AND ALSO: We told you the bad news yesterday about predictions
of an unusually cold and snowy winter. But we do have a thin reed
of hope to hang onto.

The Oct. 7 edition of the Erie newspaper offered several
forecasts, most of which indicated this winter will be a doozy.

But it also pointed to the difficulty of long-range predictions
since some factors – such as the coming temperature of the Great
Lakes – are not yet known.

For the uninitiated, let us step back a moment to discuss a
phenomenon known as “lake effect snow.”

“Lake effect snow” is what occurs when cold, arctic winds out of
Canada pick up water from the Great Lakes, and turn it into snow
which drops onto our region.

Lake Erie, in our case, may seem like a long way off but the
winds carry the moisture to the south and east and cover the
so-called “snow belt.” Bradford is on the southern-most end of that
region.

Gen Bleakley who has been recording snowfall and other daily
weather data in Edinboro for the last decade told the newspaper
that her snowfall records indicate there is little correlation
between early fall lake temperatures and eventual winter
snowfall.

At the time of the Oct. 7 story, the temperatures of Lake Erie
was 67.4 degrees – about 3 degrees warmer than the long-term
average for that period of time.

That was according to data from the Great Lakes Environmental
Research Laboratory in Ann Arbor, Mich., and the National Weather
Service in Cleveland, Ohio.

And the lake could cool considerably by the time the first
winter winds blow.

George Leshkovich, a GLERL researcher, said: “What you need to
predict (lake effect snow) is a good forecast of lake temps and
it’s too far out for that. I don’t think anyone would want to
predict ice development on the lake, early winter water
temperatures or anything like that at this point.”

In addition, the temperature of the water is not as important as
the difference in temperatures between the air and the water.

The warmer the lake and the colder the air, the more moisture
will be picked up from the lake and deposited on us in the form of
snow, and even rain under certain conditions.

Once the lakes have a good ice cover, its moisture is largely
trapped and the heavy snowfalls disappear.