Snow: An impressive start
Already, 2 to 4 inches reported across the region.
Snow: An impressive start
Steady snow has been falling for about three hours, and some of the folks who post on the Eastern Weather chat board are reporting 2 to 4 inches.
Out our way, 20 miles northwest of Center City, we've picked up about 3, with moderate to heavy snow continuing.
Check out the radar. The bluer, the heavier the snow. The reddish areas indicated sleet.
In its first accumulation report, the National Weather Service is showing 3.3 in Upper Chichester, Delaware County, and 3.5 in Blackwood, Camden County. I also has upped its its call from 2 to 4 overnight to 4 to 8 -- with heavier snow due tomorrow. The storm totals could hit 20 inches in some places.
Accu-Weather is calling for blizzard conditions tomorrow, with similar amounts. Accu-Weather's Joe Bastardi says up to 2 feet is possible. It appears that Philadelphia will be close to the bulls-eye on this one.
In short, they are talking about the kind of storm that would be the biggest in most other Philadelphia winters, but this one will have to settle for the bronze in what has become an historic winter.
As for splitting hairs on the final totals, driving around on Sunday mindful of the various amounts reported by spotters, I had a real hard time seeing the differences between that allegedly got 22.3 and those they reported 29.5.
Two inches so far of very wet snow out here in Willistown Township (Eastern Chester County, near Malvern and Paoli). The thermometer is registering 30 degrees.— FluffyToes- 5+ in Center City as of the time of this posting.— BlairW
- Greatest winter ever.— SteveMG
- This is going to be worse than predicted. The heavy wet snow is going to cause major problems. This storm feels like 1996. I got a bad feeling.— Corey301
perk up folks, we can now twitter and text each other more— rmship- it's a weird thing to say..but at this point the calamity is almost fun. Dumb thing to say for those whose businesses or health are suffering....so to you, i say forgive me. But Philly has uneventful weather and geography. i've always been in awe of a really powerful thunderstorm, for example, or strong winds, big waves, tall trees, jagged mountains, and the worse this snowstorm gets, the more it falls into that category for me. It's almost like a bit of the true outdoors is falling on our heads!
- Yeah, I've been thinking about those totals from the last storm. Where I live in West Chester, some surfaces clearly received 30 inches of fresh snow and others only 18 or 20. There was so much local differentiation, the result of very localized weather patterns and perhaps blowing (not drifting), that measurements in any particular town had to be somewhat arbitrary. What was not arbitrary was that the last snowstorm was the most impressive in my own Philly experience, since I missed the '96 affair, and could not help but remind me of my first remembered snowstorm in February 1958, when it was even more difficult to ambulate across the earth's surface because the snow was nearly two feet high and I was only three years old.— rbbloom
- I don't ever re-call so many Septa shutdowns. Truly, the City is not properly prepared for rough winter's. I wonder what they would do in a more serious need to evacuate the town.— FJG JR
- Murdock101 - if you think Philly has uneventful weather, try my old hometown of San Diego... anything above 80 degrees is a heat wave, anything below 50 - an arctic blast.— Clydezilla
Tony Wood has been writing about the atmosphere for The Inquirer for 26 years. E-mail Tony here. And read all his columns here.
