#12 Postby psyclone » Sun Feb 06, 2011 12:14 pm
thanks for this thread. i was a freshman in college living on campus at kent state university in northeast ohio for the great storm of '93. i recall this storm being well forecast at the time. even with the primative (by today's standards) modeling at the time, you could see the freight train coming days in advance and the cleveland mets hyped appropriately (i particularly remember wews (channel 5) don webster sounding the alarm.) the blizzard unloaded its full fury on saturday, march 14. the temps were in the teens (astonishing for mid march in that part of the county), the snow was powder and it was blowing like crazy. a true blizzard with vis under a quarter mile all day. saturday evening the winds increased even more, with frequent 50 to 60 mph gusts. naturally, i made frequent trips outside to witness this perilous weather first hand. of course my room mates thought i was insane but it was meteorlogically orgasmic! i recall leaning into the wind near a security light with total whiteout conditions at times. absolutely crazy. and we got lake effect after the synoptic snow ended as the huron-erie connection paid dividends with the northwest flow. i only got about a foot or a bit more from the superstorm while areas just to the southeast (like pit) got twice that. however, we already had a substantial snowpack before the storm. the drifting was phenomenal. the next day, snow was even with the roof on the leeward side of our dorm (about 12 feet) and many of the side walks on the open areas of campus had drifts of 4 to 8 feet. needless to say, the tractors that normally clear such walk ways were useless. being mid march the logic was that the guy who put it there will eventually take it away... in the meantime , we were detouring around some serious snow mountains. i will always remember the superstorm as a phenomenal, perhaps once in a lifetime event. for me, no storm since has rivaled that one. good memories.
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