This Date in Weather History

The “Blizzard of ‘96'” wreaked havoc across the eastern third of the United States. A powerful storm moved up the eastern seaboard and ran into very frigid air helping to produce traffic-stopping, life-disrupting snowfall totals. The major cities of Boston, MA, New York, NY, Philadelphia, PA & Washington DC became completely paralyzed. Philadelphia received a record 31" of snow, smashing the old record snowfall of 21.3" set in Feb. 1983. In parts of southern PA, snowdrifts were as high as 10'. As much as 4' of snow fell in the West Virginia Mountains. Nearly 2' of snow buried New York City. 29" was measured in Boston, MA. Winds gusted over 80 mph on the New Jersey shore. A total ban on travel was in put in effect in the eastern half of PA for 48 hours to aid in the clean-up and recuse stranded motorists. 35" fell in White Horse, NJ to set a state snowfall record.

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Tropical Storm Zeta, the 26 and last storm of the 2005- 2006 hurricane season, died off in the central Atlantic on January 6, 2006. This was the second storm to span two calendar years, the first being Hurricane Alice in 1954-1955. In current times the start of the Hurricane season triggers the re-start of the alphabet. The season officially kicks off on June 1st in the Atlantic basin. Sometimes tropical systems form in May or even April. In fact, there has been a named storm in every month of the year when compiling all the storms that have formed through history. Usually then when there is a natural break in the season and there has been no storm for a while the alphabet is restarted. Most of these modern protocols here established by the WMO, the World Meteorological Organization in the 1950s and 60’s with some refinements after that. That is why in the 2005-2006 season was still using the end of the alphabet with Zeta, but 1954-1955 before the rules where worked out the alphabet was already re-started with Alice.

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Lake-effect snow is produced during cooler atmospheric conditions when a cold air mass moves across long expanses of warmer lake water. The lower layer of air, heated up by the lake water, picks up water vapor from the lake and rises up through the colder air above; the vapor then freezes and is deposited on the downwind shores. But Lake-effect snow can actually occur when a lake is partially or even total frozen. That is because directional winds shear is one of the most important factors governing the development of squalls; environments with weak directional shear typically produce more intense squalls than those with higher shear levels. Frictional convergence is the major factor in producing the squally. When the wind blows over t expanse of water – or even frozen lake is flowing unimpeded, when it reaches the shore line it slows as it comes into contact with the land and causes friction. There is only once place for the air to go and that is up. The lifting causes clouds and precipitation. When the wind blows in such a way that is turns counter-clockwise, the same direction as large-scale storms – that also aids in lift. When the lake is now frozen the added element of temperature contrast and available moisture is added to the mix. This is most common around the Great Lakes in the United States and Canada. The snowfall totals can be prodigious, in a short period of time. On January 5, 1988 Heavy lake effect snows on the east side of Lake Ontario in upstate New York. So much snow fell that Interstate 81 was closed from Pulaski to Watertown for a week. As much as 45” of snow fell in less than 12 hours.

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The absolute worst winter in the 18th century was the “hard winter” of 1779-1780. The winter that year was bad. Over the course of the winter, New Jersey had 26 snowstorms and 6 of those are considered to be blizzards! Every saltwater inlet from North Carolina to Canada froze over completely.  In fact, New York Harbor froze over with ice so thick that British soldiers were able to march from Manhattan to Staten Island. George Washington decided to place his army at Morristown, New Jersey for winter quarters. When they arrived at the encampment site in November 1779 there was already a foot of snow on the ground. The worst of the snowfalls dropped more than four feet of snow with snow drifts over six feet on January 4, 1780. 

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The North American ice storm of January 1961 was a massive ice storm that struck areas of northern Idaho in the United States at the start of January 1961. The storm set a record for thickest recorded ice accumulation from a single storm in the United States, at 8 inches.  The storm covered areas from Grangeville, in north central Idaho, to the US-Canadian border. A combination of dense fog, sub-freezing temperatures, and occasional freezing rain led to the heavy ice accretions. Catastrophic damage to trees and utilities resulted, resulting in widespread power outages.  Prior to this storm, previous records of between 4 and 6 inches of ice were recorded in New York and Texas. Imagine if you will ice that is 8” thick. That is thicker than several ice cubes stacked end to end. Imagine it covering everything, consider its sheer weight. It caused almost all the tress in the region to break apart. All wires fell, roofs and other structures caved in. Consider how long it would take all that ice to melt – it was weeks and many were without power for even longer. It caused the power industry to devise new ways of not only restoring power, but new ways to distribute power including more sub stations to generate power and the burying of wires and utility lines.

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During Colonial times, Philadelphia was one of the major ports in North America. Lying and the confluence of the mighty Delaware river and the smaller Schuylkill rivers it carried a significant amount of commerce back and forth from Europe to the New World. The Delaware River was deep enough for most of the huge sailing shops of the day to connect right up the docks and easily load or off-load their cargo. Navigation was usually clear from the Atlantic ocean to the great port. Unlike present day, the presence of some ice on the river could lead to a slowing of the ability of ships to navigate any ice fields on the river. Unlike today if bitter cold struck there was no way to break the ice and the wooden ships hulls were vulnerable to damage and even ships of sinking in from significant ice. When the river froze over solid commerce stopped. January 2 was a day of great activity in the Port of Philadelphia in these times gone by after Christmas and New year’s Day, but it came to pass that on January 2, 1740 the Delaware became completely frozen over and shipping came to a halt for the winter. 

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New Years Day 1864 brought an intense day of suffering from the Mid-west into the Tennessee Valley, especially for Union and Confederate soldiers who were camped in tents and other structures not made for permanent living and therefore prepared against the cold. Times where especially tough on confederate prisoners of war, who were not used to the extreme cold. The New Year’s Day cold in Midwest was the worst in decades as a snowstorm and gale force winds struck; Minneapolis had a high of the -25 degrees; Chicago’s high was -16 degrees, with a morning ow -25 degrees minimum. The south was not spared the bitter cold, temperatures dropped from 47 degrees to -19 degrees in 21 hours at Louisville, KY. Newspaper reports from the day reported Intense suffering for Civil War soldiers and prisoners.

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In Dallas, Texas and across north Texas in the month of December the daily high temperatures decrease by 6°F, from 62°F to 56°F, rarely falling below 40°F or exceeding 74°F. Daily low temperatures decrease by 6°F, from 44°F to 39°F, rarely falling below 26°F or exceeding 58°F. It does get cold on occasion though, with record low temperatures at the end of the month in the single digits and even a little below zero on same days. Snowfall can reach a couple inches. Cold air is easily pushed down the plains from Canada in the winter season. Often times this cold air only manages to penetrate the lowest several thousand feet – so it is close to the ground. When this happens and storms push moisture in from the Gulf of Mexico it falls as rain – yet with temperatures near the ground below freezing the rain freezes on all surfaces and causes ice. On December 31, 1978 a severe ice storm struck leaving 1” to 2" of ice over a 100-mile swath from Gainesville to Paris, Texas. Electricity was off for 10 days in parts of Dallas County. More than 2,000 people were treated for frostbite, automobile or falling accidents.

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The winter of 1880–1881 is widely considered the most severe winter ever known in parts of the United States. Many children—and their parents—learned of "The Snow Winter" through the children's book The Long Winter by Laura Ingalls Wilder, in which the author tells of her family's efforts to survive. The snow arrived in October 1880 and blizzard followed blizzard throughout the winter and into March 1881, leaving many areas snowbound throughout the entire winter. For the most part the snow by passed the big cities on the East coast that winter. The cold was only sporadic but on December 30, 1880 bitter cold hit the east coast the mercury dropped to 3 below in Washington D. C. the earlier below zero reading there ever, records were also set in Charlotte North Carolina at 5 below and in Philadelphia the temperature also dropped to negative 5 and the afternoon high temperature despite bright sunshine only reach 5 above zero.

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The heaviest observed and accurately measured snowfall in more than a hundred years, across the plains plans states, hit on December 29, 1830. Many of the cities in the region had just experienced a growth spurt as a jumping off pint for westward travel. Farming was taking hold in the nations’ mid-section. Many immigrants from Europe had moved into the region and brought their farming techniques and strains of wheat that would lead to American becoming the nation’s breadbasket. The push was on to seize the land of Indigenous people and also send settlers on treks to the west coast that was not part of the United States, in places like California and Oregon. All that was stalled for a while as the massive snowstorm struck. Very heavy snow struck 36” was recorded in Kansas City and 30” in Peoria 30". it began the ”Winter of the Deep Snow" with more than 30" on ground in parts of Missouri and Illinois until mid-February. People began to re-think the move west as being too harsh. But the continue influx of refugees from the across the Atlantic continued to push people in search of more land and soon “the Winter of Deep Snow” was forgotten and the movement continued within a few years the great wagon train treks began with the opening of the Oregon Trail.

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