Lake-Effect Snow Expected Tonight through Saturday

by Ben Kouchnerkavich

Holland, Mich.-- A Lake-Effect Snow Warning is in effect for Allegan, Kalamazoo, Ottawa, and Van Buren counties until 1 PM Saturday, and a Lake-Effect Snow Advisory is in effect for Barry, Calhoun, Eaton, Ingham, Ionia, Jackson, Kent, Lake, Mason, Muskegon, Newaygo, and Oceana counties until 1 PM Saturday, for Berrien, Cass, and St Joseph counties until 10 AM Friday, and for Manistee and Wexford counties until 7 AM Friday. The heaviest snow is expected to occur late this afternoon into tonight. 6-10 inches of accumulation is expected west of US-131 and north of South Haven. This will not come all at once, but rather spread out over the span of 48 hours. Lesser amounts are anticipated further inland. Locally high accumulations will be possible. Lake-effect will diminish late Friday Night into early Saturday. 

Impacts from the snow will include snow and ice-covered roads and visibilities of a quarter mile or less. Winds may gust as high as 30 mph, causing areas of blowing snow.

In addition to the snow, there is also the concern that wind chills tonight and Friday night will drop to as low as 10 degrees below zero.

New Tech Student Gets Once-in-a-Lifetime Opportunity To Attend Presidential Inauguration

Juwona Clark

by Ben Kouchnerkavich

Holland, Mich.--A group of students from Hope College’s Upward Bound program were chosen to attend the second term inauguration ceremonies of President Barack Obama on Monday. One of those students was Holland New Tech High School’s own sophomore, 16-year-old Juwona Clark. If she had to describe her experience in one word, it would be, “amazing.” Along with her peers from Upward Bound, Juwona traveled on a bus from Michigan to Washington D.C and stayed at the Embassy Suites Hotel there.

In addition to going to the inauguration, Juwona and her fellow classmates attended the United States Holocaust Museum, the United States Capitol, and the Library of Congress. She also went to the Senate gallery, where she was able to witness a part of the government's decision-making process.

Juwona says that she likes having Obama as president because he, “tries to get benefits for unfortunate people, such as lower-class citizens who don’t have money for food and health care.”

Upward Bound is self-described as providing “fundamental support to participants in their preparation for college. Tutoring, counseling, mentoring, cultural enrichment, [and] work-study programs [are] designed to improve the financial and economic literacy of students.”

To Juwona, Upward Bound has been a positive experience for her in that it, “helps with schoolwork and tutoring.” She recommends others join as well. If you would like to apply for Upward Bound, you may download a copy of their application here.

Juwona was also featured (and quoted) in the local newspaper, The Holland Sentinel, on Monday.

Lake-Effect Snow Increasing

by Ben Kouchnerkavich

Holland, Mich.-- The lake-effect snow has been on the increase over the past 12 hours in the Holland area as a shot of better moisture and lift pushes into the area, and the National Weather Service has extended the time of our Lake-Effect Snow Advisory through midnight tonight. Eventually tonight, the flow will finally turn more northeasterly, rather than northwesterly, allowing the lake-effect bands to push offshore. One spotter report on the northwest side of Holland indicates 5.5" of snow had fallen in the last 24 hours. By the time today is over, we are expected to see an additional 1-3" of accumulation in the Holland area. The NWS warns that occasional whiteouts may be experienced on area roadways, especially through 10 PM. Your evening commute may be impacted by slide-offs, accidents, and slow-downs, as has been the case over the past 48 hours. Many churches have cancelled evening services and activities.

FOX17 is reporting that a section of I-94 between Hartford (Van Buren county) and Watervliet (Berrien county) is being closed off due to a crash, and traffic is being detoured. 

The extended forecast calls for some light lake-effect snow showers continuing tonight and into the early stages of the day on Thursday. An Alberta Clipper system will bring us some minor accumulations (on the order of 1-2”) during the day on Friday. A warming trend is expected for the weekend, with highs returning to the mid to upper-20s. Our next system will bring a chance of some snow late on Sunday, becoming mixed precipitation for next Monday and Tuesday. High temperatures for early next week are expected to return to the mid to upper-30s, and a good chunk of the time, the majority of precipitation we see will likely be in liquid form.

Where's The Snow?

By Ben Kouchnerkavich

Holland, Mich.—Typically, when we see the forecast calls for 6-10” of lake-effect snow in the Holland area, one can generally count on a snow day. This was not the case on Monday. We weren’t fleeced of a snow day- the snow simply didn’t arrive, or at least not in the manner that was expected.

The highest snow report received by the National Weather Service (NWS) for the Allegan/Ottawa county areas was an estimate of 5 inches in the Hudsonville location at 1:45 PM. Around 11:45 AM, I looked outside of Holland New Tech High School, upset to see that grass was still visible on the ground. My estimate is that we likely saw between 1-1.5” at that point.

As of 3:00 PM this afternoon, the snow continues to fall and is blowing around excessively. The 1:53 PM observation taken at the West Michigan Regional Airport (formerly known as Tulip City Airport) was indicating westerly winds sustained at 16 mph, gusting to 26 mph. This wind was knocking the wind chill down to -5. Visibilities were seen at a half of a mile.

The NWS continues to have a Lake-Effect Snow Advisory in effect for the Holland location until 5 AM Tuesday morning. They anticipate occasional whiteouts on area roadways (such as I-196, US-31, and M-40), as the snow we have seen is blown around by wind gusts up to 30 mph.

Now, as the article’s headline clearly indicated, the question to ask is “Where’s the Snow?” This was not a situation where the snow “skipped” over Holland and deposited higher accumulations just to the north, east, or south of us. The NWS had been concerned a day in advance that snow amounts would be held down due to a cold boundary layer and a low dendrite growth zone (DGZ), both of which worked to limit the size of the snowflakes we saw. Greg DeVoir is a certified trained professional within the National Weather Service’s Winter Weather Workshop. He has an excellent lesson on snow microphysics. He notes, “Snow-to-water ratio (density), precipitation phases, terrain/orographic effects, convective stability, and surface temperatures are commonly considered by forecasters. But the character (type, size, shape) of snowflakes themselves, determined by the intensity of lift, variations in moisture, and snow microphysics (vertical thermal profile), can play a crucial role in the resulting accumulations.”

There were many factors in play that were favorable for lake-effect snow. Lift, instability, and moisture were all available, which are very conducive to produce lake-effect snow. These are typically thought of as key components to the production of thunderstorms, or convection. For us, these factors were there to produce lake convection- in our case, lake-effect snow. Unfortunately for those of us who wanted to see a lot of snow fall upon us, this was not enough to overcome the low DGZ.

As a forecaster myself, it is a good learning tool for myself to take into account for future snowfall forecasting.

Click here to see additional information about snow microphysics from Greg DeVoir- Snow microphysics research and its relevance to forecasting - NOAA.