March Madness Continues, As Well As A Stagnant Weather Map

It's now the second full week of March and the annual CoCoRaHS recruiting efforts are in full swing.

I don't have any current stats, but hopefully we are seeing at least double digit numbers of new volunteers for every state.

Make sure your local t.v. meteorologists know about CoCoRaHS. They are a very effective tool in helping spread the word. Maybe they will want to conduct an interview with you!

And if they don't know about us -- they will LOVE knowing once you educate them because the data makes for a great resource when either recapping over covering unsettled weather in your region.

And in today's title I referred to a stagnant weather map -- can you tell I am a little "sore" with Mother Nature right now? We just can't good a good storm along the Front Range if our lives depended on it.

I shouldn't be so negative sounding.

The weather pattern seems an aweful lot like 2002 when we had the Hayman Fire, Colorado's largest in history. It was so dry that year and all the weather went up and around us, much like this year.

It's Spring, And That Means Contrast

Check out the temperature map above for this morning. Nearly an 80 degree contrast from north to south across the United States.

What that means is somewhere in the middle it will be quite windy due to the temperature and pressure gradient. And, given the right ingredients in place, active weather.

Over the weekend there was a small outbreak of tornadoes from south-central Kansas, across Missouri, southern and central Illinois and Indiana, and even a few in northwest Ohio.

I don't believe any of the twisters were long-track deadly events, but I did see some damage reports, one out of Indiana is coming to mind. And I believe there were a few non-fatal injuries. I wish all those impacted a speedy recovery.

If you look through the CoCoRaHS comments today (under View Data), you will see some of our observers were pretty close to the storm action.

Here is probably one of the best comments I read this morning...from one of our new observers in Ohio, station OH-PT-10, near the town of Kent.

He/She described the rain Sunday night as a "real toad strangler!"

Here are the maps of storm reports from over the weekend. You can see these and the actual text reports by visiting the Storms Prediction Center web site. Just click here.

Your Comments

Several of you made comments about the ice picture of Lake Superior that was in last week's blog.

Bob, you are right. The lake has a huge maritime history with numerous ship wrecks. I actually took a glass bottom boat tour that showed a few sunken vessels. Click here.

It was really cool.

If you are ever back in that area, you might consider this as a little side tour.

Week Ahead

Active weather is in store this week for many of the same places that have already been in on the action.

Winter holds tough along the northern tier. But notice how far north the rain is falling on the map below.

It just shows you that the days are numbered for wintry precipitation, and some of you are probably cheering for that this year -- as it has been a LONG season for some areas.

There is a slight chance for severe weather in the center of the nation.

Rain gauges from Kansas to Ohio stand the chance of seeing some rain, and it may come down heavy at times, especially in the southern Great Lakes and Ohio River Valley.

The ground is still frozen and in some cases covered with snow in these regions, so runoff and flooding is a threat, especially from Chicago to Detroit.