Winter '16 / '17 - 16th Annual 'Season-total' Snowfall Forecast Contest - Call for Forecasts!

NE.Wx's 16th annual ‘Season-total' Snowfall Forecast Contest is the absolute best ... biggest ... and probably ONLY chance to be recognized for your long-range forecasting acumen ;/

And it's easy.
All you have to do is forecast the season-total snowfall at 25 stations from RDU to CAR!

Deadline: WED ... 30-NOV-16 @ 11:59 PM EST

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Visit the Contest's website to enter your forecast.
Follow the link at the top of the page to 'Enter Season-total Forecast.'

1st place prize (delivered post-paid right to your front door):
"The Snow Booklet" by Nolan J. Doesken and Arthur Judson (paperback) and "Snow in America" by Bernard Mergan (hardcover)

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As always ... NO cost ... NO fees ... NO advertising ... NO annoying requests for personal information to enter the contest.  NEWxSFC is just a fun exercise for winter wx enthusiasts to see who can make the best season-total snowfall forecast.

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Forecast element: sum-total season snowfall @ each station
Forecast period: 01-DEC-16 through 31-MAR-17
Verification: NWS preliminary climate reports (CLM or CF6)

Error statistic: total absolute error [Σ abs(forecast - observed)]

Update your forecast as often as you want prior to the deadline.
Only your last entry gets verified.

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The reigning NE.Wx ‘Season-Total’ Snowfall Forecasting Champ-een is snowman
Last year's 'Season-total' forecast summary ... verification ... and final results ==> here

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The Contest is open to amateur and professional forecasters; broadcasters with or without trained Seals; any and all weather-biz types and / or wanna-bees; wish-casters ... astrologers ... along with any other universally recognized classes of dreamers; Pollyannas or Cassandras ... registered Nostradamusts ... non-violent megalomaniacs ... woolly-bear caterpillars or their agents ... pest detectives ... NE.Wx NG veterans and lurkers; refugees from AmericanWx and/or USWeather ... including self-imposed exiles from Eastern Wx ... and of course ... meteorologists.

In honor of USENET/s ne.weather/s patron saint Mr. Joseph Bartlo's final request (RIP) ... trolls ... goats ... hat3-lsiters ... and psests need not apply.

Winter '15 / '16 Regular Season Snowfall Contest Note

Great Blizzard of 1888 - Wilmington ... DE
Market St looking N from 10th St

17th Annual 'Regular Season'
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No FINAL standings
Two contest-worthy storms were too few for a valid contest.

Under the 'two-thirds' rule;
Forecasters are included in end-of-season rankings
if they entered at least two-thirds of all storm contests.

Given only two contest-worthy storms during the season ... forecasters with one entry only would not have been eligible.

In the interest of fairness; forecasters should have at least three opportunities to enter ... so three storms seems like the bare minimum to make certain a valid contest.

Winter '16 / '17 - Outlooks

Thread updated periodically as new outlooks and forecasts are issued from a variety of credible sources.

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AER ...

IRI ...

CPC ...

 

Read more »

Winter '16 / '17 - Arctic Oscillation (AO)

Winter '16 / '17 - Eurasia Snow Cover

Winter '16 / '17 - North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO)

Winter '16 / '17 - Multivariate ENSO Index (MEI)

Winter '16 / '17 - Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO)

Winter '16 / '17 - First Contact

 

 

Winter '15 / '16 - 15th Annual Season-total Snowfall Forecast Contest: FINAL Results

Snowman FTW!

The 'season-total' snowfall forecast contest/s error statistic is total absolute error.
For each forecast station ... the absolute value of (Forecast - Observed) is calculated ... then summed.

Forecasts with lower 'total absolute forecast' errors have more skill than those with higher 'total absolute forecast' errors.

CONSENSUS is the mean forecast of all forecasts computed for each station.
P-O-R-N is the 'Period Of Record Normal' or climatology.
Skillful season-total forecasts beat climatology.

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Table of lowest station errors.

  

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Table of the total absolute value of (total snowfall forecast - total snowfall observed).

 

If you finished higher in this table than the 'Total Absolute' table ... you did a better job of forecasting the sum total snowfall amount over the entire forecast area than the distribution of station-total snowfall amounts.

 

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Verified forecasts at NEWxSFC/s web site here.