This Date in Weather History

February 6, 2010 marked the culmination of a coast to coast storm that brought parts of the Central United States snow and ice and snarled traffic and caused flight delays for the days leading up to the 6th. As the storm approached the East Coast on the afternoon of February 5, 2010 snow started to fall along the I-95 corridor in the Mid-Atlantic region. Already warned of the impending storm airlines had cancelled hundreds of flights and moved planes out of the snowfall zone. The storm intensified aided by a strengthening pocket of artic cold settling in over New England. The result was a bomb cyclone – so called because of extreme strengthening, not unlike an explosion or bomb going off. By the time the snow was done flying on the afternoon of February 6, 28.5” of snow had fallen in Philadelphia making it the 2nd greatest snowfall in that city’s history. Baltimore totaled 24.8” an all-time record and in the nation’s capital 32.4” of measured smashing the old the record for the heaviest single season fall by almost 10”. Airports, roads and schools were closed for a week and as crews battled bitterly cold temps and strong winds in the aftermath of what would be termed the Blizzard of 2010.

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Weather records can be spotty when looking back more than 100 years ago and sometimes not as accurate as todays modern standards, but carefully recorded records of extreme events usually are on the mark. On February 5, 1892 record cold held most of the north Asia in it’s icy grip. In the Siberian town of Verkhoyansk in Tsarist Russia the mercury plunged to 90.4 degrees F below zero, making it the coldest temperature ever recorded in the Northern Hemisphere. Interestingly just two days later on February 7 of 1892 the thermometer once again hit that extreme low level. Verkhoyansk is notable chiefly for its exceptionally low winter temperatures and some of the greatest temperature differences on Earth between summer and winter. It holds the Guinness World Record for the greatest temperature range on Earth, from that 90.4 below zero to in winter to an all-time high temperature in that city of 99 the in summer, an incredibly high tempera for being located above the Arctic Circle.

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On February 4, 2008 record warmth was surging northward from Mexico at the same time 14 states prepared to hold primary elections for the 2008 Presidential election cycle. Known as Super Tuesday, it was the biggest number of state presidential primaries held on the same day up to that point. As the heat pulsed into the country a strong storm roared out of the plains states and warmth added fuel to what would become known as the Super Tuesday Severe Weather Outbreak. Temperatures soared into the 80s and beyond all across the southern states. The mercury reached 85 in San Antonio, 82 in Austin, 83 in Baton Rouge and 81 in Augusta George – all records. As the heat reached its peak the storm from the west started to act on the hot air and also moisture moving out of the Gulf of Mexico as the storm started to do it’s work it sparked an outbreak of severe storms from northeast Texas to the lower Ohio valley. The strongest thunderstorms spawned deadly and destructive tornadoes, which resulted in numerous injuries and at least 55 fatalities. One of the strongest tornadoes measured and EF4 on the enhanced Fujita scale, tore through eastern Jackson County, Alabama late that election Tuesday night.

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The winter of 1960-1961 was one of the harshest on record for the northeastern states. Winter came early with a massive snowstorm in the beginning of December then was punctuated by the John K Kennedy Inauguration storm of January 20, 1961. The last of 3 monumental snowstorms that winter hit on February 3, 1961. The deepest snow fell from just north of Baltimore to New England and paralyzed the region for days.

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The extraordinary 1952 Groundhog Day Storm was the only Atlantic tropical cyclone on record in February. First observed in the western Caribbean Sea on February 2, it moved rapidly throughout its duration and struck southwestern Florida early the next day as a gale-force storm. The 1952 Atlantic hurricane season was the last Atlantic hurricane season in which tropical cyclones were named using the Joint Army/Navy Phonetic Alphabet. It was a near normal Atlantic hurricane season, although it was the least active since 1946. The season officially started on June 15; however, that pre-season storm formed on Groundhog Day, becoming the only storm on record in the month of February. February 2 1952, a low-pressure area formed in the western Caribbean two months after the end of the1951 hurricane season. It moved quickly north-northwestward and acquired gale-force winds as it brushed the northern coast of Cuba. Early on February 3, the storm struck Cape Sable, Florida and quickly crossed the state. The Miami National Weather Bureau office recorded a wind gust of 68 mph during its passage. The winds damaged windows and power lines. The storm also dropped 2–4 inches of rain along its path, causing crop damage in Miami-Dade County. Then the storm continued rapidly northeastward, reaching peak winds of 70 mph. On February 4 it moved by off the coast of North Carolina. Later that day, it passed over Cape Cod, and dissipated after crossing into Maine. The storm caused scattered power outages and gusty winds across all across New England.  

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On February 1, 2011 a massive storm moved across the northern and central plains states to start off February on a very wintry note. Oklahoma City was pounded with heavy snow that accumulated almost a foot. This crushed the 5.5” record for the date set in 1913. It was also the snowiest February day on record in Oklahoma City. Chicago, Illinois also had the snowiest February day ever with 13.6”. Other ”big” snowfall winners were Claremore, Oklahoma at 20” and Hannibal, Missouri also at 20”. As this system spread moisture eastward there was significant icing in the Ohio Valley and snow continued to develop over New England and the Northeast although not as high accumulations as Oklahoma to Illinois. Most roads like Interstate 80 became impassable from Chicago eastward to Pennsylvania and most truck traffic from Missouri to Chicago was halted for several days.

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On January 31, 1911 the weather records show that Tamarack, California, closed the books for the month on snowfall there with 390 inches or 32.5 feet of snow that had fallen. That established a record that still holds well more than a hundred years later as the most snow in a calendar month in the United States. Tamarack, formerly known as Camp Tamarack, is an unincorporated community in Calaveras County, California, in the United States. It was founded in the 1920s. It sits at an elevation of 6,913 feet, on the west slope of the Sierra Nevada near Bear Valley and south of Lake Tahoe. It is prone to getting huge snowfalls as storms blow into northern California from off the Pacific ocean.

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The most intense cold arctic outbreak to strike the southern states in modern times plunged into that region on January 29 1966 and by the morning of January 30 set record unrivaled in the history of the region before or since. The mercury in Corinth. Mississippi dipped to 19 below zero the lowest in state history. New Market Alabama reached a morning reading of 27 below also a state record. In Greensboro, North Carolina the afternoon temperature reached just 13 and lowest high temp ever seen. Many homes were not insulated for that kind of cold and water pipes burst all across the deep south – in some places it took weeks to restore the water. Many automobiles and trucks did not have proper ant-freeze and engine blocks froze and where ruined. The cold made it into Florida and significantly damaged the citrus crops there. This cold air has swing into the region behind a massive storm that was moving up the eastern seaboard and as the cold gained form control in the south in the wake of the storm up the east coast heavy snow was falling that would reach deeps of 10” of more in Philadelphia and Harrisburg and as much as 20” in and around Washington DC.

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The Great Olympic Blowdown of January 29, 1921 , also called the Big Blow, was a compact, intense windstorm that struck the coast of Washington. The storm is remembered for the massive number of trees destroyed. At the time, it was the greatest loss of timber in the country, according to the Forest Service. Hurricane-force. winds destroyed billions of board-feet of timber across the Olympic Peninsula. More than 40 percent of the trees on the southwest side of the Olympic Mountains were blown down. The Great Olympic Blowdown felled eight times more trees than the eruption of Mount St. Helens. The old-growth timber that was destroyed created a fire hazard, and fire suppression crews were deployed by the U. S Forest Service, the state of Washington, and the Washington Forest Fire Association. Air patrols to support the fire suppression crews were provided by the U.S. Army. A herd of 200 elk were killed near the town of Forks by tree branches and flying debris and hundreds of domestic farm animals were also killed. Power and telephone lines were downed. Moored boats were dashed on the beaches. Twenty-one barges were adrift in Puget Sound after breaking from their mooring lines. Smokestacks and chimneys collapsed.

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What would be termed a "historic winter storm" moved through the southern part of the United States on January 28 2014. Snow and ice stretched from far eastern Texas into Florida and the Carolinas. Heavy sleet and freezing rain led to power outages, including in Pensacola FL. and Charleston SC. Ice and snow in Atlanta GA. led to an incredible gridlock that left thousands of stranded motorists on I-75. People were trapped in their cars through the day and night, Heavy snow fell farther north from Columbia SC to Norfolk VA, and Temperatures were mainly in the teens. Some stranded in the Atlanta area overnight slept in grocery store aisles for warmth.

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