Storm 3.1.12: Chaos in the GSD Office

To put it mildly, this storm is beginning to freak the GSD Staff out. Some of us were sent from the office and made to run a few laps around the GSD Complex just to get their heads on straight.

Earlier in the day we praised the storm for behaving nicely. Now? Not so nice. As you all have recognized, part 1 of the storm has been a predictable bust. The radar around noon sure looked robust, but the cool air aloft dried up much of the moisture and has left us with a paltry 1.5" in the Village Beautiful, not the 6-8" we were expecting.

We hope some of you will appreciate just how complicated the Leap Day storm is proving to be. We told you this would be a two-part storm in previous posts, but what we neglected to tell you is that there's a part 3 to this storm as well. Part 2--the secondary low off the coast of NJ--is alleged to develop after midnight and bring snow to our area around 4 or 5 am. Part 3 of the storm--an additional primary low that has been dumping snow on the upper Midwest--is now bearing down on us like a runaway train in a big budget Hollywood blockbuster (Unstoppable for you youngsters; Silver Streak for the over-40 set). If--and that's a big if--the coastal low and the low from the Midwest meet at precisely the right time, we'll see snow all day tomorrow. Score one for a snow day!

The NOAA folks actually are confidently predicting this scenario. In fact, at around 7 pm this evening NOAA raised their snow totals back up to 8-16 for the Northern Berkshires and 4-8" for the Southern Berkshires. This elevation of snow totals is the result of that colder air that is predicted to be in place longer. While South County may still see some sleet, most of the precip from parts 2 and 3 will fall in the form of wet snow.

While this news is encouraging, the GSD Staff is skeptical everything's going to fall into place so conveniently. The storms are moving eastward rapidly, which worries us. We are seeing incipient signs of the moisture beginning to fill in and overspread the region, which is an indication that the coastal slow is slowly starting to take shape and impact the moisture in our area. However, we don't like how the parts are so disjointed. Score one against a snow day tomorrow.

Right now, we're very bearish on this storm. Also, this appears to be an all or nothing deal tomorrow. Either we'll have no school based on a prediction of 6-10" throughout the day, or there will be school. There will be no delays.

We're not happy about it but it's what we're going with. We still will do one more update later this evening, but you'd be silly to blow off any key assignments this evening. We'll do one more update later--fingers are crossed for more encouraging data.