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Lake-Effect Snowstorms in Northern Utah and Western New York with and Without Lightning

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Lake-Effect Snowstorms in Northern Utah and Western New York with and Without Lightning DECEMBER 1999 NOTES AND CORRESPONDENCE 1023 Lake-Effect Snowstorms in Northern Utah and Western New York with and without Lightning DAVID M. SCHULTZ NOAA/National Severe Storms Laboratory, Norman, Oklahoma 26 March 1999 and 3 June 1999 ABSTRACT Lake-effect snowstorms in northern Utah and western New York with and without lightning/thunder are examined. Lake-effect snowstorms with lightning have signi®cantly higher temperatures and dewpoints in the lower troposphere and signi®cantly lower lifted indices than lake-effect snowstorms without lightning. In contrast, there is little difference in dewpoint depressions between events with and without lightning. Surface-to-700-hPa temperature differences (a surrogate for lower-tropospheric lapse rate) for events with and without lightning differ signi®cantly for events in northern Utah, but not for those in western New York. Nearly all events have no convective available potential energy, regardless of the presence of lightning. These results are discussed in the context of current models of storm electri®cation. 1. Introduction lightning-related casualties and damage during the winter is less than during the rest of the year. For example, only Observations of lightning and thunder occurring dur- 0.6% of lightning deaths and 0.7% of lightning injuries ing snowstorms (also known as thundersnow) have been occur during December, January, and February (Holle et reported at least as early as the nineteenth century in al. 1997). Third, thunderstorms with snow tend to pro- Western literature (e.g., Herschel 1888). Thundersnow in duce fewer lightning strikes than thunderstorms with rain. China, however, was viewed as a precursor to military For example, in the eastern U.S. Superstorm of March advance by the enemy, with reports as early as 1099 A.D. 1993, the majority of observed cloud-to-ground lightning (Wang and Chu 1982). Despite this long observing re- was associated with thunderstorms with rain along the cord, research on thundersnow is nearly nonexistent. Gulf Coast, not with thundersnow farther north (Orville MacGorman and Rust (1998, p. 292) state, ``We are aware 1993). Fourth, snow absorbs more sound1 and more light of no thorough scienti®c investigation of causal relation- (e.g., Fraser and Bohren 1992) than rain does, reducing ships between the electrical state of winter storms and the likelihood of reports of audible thunder or visible their snowfall. Extensive tests to evaluate the proposed lightning. Finally, the colder temperatures may serve a hypotheses concerning possible links between lightning dual purpose by keeping people indoors: injuries due to and the mesoscale and synoptic-scale meteorology as- lightning are minimized and lightning strikes may be less sociated with winter storms have yet to be performed.'' likely to be observed directly. Thus, the impetus to un- As a result of this lack of scienti®c information on thun- derstand thunderstorms with snow is less imperative than dersnow events, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric that for thunderstorms with rain, despite several docu- Administration (NOAA) Storm Prediction Center cur- mented examples of injurious and damaging wintertime rently does not issue operational thundersnow forecasts. lightning strikes (e.g., Herschel 1888; Holle et at. 1997; The lack of scienti®c inquiry into thundersnow is prob- Cherington et al. 1998). ably a result of a number of factors. First, thundersnow Among this dearth of interest in thundersnow, two quan- in the contiguous United States is relatively uncommon: titative studies have been published. Curran and Pearson 1.3% of cool-season (October±May) thunder reports from surface observing stations are associated with snow, and 0.07% of snow reports are associated with thunder (Cur- ran and Pearson 1971). Second, the perceived threat of 1 Several authors have found that sounds decrease in intensity and travel less distance over snow-covered ground than bare ground (e.g., Kaye and Evans 1939; Embleton 1996; Albert 1998). Whereas similar damping is to be expected for falling snow, literature quantifying this Corresponding author address: Dr. David M. Schultz, NOAA/National effect has not been found. Other properties that affect sound prop- Severe Storms Laboratory, 1313 Halley Circle, Norman, OK 73069. agation in the atmosphere include the lapse rate, humidity content, E-mail: [email protected] presence of hydrometeors, wind direction, and wind pro®le. q 1999 American Meteorological Society Unauthenticated | Downloaded 09/29/21 07:34 AM UTC 1024 TABLE 1. Lake-effect events in northern Utah (a) without lightning and (b) with lightning. Evidence for electri®cation: TS 5 surface thundersnow report, CG 5 cloud-to-ground lightning. Data source for electri®cation: WWD 5 World Weather Disc (WeatherDisc Associates, Inc. 1994) thunderstorm beginning and ending times dataset; HC 5 Holle and Cortinas (1998) surface reports of thunder dataset; BLM 5 Bureau of Land Management lightning network dataset; NLDN 5 National Lightning Detection Network dataset. Surface and 700-hPa temperatures are obtained from the sounding data. The surface-to-700-hPa temperature difference is DT, a proxy for lower-tropospheric lapse rate. LI 5 Lifted index. CAPE 5 convective available potential energy. Source of event in literature: C 5 Carpenter (1993, Table 1); S 5 Steenburgh et al. (2000, Table 1); HC 5 Holle and Cortinas (1998) dataset. Time of Surface 700-hPa sounding Evidence for Data source temp temp DT LI CAPE Source (UTC) electri®cation for electri®cation (8C) (8C) (8C) (8C) (J kg21) of event (a) Without lightning 1200 15 Mar 1971 None WWD 3.0 210.7 13.7 4.5 0 C 1200 17 Mar 1971 None WWD 3.4 25.9 9.3 1.9 0 C 1200 26 Nov 1973 None WWD 22.4 212.7 10.3 3.8 0 C 1200 6 Feb 1974 None WWD 27.3 214.4 7.1 5.8 0 C 1200 10 Apr 1974 None WWD 1.1 29.5 10.6 6.4 0 C 1200 23 Oct 1975 None WWD 1.1 211.7 12.8 0.7 3 C WEATHER AND FORECASTING 1200 12 Mar 1976 None WWD, HC 24.4 214.8 10.4 14.6 0 C 1200 29 Mar 1976 None WWD, HC 20.6 214.1 13.5 1.3 0 C 1200 26 Nov 1976 None WWD, HC 0.6 214.8 15.4 5.6 7 C 1200 1 Feb 1977 None WWD, HC 20.6 28.2 7.6 5.9 0 C 1200 2 Mar 1977 None WWD, HC 22.8 213.1 10.3 3.1 0 C 1200 1 Apr 1979 None HC 21.7 213.6 11.9 0.6 5 C 1200 10 Apr 1979 None HC 2.8 210.8 13.6 7.4 0 C 1200 25 Nov 1981 None HC 0.6 211.6 12.2 6.2 0 C 1200 22 Dec 1981 None HC 0.0 212.7 12.7 0.8 0 C 1200 25 Mar 1983 None HC 1.1 210.8 11.9 20.3 0 C 1200 3 Apr 1983 None HC 2.2 213.2 15.4 0.1 29 C 1200 8 Nov 1983 None HC 1.7 210.2 11.9 4.3 0 C 1200 17 Feb 1984 None HC 0.6 210.1 10.7 3.9 0 C 1200 18 Oct 1984 None HC 2.2 210.9 13.1 1.6 0 C 1200 26 Nov 1984 None HC 0.0 215.0 15.0 1.2 0 C 1200 31 Jan 1985 None HC, BLM 220.6 225.7 5.1 10.8 0 C 1200 19 Nov 1985 None HC, BLM 24.4 218.2 13.8 6.1 0 C 1200 12 Dec 1987 None HC, BLM 23.3 217.6 14.3 6.6 0 C 1200 8 Apr 1988 None HC, BLM 3.3 210.4 13.7 13.3 0 C Unauthenticated |Downloaded 09/29/21 07:34 AMUTC 1200 1 May 1988 None HC, BLM 3.3 210.5 13.8 4.8 0 C 0000 27 Nov 1994 None NLDN 20.9 214.5 13.6 21.6 6 S 1200 8 Dec 1994 None NLDN 24.9 216.3 11.4 2.2 0 S 1200 27 Nov 1995 None NLDN 0.5 212.1 12.6 20.4 60 S 0100 18 Jan 1996 None NLDN 23.1 215.8 12.7 7.0 0 S 0000 26 Jan 1996 None NLDN 24.4 214.8 10.4 20.5 0 S 1200 20 Oct 1996 None NLDN 1.6 211.3 12.9 1.6 0 S 1200 16 Nov 1996 None NLDN 20.2 211.5 11.3 2.6 0 S 1200 14 Dec 1996 None NLDN 0.0 215.1 15.1 9.6 0 S 1200 28 Feb 1997 None NLDN 20.9 212.6 11.7 4.3 0 S V 1200 1 Apr 1997 None NLDN 20.5 214.0 13.5 2.1 0 S OLUME 0000 9 Dec 1997 None NLDN 0.8 211.0 11.8 0.9 0 S 1300 25 Feb 1998 None NLDN 22.3 213.1 10.8 5.5 1 S 1200 30 Mar 1998 None NLDN 0.0 210.1 10.1 0.3 0 S 14 D ECEMBER TABLE 1. (Continued) Time of Surface 700-hPa 1999 sounding Evidence for Data source temp temp DT LI CAPE Source (UTC) electri®cation for electri®cation (8C) (8C) (8C) (8C) (J kg21) of event Avg 20.9 212.9 12.0 4.0 2.8 Std dev 4.1 3.2 2.2 3.7 10.4 (b) With lightning 0000 26 Apr 1976 1 TS report HC 2.8 28.6 11.4 3.4 0 HC 1200 29 Mar 1977 2 TS reports WWD 22.8 216.5 13.7 0.1 22 C 0000 19 Nov 1979 1 TS report HC 7.2 28.5 15.7 1.1 29 HC 0000 1 Apr 1983 1 TS report HC 7.2 27.9 15.1 22.2 0 HC 0000 3 Feb 1986 3 TS reports HC 10.6 23.8 14.4 21.8 0 HC 1200 15 Mar 1986 6 CG strokes BLM 0.0 210.3 10.3 1.6 0 C 1 TS report HC NOTES AND CORRESPONDENCE 1200 24 Nov 1988 1 TS report HC 0.0 211.7 11.7 21.6 0 HC 1200 4 Oct 1995 12 CG strokes NLDN 7.3 26.8 14.1 22.9 103 S 0000 2 May 1997 1 CG stroke NLDN 6.0 29.9 15.9 20.2 33 S 0000 12 Oct 1997 4 CG strokes NLDN 6.7 27.3 14.0 2.6 0 S Avg 4.5 29.1 13.6 0.0 18.7 Std dev 4.0 3.2 1.8 2.0 30.9 lake-effect convection produced moreevents robust revealed results.
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