Can it snow in cold nights (when days are mild) (snowing, places)
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San Jose dips below freezing 3-5 nights a year on the average but it hasn't seen any snow accumulation since 1976. The subfreezing nights are under clear skies and are usually followed by mild days (typically warms up to the 50s F even on subfreezing nights). When it's cloudy, the clouds act as a blanket keeping the temperatures above freezing at night and from warming up during the day. When we do get a cold weather system the diurnal range is usually like 45/50 F (7/10 C) with light cold rain most of the day. After the front has passed and the skies have cleared it will be something like 30/55 (-1/13 C) for the next two days. So cold days/mild nights= sunny skies.
Snow (SN, SNW, S)- Snow is an aggregate of ice crystals that form into flakes. Snow forms at temperatures below freezing. For snow to reach the earth's surface the entire temperature profile in the troposphere needs to be at or below freezing. It can be slightly above freezing in some layers if the layer is not warm or deep enough the melt the snow flakes much. The intensity of snow is determined by the accumulation over a given time. Categories of snow are light, moderate and heavy.
Look at the "thickness levels" on the charts too. VERY important how thick the cold/warm layers are
Quote:
Originally Posted by Joe90
I would think that Sydney has never seen OC and cloudy skies. Whenever it reaches OC here, there won't be even a wisp of cloud about.
I'm not familiar with the weather history over there but over here you can find and graph data such as that to see how often it happens. Is that something you can find? It's Hard to believe that there's no clouds when temps drop to 0. Temps that low don't always mean dry air. Is there no ground instability?Even high pressure overhead would create some thin clouds.
I'm not familiar with the weather history over there but over here you can find and graph data such as that to see how often it happens. Is that something you can find? It's Hard to believe that there's no clouds when temps drop to 0. Temps that low don't always mean dry air. Is there no ground instability?Even high pressure overhead would create some thin clouds.
I will try and find something (I'm a bit lazy on searching through records), but I'm confident that based on my own observation, that is the case.
It's strictly radiational freezes here (39 a year on average), and with relatively warm seas only a few kilometres away, the only way it will reach freezing, will be with total calm conditions and totally clear skies. Cloud can drift in around sunrise, when OC has already been reached, but I would say that it's extremely unlikely that OC would occur under even a thin layer of cloud.
The winter weather here is very predictable in that regard.
You're right, -5C is actually 26C. How could I not see that?
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