The only area of interest in the U.S. weather wise today is in Maine where there are winter weather advisories in place for the central and northern counties where up to nine inches of snow may fall later today through Wednesday night. When I lived there in the 70s this was no big deal. Keep in mind that Maine doesn’t have the road system we have here in Michigan. About 90 percent of Maine is forested, the highest percentage of any state. This includes some 12 million acres in the northern part of Maine where few people live. In comparison Michigan is 51.2 % forested. Maine has 46,879 lane miles of roads compared to 256,806 for Michigan and 675,580 for Texas. A lane-mile is a measure of the total length of traveled pavement surface. Lane-miles is the centerline length (in miles) multiplied by the number of lanes. Maine also has some large plow trucks and blowers to keep the roads clear.
Our other area of interest today is Hurricane Willa which is at cat 4 and will make land fall later today in Mexico. For a brief time on Monday, Willa was a Category 5 hurricane but it has steadily weakened since then due to an eyewall replacement cycle and increasing wind shear. A hurricane warning is in effect from San Blas to Mazatlán, including Las Islas Marias. A tropical storm warning is in effect from Playa Perula to San Blas and from north of Mazatlán to Bahia Tempehuaya.
Locally, up to 18 inches of rain is possible in western Jalisco, western Nayarit, southern Sinaloa and far southern Durango in Mexico, according to the NHC. Up to 6 inches of rain is possible farther inland across the rest of Durango and portions of Zacateca, southeast Chihuahua and Coahuila.
Dangerous flash flooding and landslides will occur because of the heavy rain in those areas.
After dissipating over Mexico’s mountainous terrain, the remnant upper-level energy and moisture from Willa will eventually enhance rainfall in Texas and perhaps the northern Gulf Coast Wednesday into Thursday. Willa is just the fourth Eastern Pacific hurricane to reach Category 5 strength in the month of October dating to 1971. The others were Patricia (2015), Rick (2009) and Kenna (2002). There have been 10 major hurricanes in 2018, including Willa, which ties 1992 as the most major hurricanes seen in the northeast Pacific in one year.
I got some raking and mulching done yesterday. I am lucky to have property surrounded by woodland where I can put the fallen leaves. I use my lawn tractor to mulch the leaves and it also makes a great blower. Most of the trees down here have fallen with the exception of a persistent cottonwood I have in the side yard. Up on M-89 there are still a lot of leaves on the trees.
We will see increasing clouds today with northwest winds blowing across the lake, chances of rain are around 2% so it will continue to remain dry. Our next chance of rain should hold off until Saturday.
Regarding the winter forecast Dr. Judah Cohen has an interesting article in his weekly blog post.
He states “Central Pacific El Niños are more favorable for cold winters in the Eastern US relative to Eastern Pacific El Niños. Therefore the model(s) could be incorrectly predicting a mild Eastern US winter based on El Niño.”
This is one of my concerns regarding how far the El Nino will move eastward.
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We will have below normal temps the rest of this month and October will end up below avarage for temps! Incredible and mark it down! This could be one of the longest fall stretches with below normal temps ever!!!
No worries everyone…and reality aside, October will be the the warmest October ever recorded!, as we are simply melting. Coincidently, November and December headlines are already typed and saved, and state that, reality aside, “it has never been hotter than right now!” Embrace the melt…
I’m starting to think this will be our highest gas bill ever in October can’t wait to get it and compare it ..Our furnace has been running now over 2 weeks crazzy for this time of year! INDYDOG14!
Yup, you would have to go way, way, way back to 2015 to find a colder October than the one we are currently having. That 3 years must seem like an eternity:
https://www.wunderground.com/history/monthly/us/mi/grand-rapids/KGRR/date/2015-10
Oh, and don’t forget that we are still running ABOVE average for the month yet. Funny how that works out.
Enjoy it that will done soon also since the high of 62* on October 11th 60″s seems
to be forgottenn 70’s unheard of and 80’s will be back this coming June what 90’s lol!! Pretty much a post of the pass!! INDY!!
What are you talking about? When has it ever hit 80 going into November? Your post was about using your furnace more than ever before in October, yet you only have to go back 3 whole years to find a colder October than this one. I’m sure Slim can provide countless more October’s that were far and away colder than this one.
Here’s the records page for October. Notice that never in recorded weather history has it reached 80, let alone 90, after October 25:
http://www.intellicast.com/Local/History.aspx?location=USMI0344
Where in the world do you live? From your comments back in August about leaves changing already I’m guessing you must be somewhere in northern Canada?? October temps are still above normal down here in Michigan.
After such a warm summer the great lks are below normal now in water temps everything is crashing now in mid October! INDY!!
That is great news! Means less lake effect snow if it would get colder.
Yup it’s cold outside! Lol! INDY!
40s and 50s are the perfect temps. I wouldn’t call it cold till temps drop to the teens or lower.
Snow pants and winter coats for Halloween! INDYDOG14!!
Here is a long range guess that Rocky and Indy will find to their liking (note that this guess is more for the east coast)
https://www.perspectaweather.com/20182019-winter-outlook
Slim
Bring it!
This is getting crazy. End of October and most of the trees are still green!
http://148.61.97.229/view/viewer_index.shtml?id=7464
Here is the latest reported color report for the area
https://www.foliagenetwork.com/index.php/foliage-reports/foliage-reports-midwest-us/current-season-midwest-us/129-foliage-reports/foliage-reports-midwest-us/foliage-reports-midwest-us-current-season/844-mw-foliage-report-14-2018
Slim
And here is the report from 2 years ago
https://www.foliagenetwork.com/index.php/foliage-reports/foliage-reports-southeast-us/current-season-southeast-us/151-foliage-reports/foliage-reports-midwest-us/foliage-reports-midwest-us-archive/foliage-reports-midwest-us-archive-2016/716-mw-foliage-report-14-2016
Looks like this year is ahead of pace two years ago.
Slim
The maps look very similar to me. Of course, that’s also a very subjective map. I’m seeing more green later this year than I have ever seen before in my archived photos. It’s crazy how super late falls are becoming the norm.
https://www.mlive.com/expo/news/erry-2018/10/41e81ef1915953/fall-colors-getting-later-in-m.html
What is crazy is 12 days in a row with below normal temps and no change in sight!
Snow in Main hurricane in Mexico and below normal temps far as the eye can see in GR!! Winter is crankin early this year!! INDY!!
Guess your eye can’t see very far:
See it to believe it just like this month was supposed to be above normal lol!! INDYDOG14!!
No, they had the second half of October below normal, spot on. They also had the previous 5 months above normal while everyone else said June, July, August, and September would be below. They’ve been far more accurate than most of the other forecasters.
Won’t happen!
If you look back on the past 5 months, or any month that’s predicted above normal for that matter, you post the exact same thing every time. Your track record virtually assures what they post will happen.
It has been a long and rather bland stretch of color this year with the trees. It started back in late August when some trees just turned brown and dropped leaves from the dry stress. Then through September a few trees turned and dropped their leaves. Now here we are in late October, and a third of the trees are bare, a third of the trees have color, although no where near as bright and vivid as some years, and then there are still a third of the trees that have all their leaves with many of them still being… Read more »
The latest that I have read on this years forecasted El Nino is that when it develops it looks to be weak and based in NINO 3.4 and NINIO 4. This would be a central western based El Nino. Just a reminder that weak El Nino’s here in west Michigan have had a large range in wintertime outcomes. Here is a list of past weak El Nino years and the snow fall for December, January and February and the mean temperature for the 3 months of winter (December, January and February) 1952/53 snow fall 39.7” mean temp 29.5°° 1953/54 snow… Read more »
We have had 11 below normal temperature in a row and counting! What an INCREDIBLE stretch! We are entrenched in a cool pattern baby!
What’s even more incredible is that the stretch is only half the length of the above normal stretch we had in August, back in the middle of our historic 5 month run.
Or that we’re still above average for this month.
The below nominal temp pattern continues and thankfully there is no change in sight! Keep on ROCKING!