Your weather-related questions answered
Tuesday, Dec 4, 2018 - Posted by Rich Miller
* Most ever…
* What caused this?…
Bryce Anderson, chief agriculture meteorologist for DTN, said influences from two different oceans came together to create the storm system.
“This latest event that we had featured a real strong surge of spring-type moisture and warmth out of the Gulf of Mexico,” he told the RFD Radio Network®.
An upper-air pattern led to energy coming out of the Pacific Ocean, which helped bring in moisture, warmth and, ultimately, 22 reported tornadoes throughout central Illinois on Saturday.
“The reason why we had the circumstances we had was because we had this kind of unseasonable round of warmth and the moisture flow with the seasonal chill that led to this kind of severe weather outbreaks,” Anderson said. […]
“There’s just been a lot of volatility, obviously, in our late-fall and early-winter trends,” Anderson said.
* Yikes!…
* What caused this?…
For several days after one of Chicago’s worst November snowstorms, downtown workers were on the lookout for melting snow and ice falling from buildings across the area, with what seemed like more ice than usual falling from skyscrapers and offices. […]
David Kristovich, a scientist with the Illinois State Water Survey at U of I’s Prairie Research Institute, said the Chicago area experienced a bit of a warm-up on Nov. 29 after several days of post-snowstorm coldness, low clouds and periods of precipitation. He said temperatures briefly rose above the melting point.
“The abundant moisture in the air and temperatures near and below freezing may have allowed ice to form and remain on the sides of buildings,” Kristovich said.
The temperatures recorded at O’Hare International Airport were a high of 25 degrees and a low of 19 degrees on Nov. 27, compared with a high of 38 degrees and a low of 27 degrees on Nov. 29, according to the Midwestern Regional Climate Center.
- 47th Ward - Tuesday, Dec 4, 18 @ 3:45 pm:
The freeze-thaw cycle often results in ice falling from the buildings, most of which have signs on the sidewalk to warn people. It’s one of those things about working in the Loop that you get used to. But one thing I haven’t gotten used to are all of the pedestrians who see the signs or see ice falling and they look up.
Pro-tip: don’t look up. Lol.
The tornado damage looks terrifying. Thank God no one was killed.
- Suburban Mom - Tuesday, Dec 4, 18 @ 4:08 pm:
So much ice during that blizzard, combined with just the wrong outdoor parking spot, left me with my car doors frozen shut for three days. Couldn’t get in it until it got to 34 on Thursday and melted enough that I could wrench the doors free!
- MortonPunkinChuckin - Tuesday, Dec 4, 18 @ 4:14 pm:
Q) “What caused this?”…….
A) Gravity appears to be heavily involved.
- wordslinger - Tuesday, Dec 4, 18 @ 4:29 pm:
First came that really heavy wet snow, then temps falling to the 20s turning it into ice. Recipe for disaster.
My kid was walking past Sears Tower a couple of days after the storm and he said desperate cops were screaming at people to get off the sidewalks, the ice was falling like bombs.
On two occasions in the last couple of years, I was within inches of getting clobbered by chunks of ice the size of footballs that came off the sloped glass roof of the Stone Container Building.
A step this way, a step that way, a few seconds before, and I would have been dead.
Life is often a game of inches and luck — good or bad. Walk to the far side of the sidewalk.
- Henry Francis - Tuesday, Dec 4, 18 @ 5:38 pm:
Remember all of the Guv’s warnings about it being the end of Illinois if we had JB as Governor and MJM with a super majority? Well this is just the beginning . . .
- lost in the weeds - Tuesday, Dec 4, 18 @ 8:26 pm:
Downstate we call that hail.