snow

There was a huge amount of snow yesterday in Buffalo (70 miles West of here), at least huge for mid-October. Us recent arrivals don't know what's normal and what's not in these parts, but apparently this was unprecidented:

On Thursday, 8.3 inches of heavy snow set the record for the ''snowiest'' October day in Buffalo in the 137-year history of the weather service, said meteorologist Tom Niziol. (AP via NYT)

Meanwhile, it's sunny and 48 degrees here in Rochester with no snow on the ground. That AP article reports a hundred thousand people without electricity, etc etc in Buffalo. (You'd think that in a place where it snows pretty much all the time, they'd be a little more prepared?) EDIT: Check out the photos attached to that article.

Or, in the more-emotionally-charged-than-usual words of the National Weather Service:

THE INSTABILITY PARAMETERS ARE ALMOST HISTORIC WITH SUCH A SITUATION WITH A 62 DEGREE LAKE INVOLVED MAKE THIS ALMOST UNPRECEDENTED. LAKE INDUCED CAPES ARE WAY UP INTO 1200-1500 J/KG RANGE...INVERSION/EQUIL LEVELS ARE OVER 20K FT! (NWS via weather.com's blog)