I don't care what causes it! I'm just glad that I'm more than 1,000 miles away and don't have to do anything but sit here and shake my head. Read the story @ http://time.com/3594842/lake-effect-snow/
Lake-effect snow is when cold winds move across long expanses of warmer lake water, providing energy and picking up water vapor, which freezes and is deposited on the leeward (downwind) shore. The current one can be traced back to cyclone Nuri the remnants of which made it up the the Alaskan Aleutian islands and slammed into the jet stream there causing the jetstream to shift south. Water has a heat co efficient of 1.0 which means it holds heat energy longer than the land. This early in the winter the water temp of he great lake had a November mean of around 44 degrees (currently in the high 30's) and when the cold arctic air hit it caused this major storm. http://tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov/physocean.html?id=9063020 hope this helps and yeah I am also glad I do not live there
one other thing if that arctic blast had hit Buffalo during February or March it would have produced only a mild snow. Most of the great lakes froze over last winter With summer just around the corner, the Great Lakes are officially free of ice for the first time in seven months. While only weeks ago, chunks of ice could be seen floating on the lakes as residents and visitors flocked to the waters for Memorial Day, as of June 6, the lakes were classified as ice-free. "This year is the longest we've seen ice on Lake Superior in our 40 years of records," Physical Scientist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration George Leshkevich said. http://www.accuweather.com/en/weather-news/great-lakes-ice-free-at-last/28517527 of course I bet NASA GISS documented a unprecedented boiling hot year for Buffalo
