Deep freeze has Lake Erie nearly covered in ice

[SidDithers]

http://online.wsj.com/article/APdc56fc79fded459c8dc26fbb7aa6392f.html

BUFFALO, N.Y. — For people living along Lake Erie, there's a silver lining to the arctic cold gripping the region: a halt to lake-effect snow storms.

The Buffalo News reports (http://bit.ly/LLaMqK ) that with the lake nearly fully covered in ice, the likelihood of lake-effect storms dumping large amounts of snow on western New York nearly disappears. It's the warmer, open waters of Lake Erie during winter months that lead to the types of snow storms that have buried parts of the region in recent weeks.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory says the lake is about 95 percent covered with ice.

Another upside to an ice-covered lake: More sunshine. The moisture from open water rises, creating the snow-laden clouds that block the sun.

Some good coming out of this deep freeze.

Sid

[hrmjustin]

1. Glad to hear that the lakes froze. The people there suffered enough.

[liberal N proud]

2. They were still talking the possibility of lake effect this weekend in Cleveland

So even with frozen, we can still get lake effect, just not as likely.

[SidDithers]

5. And I had always thought lake effect hitting Buffalo was more from Lake Ontario...

than Lake Erie. There's lots of open water on Lake Ontario right now.

Guess they get it from both lakes, depending on how the wind is blowing.

Went looking for current stats on Lake Ontario and found this interesting bit about all the Great Lakes.

http://www.upnorthlive.com/news/story.aspx?id=997186#.UuLCHhAo74Y

At this point, the Great Lakes are currently 48% ice covered.

The lake with the highest concentration of ice is Lake Erie, which is no surprise, as it is by a wide margin the shallowest of the Great Lakes so it freezes up much faster. Interestingly, Lake Erie is also because of how shallow it is, the warmest of the lakes in summer. As of this writing, Lake Erie is 94% ice covered.

Next in line is Lake Huron where all of Georgian Bay, the North Channel and the shoreline areas along Michigan are completely frozen over. There is open water in the center of the lake still, but Lake Huron is 69% frozen over.

The deepest and largest of the Great Lakes, Lake Superior is next in line. Being further north with much colder air in place, even with its vast size, Lake Superior is now over half covered in ice at 53% coverage. It's a dramatic shift as just as recently as New Year's Eve, the lake only had 4% coverage of ice. Outside of a small pocket of open water offshore of the Porcupine Mountains in the Western U.P., much of the western half of Lake Superior is frozen. There is however a large area of open water over much of the eastern half of the lake.

Lake Michigan is 33% ice covered. While the northern part of the lake including the Straits of Mackinac, the Bay of Green Bay, and many shoreline areas down to Chicago are frozen, there is still a lot of open water once you get a bit offshore.

Lake Ontario has the least amount of ice with roughly one quarter or 24% of the lake ice covered.

Sid

[liberal N proud]

6. Lake Erie has a thermal effect all year long

Generally, winters are milder near the shore than they are several miles inland but the trade off is snow. As the winter turns to spring Erie is at its coolest and remains cool for much of the spring and summer keeping us much cooler than the surrounding inland areas.

They will report temperatures in December near the lake that will be 20 degrees warmer than 30 miles in land and the opposite in June.

The worst part is the never ending cloud cover though! I can always say I live where the sun don't shine.

[SidDithers]

7. We get a similar effect from Lake Ontario...

I'm about a 1/4 mile from the lake, and we're always a bit cooler in the summer, and a bit warmer in the winter.

And we don't get the snow - the lake is south-east of us, so prevailing weather hits us before going over the water.

Sid

[Godhumor]

3. ice cover is also huge for the freight industry

Water levels will rise from the ice melt, which helps tremendously in getting the big boats into docks while carrying more tons of commodity.

[Botany]

4. this used to happen EVERY winter

n/t