NOVA Climate? (Richmond, Buena Vista: fit in, buying, tornadoes)

[sullyguy]

I spent my "young kid" days in NoVA. We had lined blue jeans for the colder days:



and rubber boots for the wet days. "colder" is anything with snow involved, pretty much, of which there is practically none (note - you'll find plenty of very strange people driving around with 4-wheel-drive SUVs in preparation for snow days; you'll also see amazing traffic jams during ANY precipitation ANY time of year. Neither mean anything real w.r.t. weather).

The weather killer here is humidity which makes the hot days feel even hotter. Here's some minimal weather data for Fairfax:

Average Weather for Fairfax, VA - Temperature and Precipitation

This contrasts with, say, Phoenix's very hot dry conditions:

Average Weather for Phoenix, AZ - Temperature and Precipitation

[cdmurphy]

We've never bought new snow gear for our kids. There are plenty of options for getting gear cheaply. My neighborhood has very busy sale and giveaway groups on Facebook, and there are tons of consignment stores and sales for kids' clothes in this area.

The important thing about weather here is that it is variable. I grew up in Kansas City, where there were fairly clear divisions between seasons; you could put away summer clothes, bring the winter clothes out of storage. I don't do that at all here (some people might, but I don't think it's worth the effort). You might be wearing shorts well into the fall. Sometimes we get big snowstorms in March.

I find it best to keep things mid-weight, with one parka-type coat (Lands End; I wear it fewer than five times a year, and I've had it for twelve years) and one pair of heavy boots (Lands End, also pretty old). I don't really care about being fashionable, especially if it's below freezing. I have a lot of jackets (rain jacket, hoodies, etc.) and cardigans for layering in the winter and in summer; many places I go are icy inside during summer.

[saganista]

While everyone has stories to tell about "the time that...", NoVa continues to have a moderate climate. There are four seasons here of course, and the extreme days of both summer and winter can be a serious challenge. Stiil, we have nothing here that rivals North Dakota in January or southwest Texas in July.

A typical summer day would include a low of around 70 degrees and a high in the upper 80's. Despite three very hot days at the end of the month, the average high temperature in June of this year at National Airport was 85.9 degrees, which is a little cooler than normal. July is likely to end up warmer than normal overall, as it began with 8 days of 95+ temperatures, five of which were 100+. Although there weren't any 100-degree days (at Dulles) between 1999 and 2008, a heat wave at least similar to this latest one can be expected to occur at some point in most years.

In the depths of winter, the temperature range would typically be from a low of around 30 degrees to a high in the mid to upper 40's. This past winter ran about five degrees warmer than usual. It was a balmy 72 degrees on February 1, for instance, and the average range during that month was 36-52, with 44.3 degrees being the average reading. That said, at least a handful of days when bitterly cold arctic air and significant winds move in can be expected each season. On those days, it is extremely uncomfortable to be outside unless you are cold-weather dressed. Arctic levels of protection aren't necessary, but something close would be good.

Snow that matters is actually uncommon. Some years, there will be none at all, but we can also occasionally get clobbered. The clobbering happens maybe once a decade, and when it does, everything simply shuts down for days. Because they are so infrequent, it doesn't make sense to purchase all the equipment necessary to deal with major snowfalls, so we save the money and simply endure those storms that do clobber us. More frequent are accumulations of 6 inches or so which can make everything messy for a while, but don't bring things to a halt. Schools in most jurisdictions will either close or open two hours late over even a hint of snow. This is because they can't safely run school buses over hilly local terrain when the roads are snow- or ice-covered, and with the safety of the kids in mind, officials err on the side of caution. Many people here are from the south or from countries that don't experience snow, so don't expect consistently sane behavior on the roads when the snow comes. You can get to work in 45 minutes in the morning, have it start snowing around noon, decide to leave work early at 3:00, and then not get home until 10:00. Everybody runs to the grocery store when snow is so much as mentioned in the forecast, but making sure to stop at the gas station might be more important.

Spring and Fall are meanwhile gorgeous and between them will typically provide dozens of inspiring examples of perfect and near-perfect conditions. You can learn to live with that.

Meanwhile we tend to have very low incidences of wildfires, mudslides, tornados, hurricanes, floods, tsunamis, earthquakes, avalanches, and volcanic eruptions. You can learn to live with that as well.

[ViennaSausages]

My god - the alarmism by some posters.

September - November are very pleasant.
March - May are very pleasant.

June - August are hot and humid but EVERY city on the east coast south of Boston is.

December - February are cool to cold. Bitter cold? Maybe for a week when an arctic snap rolls through. Bitter cold are Chicago, Minneapolis and Milwaukee. I think I can count on one hand the number of days its approached 0 farenheit - lows at 4:00 am

[saganista]

Originally Posted by ViennaSausages

I think I can count on one hand the number of days its approached 0 farenheit - lows at 4:00 am

You wouldn't have needed any hands at all in 2011-12. The lowest temperature recorded at Dulles at any hour of any day in December was 19 degrees. In January it was 14 degrees, and in February it was 17 degrees. Down at "heat island" DCA, the series was 29-17-23.

[ViennaSausages]

Originally Posted by saganista

You wouldn't have needed any hands at all in 2011-12. The lowest temperature recorded at Dulles at any hour of any day in December was 19 degrees. In January it was 14 degrees, and in February it was 17 degrees. Down at "heat island" DCA, the series was 29-17-23.

Absolutely correct. I have to think back to maybe 2009 as a year where we really had a cold snap.

[spencgr]

Originally Posted by ViennaSausages

Absolutely correct. I have to think back to maybe 2009 as a year where we really had a cold snap.

Well, it felt pretty darn cold during Snowmageddon in 2010, but that, certainly was an anomoly. An outlier that doesn't normally happen.

[saganista]

Originally Posted by spencgr

Well, it felt pretty darn cold during Snowmageddon in 2010, but that, certainly was an anomoly. An outlier that doesn't normally happen.

It was indeed about four degrees cooler than normal in February of 2010. The monthly low at Dulles was 6 degrees. That's nippy. At DCA it was 16. But what elevated that month to status as legend was the 32 inches of snow that fell at National Airport and the 46 inches that buried IAD. Those are Buffalo-type levels unheard of here since the 19th century.

[slduvall]

Having lived in both Vegas and here ...don't worry about the cold. I'm spent a couple pretty freaking cold winters in Vegas, of course I wasn't dressed properly, but with the winds there it gets pretty cold at night. You will be fine, good coat, good shoes. Buy snow gear second hand as recommended. But to guarentee snow, don't have anything on hand, rush to store, to find everything stripped from the shelves. Not many have it here either.

You need to worry about the humidity. As others have posted, it will suck the life out of you if you aren't used to it. Explain to your kids that the water on their arms is normal, they aren't melting, which is what my 3 year old thought after living in Vegas and then moving to FL! Do what you do there, hydrate and deal with it. You will be amazed at how many more days you can actually be outside and enjoy it.

Now...allergies...whole different ball game. Stock up on Zrytec! Whole different group of trees, grasses etc.

[saganista]

Yes, exposure to new pollens etc. can be difficult for many at first. But you can always be thankful for not having first moved here in the days before catalytic converters, emissions inspections, and E10. The area is something of a shallow bowl, and frequent thermal inversions would simply trap the worst air in layers close to the ground. Significant numbers of people developed respiratory issues within a few years of moving here. Things are much, much better on that front today.