A WINTER STORM WATCH REMAINS IN EFFECT FROM MONDAY EVENING THROUGH TUESDAY EVENING.
* TIMING... SNOW WILL DEVELOP ACROSS THE AREA MONDAY NIGHT. SNOW MAY BECOME HEAVY ON TUESDAY... BEFORE DIMINISHING AND ENDING LATE TUESDAY EVENING.
* SNOW ACCUMULATIONS... IN EXCESS OF 6 INCHES ARE POSSIBLE BY TUESDAY EVENING... WITH CONSIDERABLE BLOWING AND DRIFTING POSSIBLE TUESDAY EVENING INTO TUESDAY NIGHT.
* WINDS... WILL INCREASE FROM THE NORTH AT 15 TO 25 MPH AND GUSTY BY TUESDAY EVENING.
* IMPACTS... TRAVEL WILL LIKELY BE IMPACTED STARTING MONDAY NIGHT AND CONTINUE THROUGH TUESDAY EVENING. THE HEAVIER SNOW WILL RESULT IN REDUCED VISIBILITY. CONSIDERABLE BLOWING AND DRIFTING IS ALSO EXPECTED.
4:22 PM Sunday, from the lead meteorologist at KAKE-TV in Wichita:
Please SHARE, Thanks: OK folks, I've been talking about the possibility of a big snow, that includes Greater Wichita...along with a big chunk of KAKEland, for several days...and it still looks likely.
Starting after 11PM Monday, through the day Tuesday, the snow will fall.
Watch Ben Pringle, CBM tonight on KAKE News for the first outlook totals, and locations impacted. Of course, they will be updated as refined as we get closer. I'll be back in the office tomorrow afternoon.
However, I would go ahead and make common sense preparations for dealing with a significant snowfall, including the likelihood that numerous schools will be closed on Tuesday...possibly into Wednesday, too. Not to mention that travel may become very hazardous, if not impossible in some areas, until crews can work on the roads.
7:31 PM Sunday:
Kansas City meteorologist JD Rudd, who used to work in Wichita and now does internet-based forecasts for both areas, posts a thirteen-minute video analyzing his thoughts on the snowfall predictions, basing it on five different computer models (all of them saying no less than 4-5 inches for the Wichita area, and most saying 6-8). He finishes by saying his own expertise leads him to predict, very early and unverifiably due to the data on hand, that the Wichita area will get 4-6 inches, widespread. It's a "strict average" of all the models. He also says this may change greatly over the next 24 hours, indicating that if so, it will be to higher amounts.
9:56 PM Sunday:
Wichita Meteorologist Ross Janssen (KWCH-12) predicts six inches for the area on Tuesday, with up to a foot north and northeast of the city. The Weather Channel changes their previous forecast of 6-7 inches to 3-5 inches for Tuesday, but ups their "snow chances" to 100%. This shows how, even at this point, everyone is still speculating wildly. Janssen also mentions that there's another storm system primed to hit later in the week, but there's absolutely nothing about that which can be predicted yet.
10:53 PM Sunday:
The weather app on my computer tells me this; the sleet stuff is new:
MONDAY NIGHT
CLOUDY. A CHANCE OF LIGHT FREEZING RAIN OR SNOW
AND SLEET IN THE EVENING THEN SNOW AFTER MIDNIGHT. NOT AS COLD. SNOW AND SLEET ACCUMULATION OF 1 TO 2 INCHES. LOWS 20 TO 25. EAST WINDS 5 TO 10 MPH. CHANCE OF SNOW 80 PERCENT.
TUESDAY
SNOW. SNOW MAY BE HEAVY AT TIMES. HEAVY SNOW ACCUMULATIONS. HIGHS 25 TO 30. NORTHEAST WINDS 10 TO 15 MPH. CHANCE OF SNOW 90 PERCENT.
TUESDAY NIGHT
CLOUDY WITH A 50 PERCENT CHANCE OF SNOW. AREAS OF BLOWING SNOW. COLDER. LOWS 5 ABOVE TO 10 ABOVE. NORTH WINDS 15 TO 20 MPH WITH GUSTS TO AROUND 30 MPH. LOWEST WIND CHILLS AROUND 10 BELOW.
11:03 PM Sunday:
The Weather Channel changes its forecast yet again, now to 4-6 inches.
Approximately 11:30 PM Sunday:
I go out to, and return back from, Walmart, in order to get groceries and pre-storm essentials.
12:09 AM Monday:
The Weather Channel updates its forecast again and predicts 1-2 inches Monday night before the 4-6 on Tuesday, bringing the totals for the next 36 hours or so up to 6-8 again. This matches the forecast on my weather app above.
2:02 AM Monday:
Slowly acquiring a bad headache (usually a sure sign that nasty weather is coming, I go to bed for the night.
4:24 AM Monday:
THE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE IN WICHITA HAS ISSUED A WINTER STORM WARNING FOR SIGNIFICANT WINTER WEATHER... WHICH IS IN EFFECT FROM 6 PM THIS EVENING TO MIDNIGHT CST TUESDAY NIGHT. THE WINTER STORM WATCH IS NO LONGER IN EFFECT.
* TIMING... SNOW WILL DEVELOP ACROSS THE AREA MONDAY NIGHT. SNOW MAY BECOME HEAVY ON TUESDAY... BEFORE DIMINISHING AND ENDING LATE TUESDAY EVENING.
* SNOW ACCUMULATIONS... WILL REACH UPWARDS OF 6 TO 9 INCHES BY TUESDAY EVENING... WITH CONSIDERABLE BLOWING AND DRIFTING POSSIBLE TUESDAY EVENING INTO TUESDAY NIGHT.
* WINDS... WILL INCREASE FROM THE NORTH AT 15 TO 25 MPH AND GUSTY BY TUESDAY EVENING.
8:04 AM Monday:
In its daily news email sent through the listserv to all faculty and staff, the first item on the docket for the day is how to find out if the university is closed due to inclement weather. They also link to the policy and procedures manual (which hasn't been updated since 2006) that says a decision on whether to close for the day will be made by 4:30 AM and, when necessary, a decision on whether to close for evening classes will be made by 2PM. By bringing this up first thing in the daily news email, it becomes apparent to me that they're already making plans to close down for at least one day.
8:42 AM Monday:
My mother emails me from back home to tell me that Winter Storm Maximus (what the light snow/ice I had earlier this weekend became once it moved east) dropped 8-9 inches of snow on them back home, and WVU closed down for the day. Several roads and parts of the interstate were also closed.
10:26 AM Monday:
The Weather Channel updates its forecast again, now that most meteorologists have a better idea of what's coming -- the 1-2 inches in the overnight hours is still expected (all snow, now; no sleet/ice), but they've upped the total for tomorrow to 5-8, which brings the overall total to the 6-10 range. This matches, roughly, with the updated forecast on my computer's weather app, as well. News channels around the area start putting out graphics for snow accumulations that match this projection, or make very similar ones -- one thing that they all have in common is that none of them are calling for less than six inches tomorrow. The news channels are also now saying that it's not going to start in the overnight hours, but by around 8PM.
12:45 PM Monday:
The Weather Channel's hourly forecast claims that the snow (for Newton, anyway) won't start until around 2AM, but it will continue for a full 24 hours, not just 12, until around 2AM Wednesday. Previous forecasts claimed that the bulk of it would be done by 3PM tomorrow.
1:10 PM Monday:
So here we are.
I've kept this running timeline of updates since yesterday, as you can see, to document changes and news about this storm over the past 24 hours. Each time I looked or kept tabs on things, as you can see, it got worse. This seems to be a continuing trend not only with this storm, but basically any snowstorm that hits the area -- it is not often that a massive storm is predicted and we only get about half of what they're calling for, or nothing. Usually what happens here (and, ironically, back home in West Virginia as well) is that they call for one amount and we get more.
There's still been no news or updates on my paycheck situation, so as it's going on 2PM now, I don't really expect to hear anything today, and even if I did I doubt I'd have the time at this point to get to campus before the offices closed for the day. Rae suggested I call the payroll office to see where they are in the process, but as my cell is close to being completely out of minutes (again, those cost money) and I probably couldn't get down there, get a parking spot/shuttle over before the office closed? There's no real point. I did send an email to the Director (he forwarded a bookstore management thing to me, and mentioned another position in Nebraska that was being offered by a university one of our former GTAs works at), and in my thanking him for the info, I asked if he'd been told about what was going on with my pay stuff. He's generally left out of the loop with the day-to-day operations stuff, but he does have clout to get some stuff pushed along, and as he considers me a vital part of the composition program, well...we'll see. As for the payroll people, if I hear nothing else one way or the other from them or the department administrators, I'll have to contact them somehow; I have a draft email ready to be sent to them, but again I'm waiting a bit to see if I hear something today (and to see if they shut down the university tomorrow or Wednesday, as even if I sent something today they wouldn't respond until they were open again).
Of course, I can't deal with the whole healthcare thing until I figure out what's going on with my pay, so let's hope I don't get sick anytime in the near future.
I did get my W2s though; I haven't even opened them yet. They're in the spare room with my other tax stuff. Daisy told me to at least draft out my taxes online on TurboTax this year, as she's already completely done with hers and did it fairly quickly. I'll probably try it, of course, and may even look into it as soon as this week if I'm truly snowed in and stuck here for a few days with little else constructive to do. Hell, at this rate, I may get paid a refund more quickly than I'll actually get a paycheck, so it's worth a shot, right?
For now, though? Eh. I have little to do until the snow starts rolling in. I'm going to make some food and probably lounge about a bit. I'll update you, of course, on all of the changes and new things I hear.
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