#22 Postby PTPatrick » Fri Dec 03, 2010 8:26 pm
Well...November went down pretty crappy in the weather book as far as I am concerned. 1.5 inches for the month is dismal. This winter is really living up to the La Nina standard. Shaping up to be much like the 2008-2009 winter. That winter October was dry, and november featured little snow as well. By and large the entire winter went down pretty dry with official totals coming in at 38 inches of snow for Denver for that season. The bulk of which fell in December and march. I thought I would write up some comparisons to what we are seeing and saw in that winter.
Looking back at the season some things I noted:
1) Every month from October to March was "above average" in the temp department except for December 08
2) December had some extremely warm days though , also featuring a high of 69 on the 2nd.
3) there were 2 big cold snaps in December...one of which gave me the coldest temps I have seen yet in Denver, with a low of -19 below and a high of 2. Some snow fell with that but not much...however it stayed for a few days with temps so cold. The month ended dry with no snow cover and a high of 58 on christmas.
4) every month was below average on precip, even March, it just happened that snow was above average, because there was a high snow ratio with the big storm that came.
5) January, our coldest month was 10 degrees warmer for its average temp compared to December, which is supposed to be warmer. It featured 2 days in the 70s. and many days in the 60s. February did as well.
SO...what does this tell us? if this winter turns out anything like 2008-2009 la nina, Denver will indeed continue to be drier than normal through spring, with an occasional cold snap. Those COULD prove to be VERY cold but replaced with above average temps quickly. Snows will be infrequent, light and with high snow to liquid ratios, as they will likely be accompanied by arctic air, vs a more el nino pattern of heavier wetter high moisture snows. earlier in the season i posted that we would be dry through the end of the year but that it could recover in the spring and late winter. At this point, I am doubting that will be the case. We moistened up later that spring as El nino kicked it. I hope I am wrong and the La nina pattern buckles before we get too late into winter, but the projections at this point have it holding on. So I am going to just TRY to enjoy nice winter weather and not grumble TOO much about no snow. It gets old looking at GFS model after GFS model and seeing nothing on the horizon as far as snow goes but alas, i will keep watching and you know where I will be when anything comes up!
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