like the Valley Ruby Red grapefruit--there's none other that compares...

Grandparents (and now aunt/uncles/cousins) have place in the vicinity of Pharr --

Usually moisture helps rather than hurts -- dry cold is typically the more damaging. Often they'll mist (particularly at bloom time) to keep the water vapor in the air so it's more difficult for the air temperature to drop...at least that's what I was always told...I'm a wheat farmer and only know what I've picked up second hand. We're so far away we don't get down to where Mom's family is often...last I was in the area was in '98.

Anyway, thanks for the info...

[jo4hn]

Ayup. I was warned that if I voted for Kerry, there would be war, quagmire, deficits, and snow in Brownsville. Well I did anyway and guess what? ;-) mahalo, jo4hn

[Swingman]

Not always. I specifically said advective freezing, where "moisture" plays a part, combined with wind. The resultant evaporative cooling below ambient temperature causes the damage to the grove. With this cold front there was a lot of cloud cover and it was apparently not cold enough, for long enough, to cause radiational freeze damage.

[Larry Jaques]

On Sat, 25 Dec 2004 23:46:33 -0500, Nova calmly ranted:

TWO FEET? Oy vay, Yack. What a white Christmas! Mario's always complaining about Buffalo getting a bad rap, but I continue to hear amazing things like that (and the 5' one week a couple years ago, etc.) Methinks -he- is in denial. ;)

We were supposed to get snow but it has been 37° rain so far today. Siskiyou Pass is blanketed in white, though.

Nappy Hoo Year to you, too.

P.S: Got JPGs?

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[Nova]

Lake effect snows are funny. The snow may have missed Mario's area. I know that about 5 miles to the south of me they only got 2"-3". The official measurement at the Buffalo airport, about 10 miles east of the lake was 11".

Looks familiar although during the worse of Friday evenings storm I has to stop snow blowing as I couldn't see the front of the snow blower. Fortunately it was the light fluffy stuff and I was able to clear most of it out in about an hour after the snow stopped.

-- Jack Novak Buffalo, NY - USA (Remove "SPAM" from email address to reply)

[Duane Bozarth]

OK, I'm not arguing, as I said, that's just what I was always told by kinfolk down there...they were probably keeping it simple for the wheat guy... :)

Dry cold is about the only kind we know up here and it's calm if it's under 25 mph...

But how do you get cooling ambient this way?

Anyway, I was assuming the air temps weren't cold enough long enough for serious damage.

[Lew Hodgett]

Tell me about it.

The official reporting point for Cleveland is Hopkins Airport on the west side of the city.

Average yearly snow fall is less than 6 ft.

20 miles east in Chardon, Oh, heart of the snow belt, 10+ ft is the normal.

My local salesman for the Western New York area lived in Buffalo and worked out of his house.

At least once or twice a year he would be up on his roof shoveling off snow when I would call.

Ah the memories.

Today, I wait for a winter storm to come in off the Pacific and dump a bunch of rain on SoCal.

Really screws up my fiberglass laying work.

Lew

[Swingman]

Same thing that makes your cool your skin ... faster and cooler in a breeze, and faster and cooler with a breeze and low RH: heat of evaporation.

[Larry Jaques]

On Sun, 26 Dec 2004 16:59:16 -0500, Nova calmly ranted:

about 5 miles to the

about 10 miles east

Yeah, my buddy Terry used to drive from NYC to Canuckistan and went through there. Serveral times he stopped and stood in the sunshine a few yards from a blowing snowstorm, as if there were a wall there and the storm was contained behind it. Damndest thing he ever saw.

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[jo4hn]

[snip]

At least one forecaster says we should get a couple feet of snow up here. Gonna meet a daughter at a restaurant in Orange County for lunch tomorrow. The snow is supposed to hold off till evening. mahalo, jo4hn

[Silvan]

I've seen that too, here in Virginia. Almost like there's some kind of invisible forcefield keeping the white stuff on the other side of the line. Very weird.

We get weather like that especially in late spring.

[George]

Simple fact - can't get colder than the dewpoint. By misting, they raise, or at least hold the dewpoint. If they get significant evaporative cooling, they're not misting well enough. With a high RH, evaporation is nil.

[Larry Jaques]

On Mon, 27 Dec 2004 01:40:04 -0500, Silvan calmly ranted:

Ditto on Little Rock AFB in the 60s. I'd be on one side of the street in the sunshine while it rained like hell (80F summer rain) on the other side of the street, and I could watch the line of wetness progress slowly toward me. Great stuff for an 8-year-old.

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[Swingman]

Well George, you could trot your ass down to the Rio Grande Valley and become St George overnight by teaching them with that superior knowledge/attitude.

An even "simple(r) fact" - Your ignorance of advective freezing is showing. Have you ever tried to "mist" in a high wind?

[Duane Bozarth]

...

I was going to just drop off here, but I think there's a semantics problem...to check my memory I looked up advection -- "The horizontal transfer of air mass properties by the velocity field of the atmosphere". That's what I recalled. The effect of wind is to enhance heat transfer, yes, but it doesn't cause the cooled object temperature to drop below the air temperature...that's against thermo rules.

Sure, one can't keep all water in the air if it's blowing hard, but the same principle holds...even an ice layer over the tree can be an insulating blanket that helps if the air temperature isn't too cold too long and it's not at the most critical juncture...

Anyway, not to get too carried away...