http://debbieclarke.blogspot.com/

BOSTON —Everyone is asking, “where did all this snow come from?”

It was a fascinating set up in our atmosphere. Something we rarely see and no doubt will be study by meteorology students for years to come.

Low pressure over the Midwest traveled east ward and threatened Washington D.C. with a rare March snowstorm. With marginal temperatures it turned into a mainly rain event for our nation’s capital. As the low pressure system moved way off shore it appeared to be heading to far out to sea to have a significant impact on New England. To get major amounts of snow we usually look for low pressure to track just south of Nantucket. In this case the low pressure area was tracking nearly 500-miles out to sea.

At the same time an upper air low pressure area was plunging through the Great Lakes. It traveled near the Mid-Atlantic region and instead of joining up with the powerful ocean storm or following behind it, it set up in just the right location to help channel unbelievable amounts of moisture toward us. And this wasn’t just surface moisture this was deep Atlantic moisture through all levels of the atmosphere. We’ve seen this in tropical systems but I cannot remember seeing it in a northern latitude Ocean storm. These two systems working together set up a conveyor belt of moisture aimed straight at us.

The only thing missing was the cold air.

Most of Thursday it was rain or mix with little accumulation. It was just too mild. However as the sunset temperatures cooled a bit. As the heavy moisture fell, it forced cold air aloft all the way to the ground. As long at the snow fell hard it would stay all snow. If it had let up even a little, the snow would have turned to rain.

So there you have it. Just the right temperatures and unbelievable amounts of moisture.

bla bla bla bla bla bla blashit!

I have a few different setups. One for Oil paint one for Acrylics and one for Watercolor.

So here is my Watercolor set up. It’s so easy to carry around. Other than the box all you need is a napkin or two. Island Art and Hobby down on Main st. carry a similar setup ask for the special water brush. Contact Frontiero@hotmail.com with your photos and info if you use this type of painting kit and i’ll post it and give you a free plug here on this Rag.

OK Here’s my Car set up. It’s a Sakura 24 color watercolor box that you can put a 4″x6″ postcard size watercolor paper in it and still have a lot of palette space to mix colors. you can see and or buy my small paintings at the EJ KAHN/GoodMorningGloucester Gallery down at the Madfish Galleries on Rocky Neck this year. Maybe. HAVE FUN!