8 Dec 2014

Finger Lakes Focus: Upcoming Winter Storm

by | posted in: Forecast, Outside the FLX | 6
Approximate snow accumulations through Thursday evening. The heaviest snow will fall at different times across the region. Click image to enlarge.
Approximate snow accumulations through Thursday evening. The heaviest snow will fall at different times across the region. Click image to enlarge.

When it comes to sharing information about a large-scale event, it is important to remember where different forecasters are focused. This is especially important with this storm and the forecasts from the National Weather Service in Binghamton.The Finger Lakes region is split right down the middle between the NWS in Binghamton and Buffalo. Both of these weather service offices do a tremendous job, and the NWS Binghamton Facebook page is one of the top weather service pages in the nation. A lot of my followers are also followers of theirs- and I certainly recommend doing so.

Some of the worst of this upcoming storm will be directly in the Binghamton Office’s area of responsibility. Obviously and rightly so, their focus is on those areas. From the western Catskills, into northeastern Pennsylvania and areas east of I-81, this is a major event. As they get the word out about this storm, keep in mind the vast expanse of their coverage area and that the Finger Lakes will not be getting the same sort of storm, in amounts of timing, as areas covered by Binghamton but further east.

Approximate timing of heaviest, steadiest precipitation. Some areas will see more snow than others. Click image to enlarge.
Approximate timing of heaviest, steadiest precipitation. Some areas will see more snow than others. Click image to enlarge.

For most of the Finger Lakes, I think this will end up being a couple of snowy days, but come Friday, a lot of people might be scratching their heads and wondering ‘is that it?’, not because of hype, but because of the broad area the very good forecasters in Binghamton have to cover.

To work on alleviating this, I’ve made two maps. One is my storm total accumulation map (top). The second is when I expect the steadiest and heaviest precipitation to generally be. As you can see, I am expecting the worst of the storm on Wednesday and most of the area should see less than a foot of snow.

This is a stark contrast to areas further east, which will be hammered on Tuesday and Tuesday night and very well may exceed a foot.

This is an extremely complex system to forecast, and even harder to cover over a broad geographic region. As always, I welcome comments and questions and will try to help you with your individual needs the best I can throughout the duration of this storm.

Please continue to monitor the forecasts for updates as more details become evident.

Follow Meteorologist Drew Montreuil:
Meteorologist Drew Montreuil has been forecasting the weather in the Finger Lakes region since 2006 and has degrees in meteorology from SUNY Oswego (B.S. with Honors) and Cornell (M.S.). Drew and his wife have four young boys. When not working or playing with the boys, he is probably out for a run through the countryside.

6 Responses

  1. ROSE PARKER
    |

    I rely on his forecast w/o all the hype. to the point.

  2. Linda Competillo
    |

    Drew is an amazingly gifted and talented meteorologist. Thank you for recognizing him…he deserves it! We are very proud of our hometown boy here in Groton!

  3. Harvey
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    Drew your coverage of this event has been fantastic. We weren’t aware of FLXWx until, but are now linking to you on our BGM weather page: http://nyskiblog.com/weather/bgm/

    Keep up the good work!

    • Meteorologist Drew Montreuil
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      Thank you so much for including a link on your website! 🙂 If there is anything I can help you with, let me know!

      • Harvey
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        Drew… meant to say above “until now.” You are totally welcome. Awesome service for our central NY skiers. Probably should add that link on to our BUF page too ( http://nyskiblog.com/weather/buf/ )… as you mentioned somewhere else on the site the Finger Lakes split the two NWS CWAs.

  4. Dan Maas
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    Very well said. One of the best resources the Binghamton Weather Service office puts up on Facebook are the public briefing packages. Those briefings do a good job showing the variations expected across their entire forecast region. Your current forecast fits right in with what they’re saying. Keep up the great work. 🙂