WALL STREET JOURNAL: National Weather Service experts misjudged the path and impact of the blizzard that struck the Northeast on Monday and Tuesday, in large part because they trusted the wrong forecasting model, several independent meteorologists said.
Rather than rely on their own forecasting system—upgraded in recent weeks—the federal experts placed their faith instead on a well-regarded European computer model that predicted the worst of this storm would squarely hit New York City. That system earlier had outperformed the U.S. forecasting system in predicting the path of superstorm Sandy.
This time, the European forecasting model was wrong, several commercial forecasters said. That model, one of four complex computer simulations normally used to calculate weather patterns along the Eastern seaboard, predicted that the heaviest snow would fall between 50 and 100 miles farther west than actually occurred. Still, it correctly calculated the broader outlines of the blizzard. As predicted, the storm pounded parts of Long Island, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts and Maine, with winds in excess of 50 mph and snow in some locales up to 30 inches deep… (more)
