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

[Styx]

CanadianCoops..

What is the biggest temperature extreme you have observed from one day to the next? I imagine it is a warm day followed by a very cold one but do you also get situations where the reverse happens ( very cold then a sudden warmth )?

[ANYWEATHER]

I agree - My wife and I were actually talking alst night about when the last time it rained during the day and we cant remember and every weekend we have managed to get out and enjoy it. Got a touch of sunburn going for a bike ride yesterday - 25oC and sunny - outlook , as you say, looks amazing!

Gosh. You wait to "this" Winter!!!!

[Coopsy]

CanadianCoops..

What is the biggest temperature extreme you have observed from one day to the next? I imagine it is a warm day followed by a very cold one but do you also get situations where the reverse happens ( very cold then a sudden warmth )?

In one day about 25oC day time high from previous day time high in August 2008. From 22oc ish to about 3oC and 2 inches of snow.

The other way minus 15oC to about plus 15oC in 24 hours when a chinook wind came through the town. and about 15oC of that in an hour from -15oC to 0oC

[cheeky_monkey]

its funny i went over to get a coffee just now its windy and 5c..the number of people still out in flip flops shorts and vest is a sight too see...they obviously still in summer mode.

[Roger J Smith]

My current thoughts about the winter of 2012-13 ...

Mild air masses will dominate in western regions under a persistent upper-level ridge. This could lead to intervals of record warmth and some snow-free periods in the chinook zone, below normal snowfalls in some mountain regions trending to normal snowfall in central B.C. and above normal in northern B.C. and the Yukon-NWT. Rainfalls on the coast may also trend below average and it may feel more like spring than winter at rather frequent intervals. There will usually be one wintry episode in a winter like this, western North America is not quite as far away from source regions as the British Isles, so look for perhaps one really cold spell and a snowstorm at either end of it.

The western ridge will be in sync with a sharp trough developing over the western Great Lakes and western Hudson Bay. This will open up more to arctic air in January than early winter, and so mid-winter could become colder than normal and snowy in the Great Lakes region, while remaining rather mild and stormy in eastern Canada. Most of the eastern U.S. will probably have longer spells of mild than cold weather with one notable exception in mid-January and possibly one or two major east coast snowstorms around the end of that spell. I see indications that the Pacific warmth will begin to overwhelm this arctic regime fairly early in February leading to a very mild February in the east, but it could then turn very stormy in Newfoundland. If any parts of Canada see excessive snowfalls they would be the Great Lakes snow belts in January and the inland Maritime provinces in later parts of the winter into March-April (as in 2008, and for similar reasons, a rebound signal developing in response to the current ice-free anomaly).

One analogue winter (1953-54) set many temperature records for warmth in January in Alberta, it was 23 C at High River during that month. The record warmth was over the Great Lakes in February and it was 15 C in Toronto mid-month.

[Coopsy]

Talking of extreme changes we were at 25oC yesterday and today its 1oC and as at 7pm we have 3cm's of snow on the ground since 5pm and its still lightly snowing.

I expect prob another 5cm's overnight with this system moving through....quite the shock

[cheeky_monkey]

Yes has been a tad fresh today snow showers from time to time..can see there has been a fair bit of snow up in the mountains just by looking out of my office window.

[Coopsy]

Yeah we ended up with about 6cm's...still on the ground and not melting too fast. As soon as the sun comes out it wil be gone. Forecast 18oC and sunny for Thanksgiving this weekend.

[knocker]

It’s Snowing in Minnesota! Yes, October Is Early for That.

Early Friday morning, the temperature in Houston was gradually cooling from a high of 88 degrees, part of a Texas summer that just will not quit. Meanwhile, more than 1,000 miles to the north in Minnesota, a different kind of cooling was taking place: More than a foot of snow was coming down.

The rare early October storm that blanketed northwestern Minnesota and parts of North Dakota beginning Thursday is expected to continue moving west Saturday, the start of what could be a very snowy winter.

Grand Forks, N.D., reported three and a half inches of snow on Thursday, according to the National Weather Service, a record for this early in October. In Middle River, Minn., eight inches fell.

But the heaviest snowfall was in Roseau, Minn., 10 miles from the Canadian border, where 14 inches of wet, heavy snow fell, snapping tree limbs and causing power failures in the town of 2,500, which bills itself as the birthplace of snowmobiling.

“We’ve gotten snow this early, but not like this,†said Greg Sorensen, a dispatcher at the Roseau County Sheriff’s Department.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/06/us/october-snow-falls-in-minnesota.html?ref=us&_r=0

[Coopsy]

Cold day in calgary yesterday - driving around the cit temps from 1oc to minus 1.5oC and snowing in various locations. Come back to canmore and nothing - they forecast 5cm's but have seen this pattern many times when the front moves south and all the precip is to the east of us but the weather guys always want to factor in upsloping but its not powerful enough so we get nothing. Lovely blue skies here and hoping to get to mid teens this weekend for one last day of biking.

CM - did you get any more snow in the city?

[cheeky_monkey]

Cold day in calgary yesterday - driving around the cit temps from 1oc to minus 1.5oC and snowing in various locations. Come back to canmore and nothing - they forecast 5cm's but have seen this pattern many times when the front moves south and all the precip is to the east of us but the weather guys always want to factor in upsloping but its not powerful enough so we get nothing. Lovely blue skies here and hoping to get to mid teens this weekend for one last day of biking.

CM - did you get any more snow in the city?

yes got a light covering..was cold all day yesterday until about 4oclock then the temperature suddenly rose from -1c to +6c and the snow was gone by 6oclock

Edited October 12, 2012 by cheeky_monkey

[Coopsy]

We topped out at 12.5oC yesterday at about 4pm - very nice and hoping for the same this weekend. However back to England next wednesday for 3 weeks so hoping its nice over there

Edited October 12, 2012 by canadiancoops

[cheeky_monkey]

We topped out at 12.5oC yesterday at about 4pm - very nice and hoping for the same this weekend. However back to England next wednesday for 3 weeks so hoping its nice over there

Nice i wish i was going back to England...looking like a cold last week of October here...looks OK next week then getting colder there after. where you off to?

[Coopsy]

Nice i wish i was going back to England...looking like a cold last week of October here...looks OK next week then getting colder there after. where you off to?

Going back to maidstone, kent and surrounding area so hoping for some nice crips autumn weather. Looking forward to curry and beer and good company down the pub.

I fully expect to come back to winter in the first week of November

[Styx]

Going back to maidstone, kent and surrounding area so hoping for some nice crips autumn weather. Looking forward to curry and beer and good company down the pub.

I fully expect to come back to winter in the first week of November

Whatever happened to bangers and mash

[Coopsy]

Whatever happened to bangers and mash

lol oh i'll have them as well as fish and chips, kebab, chinese, roast and the list goes on ;-)

[cheeky_monkey]

Going back to maidstone, kent and surrounding area so hoping for some nice crips autumn weather. Looking forward to curry and beer and good company down the pub.

I fully expect to come back to winter in the first week of November

One of my best friends lives in Maidstone... fantastic footballer he was..do miss a good curry

[cheeky_monkey]

Had a beautiful autumn day yesterday nice sunny and warm temps close to 21c..however snow is the forecast for the weekend..i fear warm sunny days are on their last hurraah right now

[glosteroldboy]

Still getting some days of oddly warm weather:

It was like a summer day in the fall yesterday in many parts of the island. In St. John's the mercury got up to 20.8 degrees, breaking the old record of an even 20 set back in 1970. It was warm this morning as well - 18 degrees at the airport at daybreak.

[knocker]

US current temps.

[Coast]

Does seem to be remaining warmer across the US:

U.S. winter likely to continue hot weather trend

(Reuters) - After a hot spring and a scorching summer, this winter is likely to continue a U.S. warming trend that could make 2012 the hottest year since modern record-keeping began, U.S. weather experts said Thursday.

Drought that ravaged much of the United States this year may spread in the coming months, said Mike Halpert at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Climate Prediction Center. "The large majority of that drought we expect to persist," Halpert said. "We even see drought expanding westward ... into Montana, Idaho and part of Oregon and Washington."

Dryer-than-usual winter weather is expected in much of the Pacific Northwest, with higher-than-normal precipitation predicted for the Gulf Coast, according to NOAA forecasts. For much of the country, a three-month (December-February)winter forecast is hard to pin down. The vast majority of states have what the experts said was an equal chance of below-normal, normal or above-normal precipitation.

The densely populated East Coast, along with the southern tier of states from Texas to Florida and the upper Midwest also have an equal chance of colder, normal or warmer weather this winter, according to the forecasters. Still, there is enough data to predict a warm winter overall, said Deke Arndt, chief of climate monitoring at NOAA's National Climatic Data Center. The first nine months of 2012 were the warmest of any year on record in the contiguous United States, and this has been the third-hottest summer since record-keeping began.

"The main issues facing the U.S. going into this (winter) outlook period stem from persistent heat and drought," Arndt said at a telephone briefing. "It is likely that 2012 will be the warmest of the 118-year record for the contiguous United States." An El Nino pattern -- a recurring patch of warmer than usual water in the equatorial Pacific that can have a potent effect on U.S. weather -- gave hints of developing in September but then subsided, the first time this has happened in approximately 60 years of record keeping on this phenomenon, Halpert said. "This is one of the most challenging outlooks we've produced in recent years because El Nino decided not to show up as expected," he said.

A record-warm winter would be in line NOAA's latest report on global temperatures, which found September 2012 tied for the hottest September in world records going back to 1880. However, Arndt said that the signal of human-spurred climate change is less apparent now in some U.S. regions, especially in winter. This is due in part to the changing baseline forecasters use.

U.S. government experts look back 30 years to figure out baseline temperatures for the country. In the past, they used the 30-year period from 1971 through 2000; this year, they used 1981 through 2010. That latest period shows little sign of a warming trend in areas like Florida and other parts of the southeast, Arndt said. That updated baseline helps to "mask" the signs of climate change on a regional and seasonal basis, Arndt said

http://uk.reuters.co...E89H0QE20121018

Edited October 19, 2012 by Coast

[summer blizzard]

A large surge of cold air coming soon.

[cheeky_monkey]

A large surge of cold air coming soon.

Cold air arrived in Western Canada a few days ago..keep up!

[cheeky_monkey]

Had to spend an hour shoveling my drive and pavements yesterday no fun.

[Terminal Moraine]

Had to spend an hour shoveling my drive and pavements yesterday no fun.

There are a lot of people on here who would happily swap places with you C.M!

Is that an unusually early snowfall in your part of the world or about normal for the time of year?