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Old 02-14-2014, 09:20 AM
 
1,947 posts, read 2,230,616 times
Reputation: 1292

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Quote:
Originally Posted by airwave09 View Post
Yes we DID, and I experienced it myself. But by all means continue trolling away. Anyone arguing against the FACTS like the ones in that article are on the same level of the climate change deniers, for all I'm concerned.
Agreed entirely. Even in the 11 months I lived here last year. There was plenty of sun and clear days. Trolls just don't see them.
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Old 02-14-2014, 09:50 AM
 
Location: Beaver County
1,273 posts, read 1,629,416 times
Reputation: 1211
Quote:
Originally Posted by pghdude28 View Post
. If you like sunshine, don't move here! If you like gloomy darkness, come on down

It gotta wonder if you are describing yourself. I have said before that I never even paid attention to the gloomy days before I started reading here..I was too busy living and enjoying life....clouds and all. If one has an overall gloomy disposition it make sense they would pay attention to gloomy weather more. Kind of like when you are pregnant you notice more pregnant folks.

While I get wanting to live somewhere warmer year round and more overall sunshine I really don't get the constant focus on the negative....even if the negative is totally accurate. As I have said to other gloom and doom people in the past....I bet if someone gave you a million dollars cash you would complain about how heavy it is to carry.
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Old 02-14-2014, 09:51 AM
 
Location: Foot of the Rockies
90,316 posts, read 120,147,178 times
Reputation: 35920
Quote:
Originally Posted by pghdude28 View Post
I figured i would get back on topic and comment on the OP's post. That article is a total crock. I also think an average of 59 sunny days/year seems a bit high. Do you honestly think we had 59 days last year that had NO overcast conditions or very few if any clouds in the sky? Just a sea of blue? Even when you combine our "partly cloudy" days, we still average less than 50% of days with moderate sunshine. It's mostly cloudy days with occasional peeks of sunshine throughout the day or totally gray days with no sun. Those are the FACTS. Pittsburgh's sunshine levels are similar to Buffalo, Cleveland, Columbus, Seattle, Portland, Syracuse, Scranton etc. They all average less sunshine than national average 12 MONTHS a year. You might as well call them the nation's "Cloud Belt." On a worldwide scale, Pittsburgh may be in the middle for sun, but someone moving from an American city that receives only national average for sunshine will still find Pittsburgh very cloudy and gray. If you like sunshine, don't move here! If you like gloomy darkness, come on down
Here's what I said in the opening days of this thread:

Quote:
Originally Posted by Katiana View Post
It is the National Weather Service, not Brett Yasko, that sets the definition for "clear", "partly cloudy", etc. Most of the other weather websites use their definitions as well. Heck, by his definition, Denver probably has 350 sunny days a year. So if every locale used his criteria, Pittsburgh would still rate as one of the cloudiest places.

Quote:
(But if the sky is blue for a good part of the day and you can feel some warmth on your face — well, my friends, that’s a sunny day in my book.)
[Definition of "Sunny Day" per link in OP]

http://www.srh.noaa.gov/mlb/ldis/ada...finitions.html (broken link)
Since it says the link is broken, I will give you an up-to-date link, AND the definitions.
Glossary - NOAA's National Weather Service
Sky Condition
Used in a forecast to describes the predominant/average sky condition based upon octants (eighths) of the sky covered by opaque (not transparent) clouds.

Sky Condition Cloud Coverage
Clear / Sunny 0/8
Mostly Clear / Mostly Sunny 1/8 to 2/8
Partly Cloudy / Partly Sunny 3/8 to 4/8
Mostly Cloudy / Considerable Cloudiness 5/8 to 7/8
Cloudy 8/8
Fair (mainly for night) Less than 4/10 opaque clouds, no precipitation, no extremes of visibility/temperature/wind

So folks, a day with 1/8 opaque cloud cover is a "Clear" day. That's where the NWS is coming from. Now I know there are people on this board who don't like definitions. The guy who wrote the article in the OP doesn't like definitions, wants to make up his own.
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Old 02-14-2014, 10:37 AM
 
419 posts, read 547,932 times
Reputation: 307
Quote:
Originally Posted by airwave09 View Post
Yes we DID, and I experienced it myself. But by all means continue trolling away. Anyone arguing against the FACTS like the ones in that article are on the same level of the climate change deniers, for all I'm concerned.
I doubt we hit 59 last year. It's an average so some years it is lower. That article's title is misleading. It should've read "Number of Days the Sun comes out in Pittsburgh. " There are lots of days here when the sun comes out for 20 minutes or a couple hours but they aren't sunny days or even partly cloudy days.They are still considered "cloudy." There were many days this winter that featured sunshine but it didn't last long. Those days were still by definition cloudy. Really the best source for the amount of sun we receive is annual % of sun. We rank at or near the bottom. It is rare for us to receive a full day of sun regardless of season. Those are FACTS. Like I said before we are not alone in the cloudy category but we are definitely below national average for sun. It may not be London but we are cloudy. Even Zman's favorite city Columbus is cloudy.
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Old 02-14-2014, 10:41 AM
 
1,947 posts, read 2,230,616 times
Reputation: 1292
Quote:
Originally Posted by Katiana View Post

So folks, a day with 1/8 opaque cloud cover is a "Clear" day. That's where the NWS is coming from. Now I know there are people on this board who don't like definitions. The guy who wrote the article in the OP doesn't like definitions, wants to make up his own.
What I find curious is that in their official monthly/annual climate summaries - available from National Climatic Data Center (NCDC) | The world's largest active archive of weather and climate data producing and supplying data and publications for the world. - NOAA do not publish annual cloud cover data. I just downloaded the 2013 annual summary and some monthly summaries, and the data is not there. It only appears in the 'unoffical' monthly summaries.

If I'm missing anything, I'd appreciate someone telling me where to look. Or an explanation?

BTW, there were 16 days over 90F in 2013. Quite a few more than average. Take that Minneapolis

(I can hear Katiana downloading the Minneapolis 2013 annual summary from here!!)
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Old 02-14-2014, 12:52 PM
 
1,781 posts, read 2,072,502 times
Reputation: 1361
Quote:
Originally Posted by pghdude28 View Post
I doubt we hit 59 last year. It's an average so some years it is lower. That article's title is misleading. It should've read "Number of Days the Sun comes out in Pittsburgh. "
Let's just say that it's not surprising that you think the NWS official (low) count of sunny days is still too high. This doesn't mean that your irrational opinion is even remotely based in anything resembling facts, but you can believe whatever you want, I guess.

Just so you know, the entire reason that the article was written and the observations taken was because the author thought (correctly) that the 59 sunny days a year tallied by the NWS seemed impossibly low. Turns out, it was indeed low and he observed 145 days with approximately 30% cloud cover or less, (40% of days each year) which is what the NWS officially considers "sunny". This still makes Pittsburgh one of the cloudiest parts of the country, but not nearly as bad as was previously thought.

Now I know it's far from a scientific study, but you're still going to find many of the more rational people that actually lived here agreeing with this observation instead of the NWS one.

Quote:
There are lots of days here when the sun comes out for 20 minutes or a couple hours but they aren't sunny days or even partly cloudy days. They are still considered "cloudy." There were many days this winter that featured sunshine but it didn't last long. Those days were still by definition cloudy.
Um yeah, no kidding. Those days were not included in the author's tally of 145 observed sunny days, obviously. Just more proof that you couldn't be bothered to actually read the article before commenting.

Quote:
Really the best source for the amount of sun we receive is annual % of sun. We rank at or near the bottom. It is rare for us to receive a full day of sun regardless of season. Those are FACTS. Like I said before we are not alone in the cloudy category but we are definitely below national average for sun. It may not be London but we are cloudy.
No one is even arguing against this point at all. So your endless yammering about it is one of the most pointless wastes of time ever.

Quote:
Even Zman's favorite city Columbus is cloudy.
Yep, we already know you are both the exact same person, but thanks for the reminder.
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Old 02-14-2014, 01:48 PM
 
Location: Foot of the Rockies
90,316 posts, read 120,147,178 times
Reputation: 35920
Quote:
Originally Posted by airwave09 View Post
Let's just say that it's not surprising that you think the NWS official (low) count of sunny days is still too high. This doesn't mean that your irrational opinion is even remotely based in anything resembling facts, but you can believe whatever you want, I guess.

Just so you know, the entire reason that the article was written and the observations taken was because the author thought (correctly) that the 59 sunny days a year tallied by the NWS seemed impossibly low. Turns out, it was indeed low and he observed 145 days with approximately 30% cloud cover or less, (40% of days each year) which is what the NWS officially considers "sunny". This still makes Pittsburgh one of the cloudiest parts of the country, but not nearly as bad as was previously thought.

Now I know it's far from a scientific study, but you're still going to find many of the more rational people that actually lived here agreeing with this observation instead of the NWS one.



Um yeah, no kidding. Those days were not included in the author's tally of 145 observed sunny days, obviously. Just more proof that you couldn't be bothered to actually read the article before commenting.



No one is even arguing against this point at all. So your endless yammering about it is one of the most pointless wastes of time ever.



Yep, we already know you are both the exact same person, but thanks for the reminder.
First of all, the author misunderstood the NWS. The NWS says 59 CLEAR days. (Do I make myself clear, pun intended?) If you look at the definitions I posted, which haven't changed since 2007, AFAIK, there are three other categories that could fit HIS definition which is "(But if the sky is blue for a good part of the day and you can feel some warmth on your face — well, my friends, that’s a sunny day in my book.)" Who knows what he means by "a good part"? "Mostly cloudy" from NOAA covers 5/8 to 7/8 cloud cover, or 62.5% to 87.5% cloud cover. A day of 3/8 clear sky (5/8 cloud cover) inculdes 37.5% clear. Is that "a good part"? 1/8 clear is 12.5% clear. Is that "a good part"?
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Old 02-14-2014, 03:15 PM
 
1,947 posts, read 2,230,616 times
Reputation: 1292
Quote:
Originally Posted by Katiana View Post
A day of 3/8 clear sky (5/8 cloud cover) inculdes 37.5% clear. Is that "a good part"? 1/8 clear is 12.5% clear. Is that "a good part"?
Good questions. I dunno. The definitions are somewhat imprecise.

You see many days here when, for example, it's sunny from sunrise (assume 7am) to say 11am. Then some hazy thin clouds move in, partially filling the sky but the sun is still penetrating, and maybe by 3pm until dark (say 6pm) it is pretty much fully cloudy. Now that's a partially cloudy day? Or a partially sunny day? Does it score 3 or 7 on the NOAA scale? Is the cloud cover measured as a cumulative value throughout the day. What time intervals are measures taken? What is the field of view of the instrument? How 'thick' does a cloud need to be to be measured by the instrument? (the analogous question to how much light energy needs to penetrate to record sunshine). Why doesn't NOAA include cloud cover in its monthly/annually summaries?

I don't know the answers. Katiana? Anyone?

Right now in Squirrel Hill it's blue and very sunny but there's a reasonable amount of very thin cloud - maybe 1/3rd of the sky from my vantage point. Dunno if that's clear or partially cloudy, but its a nice afternoon for a run

Last edited by gortonator; 02-14-2014 at 03:29 PM..
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Old 02-14-2014, 04:18 PM
 
Location: Foot of the Rockies
90,316 posts, read 120,147,178 times
Reputation: 35920
Quote:
Originally Posted by gortonator View Post
Good questions. I dunno. The definitions are somewhat imprecise.

You see many days here when, for example, it's sunny from sunrise (assume 7am) to say 11am. Then some hazy thin clouds move in, partially filling the sky but the sun is still penetrating, and maybe by 3pm until dark (say 6pm) it is pretty much fully cloudy. Now that's a partially cloudy day? Or a partially sunny day? Does it score 3 or 7 on the NOAA scale? Is the cloud cover measured as a cumulative value throughout the day. What time intervals are measures taken? What is the field of view of the instrument? How 'thick' does a cloud need to be to be measured by the instrument? (the analogous question to how much light energy needs to penetrate to record sunshine). Why doesn't NOAA include cloud cover in its monthly/annually summaries?

I don't know the answers. Katiana? Anyone?

Right now in Squirrel Hill it's blue and very sunny but there's a reasonable amount of very thin cloud - maybe 1/3rd of the sky from my vantage point. Dunno if that's clear or partially cloudy, but its a nice afternoon for a run
I don't know the answers to those questions. I believe there are stats on % of sunshine as well, but you get into the same issue of how do you define "sunshine". Nothing is as easy as it seems.

Supposedly the thin clouds aren't counted in the definition of "cloudy" (according to the definitions I posted) but then you have to identify "thin". Never ending.
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Old 02-14-2014, 06:35 PM
 
1,947 posts, read 2,230,616 times
Reputation: 1292
Quote:
Originally Posted by Katiana View Post
I don't know the answers to those questions. I believe there are stats on % of sunshine as well, but you get into the same issue of how do you define "sunshine". Nothing is as easy as it seems.
.
If you can find recent ones from NOAA, I'd be very impressed. I can't ...
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