{"id":17196,"date":"2014-11-18T23:48:09","date_gmt":"2014-11-18T23:48:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/?p=17196"},"modified":"2014-11-20T23:39:30","modified_gmt":"2014-11-20T23:39:30","slug":"major-lake-effect-snow-event-downwind-of-lake-erie-and-lake-ontario","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/archives\/17196","title":{"rendered":"Major lake effect snow event downwind of Lake Erie and Lake Ontario"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"GOES-13<\/a>

GOES-13 0.63 \u00b5m visible channel images (click to play animation)<\/p><\/div>\n

Cold arctic air (surface air temperatures in the upper teens to lower 20s F)<\/em> flowing across the still-warm waters of Lake Erie and Lake Ontario (sea surface temperature<\/strong><\/a> values as warm as the middle to upper 40s F)<\/em> were 2 ingredients that helped create a major lake effect snowfall event on 18 November 2014<\/strong><\/a> (VIIRS visible image with surface analysis<\/strong><\/a>). Storm total snowfall amounts were as high as 65 inches in Erie County, New York (NWS Buffalo Public Information Statement<\/strong><\/a>). GOES-13 0.63 \u00b5m visible channel images (above; click image to play animation)<\/strong><\/em> showed the large and well defined single-band lake effect cloud features that developed over each of the lakes. The band over Lake Erie was nearly stationary for several hours, producing snowfall rates as high as 4 inches per hour at some locations in the Southtowns of Buffalo. The stationary behavior (and very sharp northern edge, due to a “locked thermal convergence zone<\/strong><\/a>“) of the Lake Erie snow band was quite evident on composite radar reflectivity (below; click image to play animation; images courtesy of the College of DuPage)<\/strong><\/em>. The formation and growth of this band benefited from a long fetch of southwesterly winds oriented along the axis of Lake Erie.\u00a0 Isolated negative cloud-to-ground lightning strikes were observed at 16:45<\/strong><\/a> and 22:15<\/strong><\/a> UTC, implying the presence of embedded pockets of thundersnow.<\/p>\n

\"Composite<\/a>

Composite radar reflectivity (click to play animation)<\/p><\/div>\n

A comparison of Suomi NPP VIIRS 0.64 \u00b5m visible channel and 11.45 \u00b5m IR channel images at 18:17 UTC or 1:17 pm local time is shown below. The coldest cloud-top IR brightness temperature was -37\u00ba C (green color enhancement), <\/em>which corresponded to a pressure of 437 hPa (or an altitude around 6 km)<\/em> on the 12 UTC Buffalo NY rawinsonde report<\/strong><\/a>.
\n<\/em><\/p>\n

\"Suomi<\/a>

Suomi NPP VIIRS 0.64 \u00b5m visible channel and 11.45 \u00b5m IR channel images<\/p><\/div>\n

Comparisons of Terra and Aqua MODIS true-color Red\/Green\/Blue (RGB) images covering the Lake Erie\/Lake Ontario region along with a high-resolution view centered on Buffalo NY are shown below.<\/p>\n

\"Terra<\/a>

Terra and Aqua MODIS true-color RGB images<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Terra<\/a>

Terra and Aqua MODIS true-color RGB images<\/p><\/div>\n

A 15-meter resolution Landsat-8 0.59 \u00b5m panochromatic visible channel image from the SSEC RealEarth<\/strong><\/a> web map server (below)<\/strong><\/em> showed great detail to the Lake Ontario snow band as it was moving inland over the Watertown NY area at 15:45 UTC.<\/p>\n

\"Landsat-8<\/a>

Landsat-8 0.59 \u00b5m panochromatic visible image<\/p><\/div>\n

Looking back to the preceding nighttime hours, a toggle between Suomi NPP VIIRS 0.7 \u00b5m Day\/Night Band, 3.74 \u00b5m shortwave IR, 11.45 \u00b5m IR, and 11.45-3.74 \u00b5m IR brightness temperature difference “Fog\/stratus product” images at 06:54 UTC or 1:54 am local time (below)<\/em><\/strong> showed that the lake effect bands were already well-developed, with minimum 11.45 \u00b5m IR brightness temperatures of -30\u00ba C and colder (yellow color enhancement)<\/em>. Even with minimal lunar illumination — the Moon was in the Waning Crescent phase, at only 7% of full — the lake effect cloud bands features could still be seen on the Day\/Night Band image.<\/p>\n

\"Suomi<\/a>

Suomi NPP VIIRS 0.7 \u00b5m Day\/Night Band, 3.74 \u00b5m shortwave IR, 11.45 \u00b5m IR, and “Fog\/stratus product” images<\/p><\/div>\n

For a more in-depth discussion of this lake effect snow event, watch the VISIT Satellite Chat<\/strong><\/a> session.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Cold arctic air (surface air temperatures in the upper teens to lower 20s F) flowing across the still-warm waters of Lake Erie and Lake Ontario (sea surface temperature values as warm as the middle to upper 40s F) were 2 ingredients that helped create a major lake effect snowfall event on 18 November 2014 (VIIRS […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":17197,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,55,30,12,45,49,48,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17196","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-goes-13","category-landsat","category-lightning","category-modis","category-redgreenblue-rgb-images","category-suomi_npp","category-viirs","category-winter-weather"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17196","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17196"}],"version-history":[{"count":25,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17196\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17222,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17196\/revisions\/17222"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17197"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17196"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17196"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17196"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}