With Leap Day right around the corner, I figured I’d try to celebrate the extra day with a bang. Mother nature is helping out a bit, and I’ll get to that later.

First, it’s a check on how the last forecast fared. That outlook called for snowfall in the 2-6 inch range over the extended weekend for the selected cities. If all five were in range: Bull’s Eye. 3 or 4: On Target. Here are those totals:

Lexington, KY: None
Charleston, WV: Trace.
Charlottesville, VA: 5.8
Washington, DC: Trace
Baltimore, MD: None

Um…woops. Only Charlottesville was in range, so that’s a Complete Miss, the 2nd straight one for me.

Am I really going to do a lot better with long range forecasts than the short term ones? Seems that way. That forecast was also the halfway point for the PBR, just 5 remain. I have my work cut out for me if I’m going to hit the 1.00 average.

So let’s get to it with the next forecast! This one features Minneapolis, MN, Bismarck, ND, Fargo, ND, Aberdeen, SD and Pierre, SD.

Bull’s Eye At least one of the five will have a foot or more snow by the end of Wednesday.
On Target All five chosen cities will have at least 6 inches of snow by the end of Wednesday.
Complete Miss Any other result.

Have a great week everyone. And if you’re in the snow storm’s path, be careful out there!

It has been awhile since I’ve done a PBR forecast on the site, and it’s about time I fixed that. Before that, here are a couple of notes.

First off,I think I’m going to be making alterations to my plan as we go. The idea was to have 5 months of forecasting options for 10 PBR forecasts, December through April. December was pretty much a bust, and I can’t imagine April being that much better. So now I’m going to try to squeeze in the remaining forecasts as quickly as possible. There are 7 weekends between now and April, so if I plan on a forecast for each week, then I’ll be in good shape.

Finally, for those of you who have just started coming to the site, I figured I’d explain just what the PBR forecasts are. Point Blank Range forecasts are predictions made generally 1-3 days in advance. All forecasts made are with complete certainty, no waffle words such as “chance of” or “likely”…and, I keep track of how the forecasts have fared. There are 3 scoring ranges with any PBR forecast: Bull’s Eye (2 points), On Target (1 point) and Complete Miss (0 points). On Target is more or less what I anticipate to happen, while a Bull’s Eye is like a bonus. The goal for the end of the season is to average “On Target”, or 1.00 when this and the Shot In The Dark forecast results are combined. SITD forecasts are like PBRs, except done monthly and double points.

With that said, let’s take a look back at the last forecast, done for January 27th and 28th. I believed that snowfall would be in the 1-3 range for Madison, WI, Milwaukee, WI, Minneapolis, MN, Detroit, MI and South Bend, IN. If all five were in range, that’s a Bull’s Eye while a majority would be On Target. Here are the snowfall totals.

Madison: 0.5
Milwaukee: 0.6
Minneapolis: 0.5
Detroit: 1.3
South Bend: 0.4

Only Detroit was in range, so that is a Complete Miss.

With that out of the way, it’s time for this edition. The featured cities are Lexington, KY, Charleston, WV, Charlottesville, VA, Washington, DC and Baltimore MD.

Bull’s Eye All five of the selected cities will total 2-6 inches of snow for the 3 day weekend.
On Target 3 or 4 of the selected cities will total 2-6 inches of snow for the 3 day weekend.
Complete Miss Any other result.

Have a great weekend everyone!

It’s time for another edition of Shot In The Dark Forecasts! I wouldn’t be doing Anchorage any justice if I didn’t feature them at least once this season. So for February, they get the spotlight to themselves in this SITD forecast. Before we get to that, how did the January forecast fare?

I believed January would be below average for five chosen cities. If that held true, it’d be a Bull’s Eye forecast. Another way to get the Bull’s Eye was if one of the five was below average by a foot or more. 3 or 4 of the cities were below average, with none being a foot or below average, then the forecast was On Target. Below are the totals for those five cities and their averages in parenthesis.

Ann Arbor, MI: 16.8 (13.4)
Colorado Springs, CO: 0.5 (5.1)
Erie, PA: 26.5 (29.8)
South Bend, IN: 35.0 (20.6)
Worcester, MA: 13.6 (17.1)

3 out of the 5 were below average. None of them were lower by a foot or more, so it’s On Target. Of the group, South Bend was the big winner, beating average by more than 14 inches!

So let’s take a look at the standings. Remember that for SITD, an On Target forecast is worth 2 points.

If this was a Bull’s Eye, I’d be right at 1.00. So I am just a bit short with a little more than half of the forecasts to go.

Now for this edition’s forecast, which features only Anchorage, AK. In an average season, Anchorage will get 11 inches in February. But as we the stats show, this has been anything but average for Anchorage. In fact, they’re already almost 30 inches above average for the entire season! I think this above average pattern will continue for them.

Bull’s Eye Anchorage’s February total will be at least triple average for the month.
On Target Anchorage’s February total will be at least double average for the month.
Complete Miss Any other result.

Have a great February everyone!