Gobbsmacked! Most Forecasters See Hefty April Snowfall Into Midweek

Approximately 1.5 inches of snow fell Tuesday night. Most of the updated forecasts below reflect forecast snowfall from Wednesday night into Thursday night.

Here's our in-depth weather discussion with Tom Novak of @NovakWeather from late Tuesday. Get the inside scoop like you've never gotten it before.

Some have coined this season "Winter II." It certainly doesn't resemble anyone's idea of spring. Forecasters are tossing around some pretty significant amounts. As of 6 p.m. this Tuesday evening, most forecasters were predicting approximately 6 inches of snow while others (MPR and KSTP) were predicting a little more. A notable exception was the National Weather Service, which forecast a whopping 8-18" of snow.

On paper (on monitor?) the amounts forecast suggest a significant storm were this midwinter; however, with April's snow accumulating inhibitors -- high sun angle, relatively warm surface temps, temps edging above freezing, etc. -- and a long-duration snow, we wonder if the impact will be as great as the public might otherwise be lead to believe.

Blue represents forecasts from late news.
Orange-ish font represents forecast as of mid evening Wednesday.

WCCO: 4-8"(Snow meter showed 9.9". Noted half of snow might not accumulate) (6 to 10", meter shows 9.3" for MSP)
KSTP: 6-10" with some 12" amounts. Likely a Top 10 April Snowfall (meaning 7.5") (6-12, maybe a bit more in some place; 1-2 by morning, mostly on grass) (6 to 12")
KMSP: 5-8"(8-10" north, 4-8" south, 7.5 snow meter, "might be conservative" "With compaction, overall 5-8" for metro" "maybe an inch by morning") (5 to 10")
KARE: 3-8" (showed 6" for metro) No change. (6 to 10")
NWS: 8-18" (weather.gov for KMSP -- see graphic below) No change. (7 to 15")
Strib: waiting for update (6-12") "This factors in relatively warm ground temperatures and some melting of snow on contact."(4-8" additional)
MPR: 6-12"(another to 5 to 10"by Thursday night)
Accuweather: 4-8"
The Weather Channel: 4-8" (weather.com) (Per commenter below, forecast for 7-13" -- weather.com is very confusing.
Novak Weather. 6-10" (Wednesday night thru Thursday noon)

NWS forecast (weather.gov for KMSP) on Tuesday evening.

Huge Disparity for Saturday Forecast

So what happened today? And what are the prospects of sunshine tomorrow? Here's what the NWS told us:

"Higher than today...but still some concerns. The problem today was a batch of high clouds on top of the lower stratus earlier today which likely limited the ability of the sun to dissipate the lower clouds somewhat. Also...the stratus was quite thick. We do expect clouds for tomorrow morning and we'll even have to watch out for dense fog in the morning. Don't expect full sun tomorrow...but it certainly looks like a partly cloudy scenario by the afternoon.

Update: As of Saturday early afternoon, Twin Cities forecasters were using the B word to describe today's forecast. Kudos to @NovakWeather for being the first to tell us it would stay cloudy and cool.

As of this Saturday morning, there was a huge disparity in forecasts for Saturday's high temperatures. Forecast highs ranged from the upper 50s to 74. Here was a sampling that we found.

weather.com

Accuweather

KARE11

NWS

Twitter and Twin Cities Forecasters: Who Should You Follow?

Twitter and Weather

As social media, and in particular Twitter, become more and more the standard for the dissemination of weather information, we thought we’d devote a post to the tweeting activities of Twin Cities weather outlets and forecasters. We’ll include our philosophy on weather tweeting as well as an outlet-by-outlet assessment of the weathercasters with Twitter accounts.

The Need for a Single Voice

As it stands now, there’s a fair amount of inconsistency in the world of weather tweeting. For example, when breaking weather events develop, one can’t be sure whether it’s better to follow the generic station weather Twitter account (i.e., @WCCOWeather) or whether it’s preferable to follow one’s favorite weathercaster to receive updates. The generic Twitter weather accounts primarily just provide a single morning tweet on the day’s forecast; they’re essentially useless as a source for breaking weather. However, relying on a particular forecaster to provide timely tweets can be hit and miss, depending on whether the meteorologist is working at that time of day or is otherwise moved to tweet.

We think weather outlets (primarily the television entities) would be well served to dedicate a single Twitter account whose sole purpose would be to provide breaking weather information. Twitter account names could be clear for this purpose, something along the lines of Fox9BreakingWx or KSTPBreakingWx.

Just the Weather, Ma’am

We understand that the “social” in “social media” suggests a type of communication that’s informal, friendly and almost fun, but when it comes to weather information, we think the tweets should stick to weather. It’s our feeling that weathercasters are first and foremost providers of weather, and not celebrities whose vacations and daily doings we need to know about. Yes, we’re old school.

Just as importantly, too many nonweather-related tweets add up to wasted time, a commodity we all find to be in such short supply. Reading about the extreme garage sale, the trip to Israel, or one’s idle thoughts on Idol mean junk mail in the Twitter mailbox of a weather enthusiast.

Not surprisingly, it appears that television weathercasters are more apt to delve into the “social” side of things than authors of weather blogs whose tweets are almost exclusively weather related. For weathercasters interested in sharing their personality, we suggest the use of separate Twitter accounts for weather information and celebrity doings.

Who’s Tweeting?

The following is a listing of the weather tweeters of the Twin Cities. Our list may not be complete; please let us know if there are others we may be missing. And, as always, we’d love to hear your opinion.

WCCO

@MorningWXGuy (Mike Augustyniak). Prolific tweeter. Unfortunately, roughly half of those tweets are not weather related. If you’re looking to follow him for weather information, you’ll have to sift through a lot of extraneous stuff.

@WCCOShaffer. A basic, middle-of-the-road weather tweeter who seems responsive to followers’ questions and comments.

@WCCOWeather. Daily weather tweets that provide links to daily WCCO weather blogs or the weather page. Good, standard fare.

KSTP

@Dave_Dahl. Given the sporadic rate of his tweets, you get the impression that KSTP is encouraging him to tweet, but he’s just not quite into it.

@PatHammer. Frequent tweeter of mostly weather information. Consistently provides weather expectations for Twins games.

@ChikageWindler. Yes, she’s in Indy now, but still a timely source for breaking Minnesota weather. Very social tweeter.

@KenBarlowWx. Past record (from previous job in California) suggests a regular, primarily weather-oriented tweeter. We anticipate an initial period of sentimental “it’s nice to be back in MN” tweets, but hopefully weather discussion will quickly prevail.

@KSTPWeather. Generally your basic straight “today’s weather” daily tweet. However, there are times when it’s used to retweet tweets from other KSTP staff, which feels overly promotional to us.

FOX

@Fox9MJurica. Marina Jurica. Average tweeter. Generally sticks to weather only.

@Ian_Leonard. A rather prolific tweeter with particularly frequent updates during severe weather. Sometimes on the edge of too many tweets that aren’t weather related.

@KeithMarler. For the most part, tweets are dutiful morning weather updates. Non-weather tweets are existent, but minimal.

@fox9weather. Inactive since March 28. Why?

KARE

@JonathanYuhas. Prolific tweeter. All are weather related with some relating to interesting weather beyond Minnesota. Good stuff.

@SvenSundgaard. Frequent tweeter with tweets both social and weather related. Tweets are a bit more personal/social/agenda-related than we’d like to see.

@kare11wx. The daily – weekdays only – source of singular “today’s weather” updates. Why is this account inactive on weekends when weather is arguably more important than weekdays?

@jerridsebesta. A fairly prolific tweeter, but too many tweets that have nothing to do with weather for our taste.

Star Tribune

@Pdouglasweather.  Excellent use of Twitter. Tweets are both regular and timely, combining reference to the Twin Cities most widely read weather blog and breaking weather information. Frequency of severe weather tweets are “just right.”

Minnesota Public Radio

@MPRWeather. Another excellent employer of Twitter. Tweets are exclusively weather related and come with appropriate frequency. A solid source of weather information for both the Twin Cities and greater Minnesota.

NWS

@iembot_mpx (through Iowa State) Other

@NovakWeather. A Rochester-based meteorologist and all-business tweeter who covers the Minneapolis-Rochester corridor. Provides a nice mix of scientific-speak tweets to weather enthusiasts and more basic updates for general interest followers.

Regional

@darylritchison -- WDAY Fargo, ND @Mitch_Keegan -- KEYC Mankato, MN

Tuesday Night/Wednesday Snow Watch

As of Sunday night, there is some consensus among local forecasters that a significant snow event (for April, anyway) is on the way. Check out our spreadsheet to see the progressive forecasts leading up to Tuesday evening.
The most striking prediction to us was the confidence displayed by normally conservative KARE11 in predicting a significant snow event. WCCO continues to show models with projected snow amounts that they don't really agree with, which doesn't make any sense to us considering theirs is a visual medium and some people watch with the sound down.

Normally conservative KARE11 is bullish on the storm.

This screenshot suggests Mike Fairbourne is predicting 9.1" of snow. But that's not actually what he said.

Dave Dahl says Tuesday night's storm will be similar to Friday night's.

(Midday update)
We'll provide a forecaster recap later tonight for the possible snowstorm Tuesday night and Wednesday. At this juncture, there appears to be considerable variance in what forecasters are thinking. KSTP is poo pooing any chance of real snow (instead forecasting primarily rain) while others such as  KARE (per tweet from Sven Sundgaard) see either snow or no precip at all.

Here are a few comments we found on Sunday morning:

@svensundgaard
Biting my finger nails... lots of possibilities with this Tuesday storm, could be lots of snow, or does it head south and we're just cold?

@novakweather
I will not be surprised if a foot or more of snow falls over so. and/or central MN by noon Wed.

Steve Frazier, KSTP, 6 a.m. update
"I think the accumulating snow is pretty much behind us. Some rain showers on Tuesday and Wednesday that could get a little flaky from time to time."

Strib Weather Column
The models agree on the timing of the next storms (late Tuesday through midday Wednesday), but not the amounts. The range: 4-14", give or take a foot. Throw out the highest and lowest values and you still wind up with a midrange prediction in the 4"+ range. We'll see. It's still (very) early to be attaching inch-amounts to the forecast. Could it be "plowable"? Absolutely.

From the TMF Soapbox: A Weather Watcher's Bill of Rights

While TMF doesn’t presuppose it’s speaking for the weather watchers of the world, let alone those residing in the country’s second coldest state, we’d like to set a few expectations for Minnesota’s weathercasters. We’d love to hear your thoughts.

1. Use social media for all it’s worth. It doesn’t take an expert futurist to see that local television news broadcasts – indeed the concept of watching the news at a particular time of day on a big screen – are going the way of the dinosaur. Providing timely information in an electronic space is both “good weather” and, alas, good marketing. In our market, we’ve noticed that KSTP has escalated its commitment to providing timely, online updates with new video forecasts that are announced through tweets and Facebook updates. This makes good sense: Why should we have to stay up to watch a forecast when a new has already been developed. There are forecasters in our area, such as NovakWeather, who provide their services solely through non-traditional media.

2. Be consistent in the media you employ. The weather information provided on television or radio should match what’s posted on your website. There’s nothing worse than dialing up your favorite station's website only to see Friday’s forecast posted front and center when it’s Sunday. Worse yet, is when the site shows the morning forecast (which might not mention any possibility of storms) when an evening forecast has just been shown on TV that is markedly different.

3. Walk the talk. Keep information on your electronic media current. If you’re going to say “check out our website for the latest weather information whenever you’re on the go,” please live up to your end of the bargain.

4. Employ confidence ratings in your forecasts. Everyone knows that some forecasts are more slam dunks than others – or as the weather gurus might say sometimes there’s “model agreement” and sometimes there isn’t. The phrase, “I gotta tellya, this forecast has big bust potential,” are words we should hear a bit more often.

5. Dare to be different! It’s no secret that weathercasters (indeed, the public) has access to the same large universe of weather model information. We wouldn’t suggest that the Geico gecko could predict the weather, but it’s easy to become routine and formulaic in your approach. Use a hunch now and then, and stick yourself out. Sure, you may miss a forecast (and pay dearly on TMF – that’s a joke), but if you explain your reasoning, we admire it. For example, when studying the various forecasts for the long-range predictions of the first major cold wave, we noted that KSTP’s temperature prediction stood out like a sore thumb from the consensus. In the end, they had the best prediction by far.

6. Be creative. Present information in a fresh and unorthodox way. It’s more entertaining for the viewer or reader, and can be a better way to illustrate a concept. Our favorite weather site, the Capital Weather Gang, provides rather unique forecasts when snow is in the offing. Here’s an excellent example of a logical, yet uncommon, way to depict possible storm outcomes:

Here’s an excerpt from the blog entry:

Here are the current accumulation possibilities that will certainly evolve in the next several days:

30% chance: A dusting or less

30% chance: A dusting to 1"

20% chance: 1-5"

20% chance: 5"+

To us, this should be a standard tactic in communicating weather scenarios.

7. Give us the love all the time. Yes, the interest in weather is much higher when severe summer storms threaten and when mighty blizzards are aiming in our direction. You should be all over that, both because it affects the most people and because it reflects your presumed love and passion for weather. But if it’s 9 in the morning and a surprise, post-newscast storm has suddenly popped up that will threaten an outdoor lunch or a golf outing, get the word out! There’s real, practical value there, though it may not make for sexy headlines. Finally, weather doesn’t take the weekend off, and neither should weekend weather updates.           

8. Send your written forecasts past a proofreader. There’s no reason to think that a meteorologist specializing in science knowledge is necessarily going to be a good writer, but as long as information is provided through a literary medium, please check your spellings and the flow of your phrases and sentences. Ultimately, your business is detail-based and sloppiness in communication suggests potential sloppiness in the way you go about your job.

9. Present information every six hours (online). Why every six hours? Because that’s how often the key weather models are run. The schedule of television news broadcasts shouldn’t be the governing force behind how often you present information.

10. Spare the gimmicks. Do we really need to know that Johnny’s parents wrote in to find out the forecast for his birthday party in Glenwood on Saturday? In our mind, a better change of pace is to employ a small science presentation. KARE’s Sven Sundgaard’s “Simply Science” segment is a good example.

11. Forgo the misleading teases. Don't allow the news anchor to say, "Snow is coming our way tomorrow," and be left having to explain that distant Mankato or southern Minnesota may get a coating of snow. It’s insulting to us and puts the weathercaster in an instant uphill battle for credibility.

12. Tell us when you blew it. People dig honesty and it’s the best way to earn long-term credibility. If a forecast was missed, don’t skip over it or pretend it didn’t happen. Tell us why it happened – and that you’ll never make the mistake again. (Insert joking smiley face here.)

13. Accurate forecasts. Notice we put this one last? While ultimately, of course, this is what matters most, it’s really part of the whole way that a weather outlet should communicate with its followers. We believe that a well-explained and well-reasoned forecast is simply good communication. And that in the end, people may remember the way you communicate as much as the accuracy of your forecast. That’s our feeling, anyway.

Agree or disagree with these ideas? Please share your thoughts.