Northern Heavy Band Steals the Snow in Central PA

A heavy snow band (not predicted by most forecasting outlets) set up over and south of AccuWeather HQ yesterday evening, stealing the show from what should have been a consistently minor snow event for the state. With totals between 4 and 6 inches under this heavy band, we stole the snow (oops - show) for this storm system, as you can see by the map below. Reports were scattered and mostly between 0 and 2 inches in the rest of the state:

It was some of the heaviest snow I've ever seen in State College (I moved here in 1997). At my house, I got over 2 inches in an hour, ended up near 4 inches total, and even higher amounts were observed southeast of me. It made for some great photo opportunities for both Ronald Shawley down near Johnstown, Pa., (marked "Ron" on the radar) and me (location marked "Jesse" on the radar below):

Locally, meteorologists argued over the cause, but the National Weather Service in State College described the event as: "A COMPACT MID-LEVEL LOW AND RELATIVELY NARROW RIBBON OF HEAVY... 850-700 MB FGEN [FRONTOGENESIS] SNOW... A MESOSCALE BAND OF MID-LEVEL FORCING AND RIBBON OF HIGHER QPF... TO THE NORTH OF THE STRONG UPPER JET/S LEFT EXIT REGION."

The radar showed a band of thick (up to 20,000 feet), heavy (over 40dBZ) radar echoes showing snow over our area. There are also a couple of other interesting radar anomalies that I have marked on the image, including the "cone of silence," local wind turbines, and "masked mountains." The latter involves using software at the radar site, removing mountains that the radar beam often hits (which would look like stationary heavy storms).

The NWS pointed out that it was forecast at least 24 hours out by the NAM model. You can read their complete statement here. I was disappointed though that it wasn't forecast by the high-res HRRR model, which instead showed a hotspot around Philadelphia that didn't pan out.