Snow in Tallahassee, FL?

     As most people are aware of winter weather and the likelihood of snow for the Tallahassee region, I'd like to point refer you to an article on how often snowfall occurs in Tallahassee.  I'd also like to address what you should be doing to prepare.  As always, follow advisories and keep a close watch on the weather, but for me the biggest concern for most is driving.  The conditions are very favorable for freezing rain (super-cooled raindrops that freeze on contact), which means you should avoid driving if at all possible!  If you must drive, go slowly and begin stopping way before necessary under normal conditions.  Be safe everyone and I hope to post some pictures of winter precipitation in the coming hours!

Fountain Angels and a National Championship

     The Noles won the final BCS championship game and I went to Tallahassee to watch the game.  Excited to go out and see how crazy the town would be Tracy and I went out for a quick walk and check out Tennessee Street.  Boy was it a cold walk.  Everyone was outside celebrating despite it being 22 degrees outside.  I made I quick walk down Tennessee street, got some chicken fingers and decided it was too cold and walked back home.

     Since the temperatures were so low, I thought I should check and see if any icicles had formed on any of the fountains around campus.  Seeing this my sophomore year in school was really a beauty, but alas, I didn't have my camera or a smartphone with a camera and was forced to just make memories.  This time around I was able to capture some really impressive pictures of the frozen fountains.

Click read more to load more photos.

Rain for Tampa Bay

     I've made a chart using data from the National Climatic Data Center (NCDC) to make a nice chart presenting rainfall totals by the month at the Tampa International Airport weather station.  In the chart below you will notice that I have included 2012 and January through August for 2013.  What I'd really like to point out is that yes it has been a rainier summer than the average, but take for instance June 2012, there was well over twice the average amount of rainfall, and rightly so.  If you recall, Tropical Storm Debby made landfall in the Big Bend region of Florida and dropped a lot of rain in a very short period of time in the Tampa Bay Area.

     The big point that I am trying to make here is to think about what an average is.  Take this simplified example: if in region A there is 100 inches of rainfall for half the year and none for the rest of the year; region B  75 inches half the year and 25 the other half; and in region C 50 inches in both halves of the year.  All of each of these regions have 50 inches of rainfall a year on average, but the climate of these regions clearly are aren't the same as one another.  That's one thing I would like for everyone to keep in mind when looking at statistics.  You have to be able to completely understand how the numbers are calculated and what they are telling you before you can begin to make any sort of conclusions from them.

     To go on and answer the question as to why is has been so rainy this summer in the Tampa Area I'll first say that it has been a rainy year, but it's nowhere near the records.  Next I will say that I believe the reason it has felt so rainy is because of extended strings of rainy days.  In Tampa Bay, rainfall in the summer really depends a lot on tropical systems and this season we've Andrea and Dorian contribute to our rainfall in June and August respectively which have contributed to rainfall as well as a set-up with low pressure systems in the gulf being forced to the northwest.

Rainfall Totals from NWS Summer 2013

I'm still working with the data from the NCDC, but I'm having a hard time creating a useful graph with the software I have.  Here is a map provided by the NWS office in Tampa showing the rainfall totals in the area.

https://twitter.com/NWSTampaBay/status/375933267829981184/photo/1

Why So Rainy Tampa Bay?

     I was recently asked why there has been so much rain this summer in the Tampa area, so I'll first like to give you the rainfall totals for June, July, and the total so far for August, and they are a bit higher than our "normals" or "averages."

June 2013: 11.30 inches
July 2013: 10.19 inches
August 2013: 10.81 inches (so far)

These are higher than our "average" but keep in mind that that an average numbers are not necessarily typical values and can often mask data that varies quite significantly.  I however cannot complete this post until August has ended to have a complete data set to analyze so look for a much more complete post to come in the first few days of September!

Mammatus Clouds

     While Driving to dinner the other night with my friends, I noticed a fairly rare sight in the sky. Pictured below are mammatus clouds. Named so because of their breast-like shape, these clouds are associated with strong thunderstorms and most commonly they occur at the base of a cumulonimbus (anvil shaped thunderstorm cloud).  Mammatus clouds aren't dangerous and usually occur after severe thunderstorms.  If you think these are neat clouds, it's all the more reason you should watch the sky for unusual sights!  

Welcome!

Welcome to Florida Weather Farm, a website intended to stimulate interest in the weather around them. I invite people to send any questions, comments, pictures, or anything else related to the weather and I will do my best to answer all questions.  I also aim to present interesting stories that are related to meteorology.  I am open to any suggestions to the design and layout of the website.  Either leave a comment or send me an email (kkenmoody@gmail.com) with the subject FWF so that I can answer them faster.