Another round of random evening thoughts: clickbait is effective in convincing the targeted audience to click on the article/video/etc they are promoting & increasing their views. But there is another component to consider — what is the long term impact of clickbait?

A key nuanced distinction that isn’t made nearly enough on social media-driven discussion on hotly debated topics: Anti-Zionism isn’t the same as anti-semitism. But there is some overlap between the two, and there are some bad faith actors driven by antisemitism that weaponize that overlap.

Random evening thoughts — it’s possible that events in the past which all records of their existence are gone may be lingering around in a modified form as myths today… (1/2)

I once posed a question to a well-respected professor in my department — how did some former students who made unique & insightful research never advance in their careers, or some “fell off”, so to speak? They froze at that moment and didn’t have an answer. Years later, I think I made sense of it.

I was… mentally impacted by these storms (As anyone at SUNY Albany in the CSTAR program on May 15, 2018 recalls)

It’s understandable why a lot of people are panicking over hantavirus — many still recall being told there was nothing to worry about with Covid, then how it will be done within weeks, etc. But not only is hantavirus very different from covid, the source of the messaging is also a key difference.

In most cases, even models that on average do not verify as well as other models can have advantages for certain phenomena or variables. The NAM nest remains exceptionally strong for low-level cold air damming and sleet extent in mid-level warm air advection environments.

Seeing a lot of newly graduated meteorologists (congrats to all by the way!) as of late made me reflect on my own journey having received my meteorology degree 10 years ago — so much has changed in the field, especially in terms of technology, knowledge, and job opportunities.

Good friends are there for you on your good days and your bad days alike. They don’t feel the need to avoid you at all costs or treat you worse when you’re not your usual fun self.

I speak both for myself and for many of my colleagues and friends that the REU program at OU was an important milestone in our careers and provided us with many valuable opportunities and experiences. Disappointing that it’s the latest casualty of politics.

Only a few days left to apply for student travel grants! Students in undergrad and graduate school are highly encouraged to apply if you're planning on attending the Joint Summit.

Interested in hurricanes? I want to introduce TC-ATLAS: the Tropical Cyclone Analysis Tool for Live and Archived Structure. Explore live or past storms without writing a line of code or downloading a data file, building on the capabilities of TC-RADAR: michaelfischerwx.github.io/TC-ATLAS/ind...

Number of days this month that have tied or exceeded the previous (thru 2025) March monthly temperature record.

The Middle East is about to get extremely stormy - from a weather perspective, that is. A deep trough over Egypt & Saudi Arabia is expected to force a severe weather outbreak & torrential rain capable of extreme flooding over UAE, parts of Iran, and the Strait of Hormuz.

It’s the 5 year anniversary of this thing happening

Way to go YouTube giving me an ad trying to sell me processed cheese right after I watch a video about processed cheese

One of the wildest 24-hour loops you'll see in the Mid Atlantic - from mid-upper 80s and tornado warnings to 33F and heavy snow

On the left: 4pm today, with 85-90 degrees across Virginia into Washington DC On the right: 4pm tomorrow, with widespread snow across Virginia into Washington DC Going straight from summer to winter in just 24 hours

Localized onshore SE flow doing its thing. Microscale forecast bust in parts of NYC and NE NJ stuck in the 50s and low 60s while the rest of the area surges well into the 70s

Just your typical elevated hailstorm moving into Chicago where it’s 39F at the surface but with >1000 J/kg MUCAPE

NYC surged to a high of 69 today, marking the first time Central Park reached the 60s since *November 9, 2025*. This ends a remarkable stretch of 118 consecutive days below 60F, the longest such stretch since 1981-82 with 122 consecutive days below 60F.

Neat GIF of the evening — the last 2 months had a time mean trough in the East & ridge in the West. As you go up in height into the stratosphere, the wavenumber decreases but a time mean trough lingers over the East as the vortex tilts with height while remaining elongated.

A very careful attempt at a neutral analysis of an ongoing conflict: In any conflict, especially during wars, it is surprisingly easy for bad information to spread. Fake AI videos/photos are clear examples - these can usually be spotted but require effort to pick apart small details. But...

A very careful attempt at a neutral analysis of an ongoing conflict: In any conflict, especially during wars, it is surprisingly easy for bad information to spread. Fake AI videos/photos are clear examples - these can usually be spotted but require effort to pick apart small details. But...

There seems to be a short-term precipitation type bust underway — mPING reports suggest the precipitation overspreading north NJ & NE PA is falling as sleet, despite HRRR & NAM modeling a precip type of snow.

Now that more observations have arrived, here's my updated hand-drawn contour analysis for snow accumulation from this week's blizzard:

Keeping in mind the map on the right is only a preliminary verification analysis (made while the storm was ongoing in parts of New England), I wanted to start with a quick verification of my forecast map - I'll write up a more detailed review when I have some time later this week.

Using all public storm reports from the NWS so far, I contoured a preliminary estimated snow accumulation map for today's blizzard (through 6-8pm EST tonight). Truly a historic storm - both in terms of impacts, and the forecast challenges leading up to it.

With approximately 13” recorded in 5 hours, Providence, RI got about as much snow in 5 hours as Denver received all winter to date

❄️ FINAL FORECAST: BLIZZARD OF 2026 ❄️ Now that the snowstorm is underway, I went into a high level of detail trying to narrow down the snow band placement and evolution. Forecast reasoning follows in the thread below:

NWS New York makes an excellent point in their discussion. Snow rates will start light tomorrow morning & above-freezing temps mean snow will accumulate little if at all for many. Do not be fooled - this doesn't mean the forecast busted. Conditions will steadily deteriorate into the evening.

NWS New York makes an excellent point in their discussion. Snow rates will start light tomorrow morning & above-freezing temps mean snow will accumulate little if at all for many. Do not be fooled - this doesn't mean the forecast busted. Conditions will steadily deteriorate into the evening.

Something interesting of note for modeling applications & later evaluation efforts - the NSSL MPAS 2-moment (left) vs. 3-moment (right) MP schemes actually have a non-negligible difference in how far west the snow band expands:

Given the latest data & analysis, this is my current forecast snow map for the upcoming major East Coast snowstorm. Major uncertainties remaining include how far east/west the sharp gradient over PA/DE/NJ will be, and where a >24" corridor of snow totals will be.

I just had an interesting realization I’m traveling this weekend and asked ChatGPT for tips on what to visit and what cafes & restaurants to try — it gave me a whole list and backup options — and I disregarded all of them and found even better options on my own

You might've heard of the butterfly effect - but did you know the person who coined it (Ed Lorenz) was a meteorologist? Check out how a very slight shift in the initial position of a tropopause polar vortex (TPV) over Quebec rapidly grows over time:

It's thanks to the NCAR supercomputer that I was able to finish my PhD dissertation - without it the task would've been much harder and taken much longer. I'm sure many others in the atmospheric science community are in the same boat.

[Meteorology thread 🧵] Even though models no longer show a major snowstorm for Sun-Mon, ensembles show a different story - while most ensemble members don't show snow, out of those that do have snow, most of them show a major snowstorm. This is called a "low-likelihood, high-impact" scenario.

Niche obs — given the unique angle of approach of this cold airmass & its narrow width, the Philly-NYC-New Haven segment of I-95 is the coldest along its entire route. I’d have to imagine that doesn’t happen often, except for back door cold fronts or relatively localized precipitation events.

The arctic front moving eastward is currently merging with the inverted trough axis over NE CT, leading to enhanced low-level convergence and a sharp increase in snow rates:

As I analyzed in much more depth in my thread last night, there are two separate near-stationary heavy snow bands this morning: 1. Training heavy snow bands over NE Mass 2. Inverted trough axis has come to a near stall over southern RI into far eastern CT

As low-level convergence increases, heavy snow is developing along the inverted trough axis in eastern LI & SE CT. The inverted trough will continue slowly moving east & tilting towards the NW-SE until temporarily stalling tomorrow as the mid-upper level flow becomes oriented parallel to its axis.

This isn’t your typical view of the Hudson River across from Manhattan — widespread ice coverage across the river this morning.

(1/2) A valuable life lesson I’ve learned: True expertise isn’t only about correctly identifying and recognizing signals — it’s also about recognizing when you *don’t* know something, or when no one can know it yet beyond a lucky guess.

The more LLMs progress in their abilities, the less the question becomes “can we use LLMs for this task” and the more it becomes “*should* we use LLMs for this task”. And there are considerations beyond ethics to take into account as well.

After some more events over the last few days I'm excited to announce I'm a lead contender for the unluckiest person of the month award

Ice buildup continues along the edges of the Hudson River — this photo is from the NJ side, there’s a lot more ice from the NYC side of the river

A very random thought I had this morning — and I’m just posting it as food for thought or to seed ideas — if you could go back to your Masters research and make changes to the methodology and approach you took to the research question(s) at hand, do you feel you’d have few or many changes?

Here’s a map you don’t see often: the place with the coldest temperature anomaly vs. average in the northern hemisphere over the last 5 days is….. Ohio

If your idea of a nice post-AMS recovery day is your parking spot blocked by a pile of snow/ice, your shovel snapping in half trying to clear it, all stores sold out of shovels, and spending hours clearing it with a hammer in 4 degree wind chills blasting your face, my AMS recovery is going great!