Yes, Buffalo has a bad rap for snow. Today there is a lake effect snow warning for several parts of the area. The cool thing about where we live is that surrounding areas can be getting slammed with snow while we are getting nothing. We are wedged in the perfect spot between Lake Erie and Lake Ontario. The snow that Buffalo is so famous for is due to lake effect snow. Wikipedia defines lake effect snow as the snow that is produced in the winter when cold, Arctic winds move across long expanses of warmer lake water (in our case Lake Erie), providing energy and picking up water vapor which freezes and is deposited on the shores. Because we live wedged between Lake Erie and Lake Ontario, we get much less snow than the surrounding areas. But the neat phenomena we see where we live is the amazing cloud patterns during the winter. We can see the walls of lake effect snow clouds that are coming off of the lakes. And since we are wedged between two of the great lakes, we often see these walls of clouds to both the north and south of us. You can see from this picture the difference between north and south. It was actually sunny were I was but you could tell the clouds were making it dark not too far south from me. Normally these cloud "walls" have a much clearer definite line of a border, but regardless, this was still a pretty neat scene today too.
Monday, November 17, 2008
Lake Effect Snow
Yes, Buffalo has a bad rap for snow. Today there is a lake effect snow warning for several parts of the area. The cool thing about where we live is that surrounding areas can be getting slammed with snow while we are getting nothing. We are wedged in the perfect spot between Lake Erie and Lake Ontario. The snow that Buffalo is so famous for is due to lake effect snow. Wikipedia defines lake effect snow as the snow that is produced in the winter when cold, Arctic winds move across long expanses of warmer lake water (in our case Lake Erie), providing energy and picking up water vapor which freezes and is deposited on the shores. Because we live wedged between Lake Erie and Lake Ontario, we get much less snow than the surrounding areas. But the neat phenomena we see where we live is the amazing cloud patterns during the winter. We can see the walls of lake effect snow clouds that are coming off of the lakes. And since we are wedged between two of the great lakes, we often see these walls of clouds to both the north and south of us. You can see from this picture the difference between north and south. It was actually sunny were I was but you could tell the clouds were making it dark not too far south from me. Normally these cloud "walls" have a much clearer definite line of a border, but regardless, this was still a pretty neat scene today too.
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We get Lake Effect snow down here i Central PA. Usually, it's coming down from Lake Erie, carried by a northwest wind. (Yes, it can travel over 100 miles if the winds are right, particularly early in the season.) But occasionally we get it off of Lake Ontario. For that the wind has to be pretty close to a northerly wind. We got a bit of bluster today and when I looked at the radar map, it was coming from Lake Ontario.
All I can say is that for the past several years we have gotten a contract for snow plowing for our driveway. We don't get a ton of snow but for the times that we do get hit, it is the best money we have ever spent!
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