Every time a snowfall is predicted, local and national media outlets will use various computer models to generate their accumulation forecasts. We will be\u00a0saving and tracking these maps all winter long with a goal of determining which media network is the most reliable in predicting snowfall. Our commentary will describe the map\u2019s successes and failures, then we will assign an Accuracy Score on a 0-10 whole number scale. We will average each agency\u2019s Accuracy Score throughout the winter and keep an updated rankings list at the bottom of each Forecast Analysis post. It is important to note before we get into the\u00a0post that this analysis is for Western Pennsylvania. Many of these maps also have predictions for many other parts of the Mid Atlantic and Northeast, but know our discussion is only referring to the areas around Pittsburgh.<\/p>\n

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$\"WPXI:$ <\/a><\/p>\n
WPXI:<\/strong>\u00a0Channel 11 was one of the networks that became aware of a more forceful northern push once the system made its way into the area. In this map from noon Friday, they put the 1-3 inch cutoff line right through the city of Pittsburgh. Since the city officially saw almost 5″, this makes their prediction off by at least 2″. Their southern Allegheny County predictions were more in line with reality, but the totals in southern PA far exceeded their 10-15 inch range.\u00a0Accuracy Score: 4\/10<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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$\"WTAE:$ <\/a><\/p>\n
WTAE:<\/strong> Pittsburgh\u2019s Action Weather elected to use many thin bands, rather than larger broad-ranged ones. They nailed the official NWS total from Moon Township, having 4.9″ fit perfectly into a 3-6 inch range. Their purple shadings were pretty close, but like WPXI, they undershot the 20+ inch totals that were recorded in southern PA.\u00a0Accuracy Score: 7\/10<\/strong><\/p>\n
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$\"KDKA:$ <\/a><\/p>\n
KDKA:<\/strong>\u00a0The team at KDKA stood strong all week and refused to let the swaying models impact their forecast. They were among the first to publish an accumulation prediction map during the 4:00 news on Wednesday, and we really liked their initial thoughts. Over the next three days, the only change made to their map was an increase of the 4-6 inch range, which originally was 3-5 inches. Just like WPXI, KDKA drew their boundary line right through the city, which proved to be too far south. Their 4-6 inch range was also too far south, as storm reports of 9+ inches came in from this area. Like their two local competitors, KDKA also far undershot the totals in southern PA.\u00a0Accuracy Score:\u00a0<\/strong>3\/10<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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$\"Intellicast:$ <\/a><\/p>\n
Intellicast:\u00a0<\/strong>The map from Intellicast\u00a0demonstrated just how ridiculously thin the accumulation gradient was for this system. The\u00a0remarkable cutoff of accumulation made forecasting for specific locations so difficult.\u00a0Intellicast had a rough time predicting the last snowfall, which was disappointing because it has been one of our favorites over the past few winters. Fortunately, it did super for this storm. A range of 4-12 stretched from tip to tip of Allegheny County, and that ended up being pretty close. Their 4-6″ line through the center of the county was very close to the official 5″ in Pittsburgh, and their 12″ line matches up very well with the collected reports. In addition, they correctly forecasted the heavy 16+ inch totals towards the PA\/WV\/MD borders. If there’s something to complain about here, its that their accumulations may have been a bit too far north.\u00a0Accuracy Score:<\/strong> 9\/10<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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$\"NWS$ <\/a><\/p>\n
NWS Pittsburgh:<\/strong>\u00a0The National Weather Service did a phenomenal job of keeping everyone updated and refreshing weather alerts throughout the storm. Unfortunately, their snow map was off. They called for a range of 2-3″ at their Moon office, well short of the 4.9″ they saw.\u00a0Only the extreme southern tip of Allegheny County was marked at 6-8 inches, which ended up being spot on. However, like many others, they undershot totals further south, but were among the closest to being right. They nailed the extreme thinness of the accumulation gradient, but underestimated just how much snow could fall north.\u00a0Accuracy Score:<\/strong>\u00a04\/10<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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$\"NWS$ <\/a><\/p>\n
NWS Digital:<\/strong> Last snowfall, this model was disastrously wrong, but this storm\u00a0it seemed to be better in line with everyone else. It did undershoot the accumulations just about everywhere, but it nailed the placement of the northern boundary. Putting this shading on top of the snowfall total map at the top of this post, the shape is almost exactly right. However, as we mentioned, the totals were not close. The 4″ boundary was well south of Pittsburgh, which as we know ended up being north of the city. This model also\u00a0predicted totals that were far too low for southern PA.\u00a0Accuracy Score:<\/strong> 4\/10<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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$\"AccuWeather:$ <\/a><\/p>\n
AccuWeather:\u00a0<\/strong>The digital weather giant AccuWeather was among the first to publish an accumulation map for this storm, and although numerous changes were\u00a0made to it in the high snowfall areas, the ranges in western Pennsylvania never\u00a0changed. This proved to be costly to the accuracy of their forecast, which put the boundary between no snow and 1-3″ right through the city. Accumulating snows were seen north of Pittsburgh, making this map too far south from the beginning. Remarkably, their 3-6″ range stretched all the way south into West Virginia and extreme souther PA, which was way off. Totals of more than 20″ fell in areas that they forecasted to be less than 6″.\u00a0Accuracy Score:<\/strong>\u00a01\/10<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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$\"The$ <\/a><\/p>\n
The Weather Channel:<\/strong> The \u201cWeather Giant\u201d was the first to issue a snow map for the storm they\u2019ve named Jonas, and they wrestled with the northern extent of the storm many times. Earlier in the week, they thought Pittsburgh may not see any accumulation at all, but thankfully they brought their boundaries further north. Alas, they were still too far south. If the cities were labeled on this map, Pittsburgh would be on the boundary between 1-3 and 3-5 inches. Thus, with a 4.9″ total, TWC undershot the totals. Unlike every other map on this page, TWC did accurately bring the 18+ inch range up into southern PA. Had they shifted their map further north, it would have been almost perfect.\u00a0Accuracy Score:\u00a0<\/strong>5\/10<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Here’s an updated look at the Accuracy Score rankings:<\/p>\n\n
\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Every time a snowfall is predicted, local and national media outlets will use various computer models to generate their accumulation forecasts. We will be\u00a0saving and tracking these maps all winter long with a goal of determining which media network is the most reliable in predicting snowfall. Our commentary will describe the map\u2019s successes and failures, \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0…Keep Reading<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":125,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-119","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-prediction-analysis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/pghsnowday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/pghsnowday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/pghsnowday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/pghsnowday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/pghsnowday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=119"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/pghsnowday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":127,"href":"http:\/\/pghsnowday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119\/revisions\/127"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/pghsnowday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/125"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/pghsnowday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=119"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/pghsnowday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=119"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/pghsnowday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=119"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}