Lake Effect Snow.

[MackerelSky]

And most likely looking at a record amount of accumulation since they've been keeping records.

The worst of it at this time is a few miles South of Buffalo NY and stretching South towards Pennsylvania about 30 miles. That is the estimated width of this lake effect snow band coming off of Lake Erie that started early Tuesday morning and is going to continue thru early afternoon on Wednesday. If you've never experienced snow coming down at 3 to 5 inches per hour, let alone lasting like that for 36 hours, it's something to see. Some locations by early afternoon tomorrow will be near 6 feet of snow and steady winds averaging 27 mph and gusting above 55 mph.

To make matters even worse, Wednesday evening around 9 pm begins another lake effect snow warning expecting to last until Friday Morning, with another 2 to 3 feet of snow expected and again with the high SW winds off of the lake.

But the kicker to it all? Sunday begins a what could be considered the knockout punch. Temperatures are expected to rise to the mid 50's to mid 60's thru the middle of next week with nightime lows above freezing also. 8 plus feet of snow quickly melting.

Anyways, I've attached a couple of links, the first one is to the ridge radar from Buffalo that I have on my site and a link to a local Buffalo tv station that has good coverage of the event.

http://mckeanweather.com/mwridgeR.php

http://www.wgrz.com/weather/

Fortunately for me here at the house, we won't be getting anything like they are receiving up north, but when the winds change to the WNW later in the week we'll be getting a foot or more.

Thought you might be interested...

Brad

[mcrossley]

That must be an amazing phenomenon to witness, I guess you build strong roofs around there!

[PaulMy]

Roofs are usually not an issue any more. Years ago there were quite often instances of old hockey arenas with wooden quan'set type of roof that most small towns and villages had that collapsed due to heavy snow burden from such Lake Effect snow squalls. Those old arenas have been pretty well all replaced.

Brad I hope you are doing ok, we've pretty well missed the brunt of it so far as the winds were not coming down from lake Huron.

Paul

[MackerelSky]

What roofs Mark?



That was taken yesterday around noon from what I can tell.

Imagine waking up to this yesterday morning...



That little movie of the dog at the front door was on the news last night and she seemed to be barking to get outside.

They are getting a little break this afternoon from the snow but there is still a travel ban for most of the area. Your vehicle is impounded and you are given a ticket/citation if you are out driving around.

I'll be happy to take just a foot of snow later this week Paul if that's all we get and the cold I can live with, even tho we are adding more 'freeze days'...not going to reach the freezing mark again today and only a couple of inches on the ground.

There are some amazing photos using images/Buffalo NY at google.
This one is from the Hyatt hotel in downtown Buffalo taken yesterday afternoon looking south west over lake erie. It's the northern edge of that dumper coming off the lake and onto land a couple miles to the south. We've learned not to drive thru these kinds of thing, lol.



Brad

[Hunter362]

Just looked through a boatload of pictures posted on the local stations here in Syracuse.
Pretty amazing stuff! The above scene you have there, went on for HOURS, pretty much like that with very little variations.
Areas in that band got anywhere from 3 to 6 feet, with hugh drifts. while 6 miles away at the Buffalo airport they measured 4 inchs for the day.

I like this picture I just saw.

[MackerelSky]

Pretty amazing stuff! The above scene you have there, went on for HOURS, pretty much like that with very little variations.

It is amazing and I can't think of anywhere else in the world aside from the 'Great Lakes' that it happens. That train(fetch) of snow was estimated to be over 250 miles long over Lake Erie. You can just see the warm water being pulled off the lake to an elevation of about 200 feet, form snow and then falling back as snow.

They are setting up for another round today with an additional 2 or more feet expected

lake.PNG

You are probably used to some lake effect there in Fairmont I would assume. Maybe nothing like what's going on to your West, but you've had bands come off of lake Ontario surely.

All the Best

Brad

[uncle_bob]

That's incredible guys.
I suppose there's one good thing about this, you'd get a least a few days off work (well it's good if you still get paid for being snowed under).

[MackerelSky]

As Mark mentioned in his post, roofs have to be pretty strong to endure the type of storm they've just had. With the weight of the additional snow from Thursday they are experiencing some collapses of some structures.


You have to have a few friends or hire some folks to help get the snow off. If there is a nice part about this kind of work, even if you fall of the roof, you won't get hurt. You might get lost though!

Soon as the ban is lifted for travel into Orchard Park NY, maybe later today, I'm going up to help a couple of friends who are in the same boat as these folks posted above.

This picture, along with others are listed here http://www.ctvnews.ca

Brad

[Hunter362]

Pretty amazing stuff! The above scene you have there, went on for HOURS, pretty much like that with very little variations.

It is amazing and I can't think of anywhere else in the world aside from the 'Great Lakes' that it happens. That train(fetch) of snow was estimated to be over 250 miles long over Lake Erie. You can just see the warm water being pulled off the lake to an elevation of about 200 feet, form snow and then falling back as snow.

They are setting up for another round today with an additional 2 or more feet expected

lake.PNG

You are probably used to some lake effect there in Fairmont I would assume. Maybe nothing like what's going on to your West, but you've had bands come off of lake Ontario surely.

We sure do and it can be the same story at times, like your 1st post, a band just has to drop a few miles south and we go from a couple inchs, to a foot of snow. It's like there's an imaginary wall where the NYS Thruway (west-east) divides the North from the South.
North gets hammered and South enjoys sunshine all day.

[PaulMy]

We have had our share of Lake Effect snow when it comes down from over Lake Huron, sometimes just a few miles to the west, or to the east, or right over us depending on the winds, but not like the Buffalo area has endured this past week. Those drifts on the roof appear to be near 10 feet, wow.

From news reports, there seems to be a lot of community efforts to help the elderly and others who are struggling to get walkways and driveways cleared so they can get out.

Paul