North American Weather (U.S.A & Canada)

[debs]

Hi Guys,

First of all, hope you all have a great 2009.

We have snow here today and theres quite a bit falling. It started at 2pm ish and we already have a foot of snow. Ice pellets and frozen rain are forecast for overnight so kids may be off tomorrow, although temps are set to rise to about 3 degrees so we will just have to wait and see.

Now for a question. We are planning a mini road trip next year to santa Fe, Grand Canyon and Las Vegas, might even pop over the border into death valley. what sort of temps can we expect, that far into the USA around August next year. Have retired family coming to join the trip, so just wanting to prepare them.

Cheers in advance.

TTFN

debs

[Coopsy]

How often can you leave England and it is colder than when you arrive in Canada? In Kent, England, the day time high was minus 2oC. I have just arrived in Canmoe, Alberta and it is 0oC day time temp. Very nice surprise. Dont think it will last

[Roger J Smith]

It has turned very mild on the coast here and a lot of our snow has melted in some heavy rainfall. Not all gone yet, but snow depth reduced from about 18 inches to 4 inches in the past two days. Many highways now closed in the southern part of BC, as avalanches come down all over the place with the milder weather in the mountains. More like mudslides at lower elevations, but snow melt is negligible above 800 metres so far.

Looks like a more variable pattern for Alberta now, Rich, some of this milder air will make it as far as Calgary at times, but there are also indications of more very cold arctic air building up and spreading south next week, so a bit of everything.

Debs, for that planned vacation, it would be generally quite hot although it's a dry heat and if you have an A/C vehicle and plan your days well, you can handle it. Average highs would range from 30 C in higher parts of the southwest to 40 C in Las Vegas at that time of year, and you'll find the weather mostly sunny with a few days of brief thunderstorms mostly over mountains. Would recommend southern Utah for scenery as well as where you mentioned. Death Valley can be 5-8 deg hotter than even Las Vegas, might be an idea to go there only if the daily forecasts are moderate, it could be a real oven there if the region is in a warmer than average spell (the variability of the weather there in August is not great, however, I would imagine it is less than 5 deg from bottom 25% of data to top 25% and even records might only be 10 deg apart). So you can pretty much count on hot, dry weather in that region, as well as the odd thunderstorm perhaps every third or fourth day on the average, and those mostly in the evening hours.

[Yozzer]

Debs, for that planned vacation, it would be generally quite hot although it's a dry heat and if you have an A/C vehicle and plan your days well, you can handle it. Average highs would range from 30 C in higher parts of the southwest to 40 C in Las Vegas at that time of year, and you'll find the weather mostly sunny with a few days of brief thunderstorms mostly over mountains. Would recommend southern Utah for scenery as well as where you mentioned. Death Valley can be 5-8 deg hotter than even Las Vegas, might be an idea to go there only if the daily forecasts are moderate, it could be a real oven there if the region is in a warmer than average spell (the variability of the weather there in August is not great, however, I would imagine it is less than 5 deg from bottom 25% of data to top 25% and even records might only be 10 deg apart). So you can pretty much count on hot, dry weather in that region, as well as the odd thunderstorm perhaps every third or fourth day on the average, and those mostly in the evening hours.

A few years ago a pal of mine and his girlfriend did a coast to coast trip in a rented mustang convertible. They made the fairly rudimentary mistake of driving along desert roads in mid summer with the top down. Came back looking like boiled lobsters...apart from white bits where they'd had their sunglasses on!

You'll have a great time, be a nice change from shovelling snow eh?

[Oblix]

Not sure if this is the right thread to ask this question in, but I'll try anyway.

Could anyone point me in the direction of any research on on the weather charts etc following the grounding of aircraft after Septemerber 11 2001?

I'm interested to learn if the grounding on mass of aircraft had any effect on weather patterns.

[Yozzer]

Departing LP middle of next week will usher in a significant blast of cold from the Plains to the North-East. Could see some -40 temps in a few locations. My betting would be ND or Minnesota (the usual spots), but also possibly upstate New York and Northern New England. Puts the UK's recent cold snap into some perspective...

[debs]

Hi all.

Thanks for your advice on holiday temps. Will let the in laws know.

Weather here is great. - 17 with a windchill of -25, doesn't feel too bad in the sun. Had another 4 inches of snow yesterday......not forecast for this region but came anyway.

Hoping for a snow storm mid week. http://nwstatic.co.uk/forum/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/laugh.gif

Pictures are of frozen stream down by the beach. Incidently, the harbour has an ever thckening crust of ice forming over it.

Enjoy

Debs

[stewfox]

Whats going on in Alaska ? Its cold even for them folk

http://www.freep.com/article/20090108/NEWS07/90108032

[Roger J Smith]

Here's a roundup for y'all.

Milder air has moved in from the Pacific about as far as the Rockies, and as the ridge builds over the west coast, strong arctic highs are being pushed off a cliff so to speak towards the southeast. There will be a couple making the trip towards Florida and as Yozzer indicates, could be close to -40 or even colder in a few spots as the temps now are close to -50 C in parts of the Yukon and NWT.

Looks as though this very cold period will envelop the east coast where it has been fairly close to normal past week, and bring a little snow to the large cities on Thursday (an earlier storm moves by further north tomorrow and could catch NYC but will give Boston 3-7 inches and then hit Debs with a few inches there as well).

Seems that the most anomalous cold will head more south than east with this, frost and freeze warnings likely for Florida and south Texas later this week, and below freezing into central Alabama and Georgia by about Friday.

The whole pattern is slowly moving east and the milder air will stream into the prairies and northern plains, giving them some long-awaited relief, and bringing strong chinook warmings to southern Alberta. Could be 12-15 C there later this week and through the weekend. The milder air here is slowly melting the formerly very deep snow pack, still leaving a cover on most grassy surfaces of 4-6 inches but at least the roads and sidewalks are now quite passable. It is not likely to get very mild here because of an inversion under high pressure, expecting a foggy period with temps near 7 C.

[Yozzer]

Whats going on in Alaska ? Its cold even for them folk

http://www.freep.com/article/20090108/NEWS07/90108032

Absolutely, but that core of cold is now rapidly heading south east, to be replaced by a very mild surge with it's origins in the Pacific. Temps over central and eastern Laska could very well end up 50C above where they have been, and that would be above freezing, pretty unusual for this time of the year!!

[debs]

Hi all,

Lets get away from it all.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20090113/od_af..._20090113032028

Its good to dream.

Temps here are -15 but set to drop to -21 later in week with windchills into -30`s. Will keep you posted on this approaching snow storm too.

TTFN

Debs

PS...Stop dribbling at the advertisement. They`ll probably get a 22 year old buff man or woman....not ordinary joe public.

[mezzacyclone]

Hows it looking at Heinz field for the Baltimore @ Pittsburgh AFC championship game sunday?

If its cold i`m sure the defences of these two behemoths will raise the heat.

Looking forward to this game immensely but we gotta take our hats off to Arizona for beating Carolina to get a ticket to the NFC Championship with Philly,,,? - - - Just realised most of this thread belongs over in the NFL08-09 sports column?

but if you could shed some light on conditions expected folks? toodleoo from a zonal blighty http://nwstatic.co.uk/forum/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/ohmy.gif

Edited January 14, 2009 by mezzacyclone

[Roger J Smith]

Okay then, Pittsburgh weather for Sunday, mostly cloudy with light snow possible, -7 C (20 F). Not very windy.

Meanwhile for Arizona, where they have the option of closing the roof, it won't matter because either way it will be dry and about 21 C, the only variable is whether they have the roof open or closed. Weather outside sunny to partly cloudy, 18-21 C.

I have the feeling the Pittsburgh game will be low scoring and the other one high scoring, both pretty close calls too.

Would take the home teams by narrow margins if you do a spot of betting on sports, but cover Phil to win close as well.

Weather for Obama's inauguration (20th) appears likely to be partly cloudy, 4 C (about average for DC). The east coast will be gradually emerging from the deep freeze by next Tuesday.

[debs]

WIND CHILL WARNING: Saint John and CountyIssued at 3:33 PM AST WEDNESDAY 14 JANUARY 2009

WIND CHILL VALUES OF BELOW MINUS 35 EXPECTED TONIGHT THURSDAY MORNING AND OVERNIGHT THURSDAY NIGHT. THIS IS A WARNING THAT EXTREME WIND CHILL CONDITIONS ARE EXPECTED IN THESE REGIONS. MONITOR WEATHER CONDITIONS..LISTEN FOR UPDATED STATEMENTS.

A STRONG NORTHWEST FLOW COMBINED WITH COLD ARCTIC AIR WILL RESULT IN WIND CHILL VALUES BETWEEN MINUS 35 AND MINUS 40 OVER NORTHERN PORTIONS OF THE PROVINCE TONIGHT AND EARLY THURSDAY. EXTREME WIND CHILL VALUES WILL SPREAD TO ALL REGIONS OF NEW BRUNSWICK OVERNIGHT THURSDAY INTO FRIDAY MORNING AS TEMPERATURES PLUMMET FURTHER

Should make for an interesting day tomorrow.......hope the car starts.

Debs

[Coopsy]

I guess you havent got a block heater for the car? Wrap up warm. A nice warm day here at plus 3oC

[Waveform]

Just looked at the weather station here. Temp is -18.9°c. Thankfully the wind is light not playing windchill games.

Looks like these temps are here at least until Monday, then a low moving in from the south west bring warmer temps at a cost of probably 20+cm snow.

I guess I would rather have the snow than the -30°C windchill temps.

[Yozzer]

Waiting for final figures to come in, but looks like a few valley stations got down to 40 below this morning in Northern New England. Quite a few power outages in Southern New Hampshire too, not really a day you'd want that to happen!

[debs]

WIND CHILL WARNING: Saint John and CountyIssued at 4:57 AM AST FRIDAY 16 JANUARY 2009

WIND CHILL VALUES OF BELOW MINUS 35 EXPECTED TODAY TONIGHT AND SATURDAY MORNING. THIS IS A WARNING THAT EXTREME WIND CHILL CONDITIONS ARE EXPECTED IN THESE REGIONS. MONITOR WEATHER CONDITIONS..LISTEN FOR UPDATED STATEMENTS.

AN EXTREMELY COLD ARCTIC AIRMASS WILL PERSIST TODAY TONIGHT AND SATURDAY. LIGHT TO MODERATE NORTHWEST WINDS WILL PRODUCE WIND CHILLS OF MINUS 35 OR LOWER.

Hi All,

Yet anoher weather warning for us. Temps at the moment is -24 with a windchill of -35. Tomorrow gets worse with -29 and windchill to -40 and above. Even with the heater on in the car coming home if was cold, if you turned the heater off it was freezing withing minutes. Cold caught in my throat this morning and made me cough. Its exciting stuff really, to experience these sort of temps. Not so exciting filling the car up though....lol

Will keep you posted

TTFN

Debs

Edited January 16, 2009 by debs

[johnholmes]

stay safe and warm if you can over there, horrendous values of windchill - the temperatures are hard to believe from this balmy island-barmy at times in the model thread!

[SteveB]

Hi All,

Yet anoher weather warning for us. Temps at the moment is -24 with a windchill of -35. Tomorrow gets worse with -29 and windchill to -40 and above. Even with the heater on in the car coming home if was cold, if you turned the heater off it was freezing withing minutes. Cold caught in my throat this morning and made me cough. Its exciting stuff really, to experience these sort of temps. Not so exciting filling the car up though....lol

Will keep you posted

TTFN

Debs

How do you keep warm in your house with temps that cold.

When it was -6c last week. our heating struggled to keep the house warm.

[Yozzer]

OK, just spoke with my neighbour who keeps a Radio Shack amateur weather station, and temp fell to -39.1C last night. Bear in mind his house sits about 150' above the river, and I reckon it would have been a little below -40 in the valley floor last night. Incidentally record low for NH is -47C, so cold is not too far off record values. Sure is cold enough though.

Not many skiers out today, apart from the Brits of course...Mad dogs and Englishmen eh?

[Yozzer]

How do you keep warm in your house with temps that cold.

When it was -6c last week. our heating struggled to keep the house warm.

Houses here are well insulated and make good use of timber which is also a good natural insulator. Snow generally covers the roof in winter so provides even more insulation. A major difference as well is that most houses have basements which again provides a thermal barrier to the main body of the house. The central heating furnace sits here, warming the basement and the heating to the rest of the house is usually by means of forced hot air from this unit.

Don't worry, North Americans know how to keep warm...

[Waveform]

Went down to about -30°C here last night.

There was very little wind thankfully.

I lit a fire off in the wood stove as a little boost.

Still looking like we may get out of this Arctic air early next week.

I know one thing for certain, if for some reason or another I took the notion to move up North,

this has certainly cured me of that affliction.

OK, just spoke with my neighbour who keeps a Radio Shack amateur weather station, and temp fell to -39.1C last night.

Damn! that is cold....

The seagulls had to push start the crows to get them going this morning.....

[debs]

How do you keep warm in your house with temps that cold.

When it was -6c last week. our heating struggled to keep the house warm.

Hi Steve,

I'm not cold in this house, as mentioned the houses are well insulated. I have the temp set to 18 degrees and its not clicked on for a while and the room temp is reading 22 degrees and that is all solar heatshining through the window...... I have a huge 10 foot wide window facing south and the Bay of Fundy and the sun is gloriously hot. I'm sure on my deck the ground temps are alot higher. Its different here that in the Uk because we tend to get lots of sunshine during the winter instead of the grey skies of the UK. When we visited back in 2006 it was -6 and windchills were -14 BUT over on PEI (Prince edward Island) where we were visiting, there were people sitting on their decks. we realise now that out of the wind and in the sun, you can do that here, even with minus temps as the sun is strong.......its a different kind of cold. One to be experienced.

TTFN

Debs

Edited January 16, 2009 by debs

[Yozzer]

If confirmed, -50F (-46C) was recorded this morning at Big Black River in Maine, which may be a new state record.