49 States Isn't Bad

Just a quick update to yesterday's snow related post. Evidently the snow cover on the volcanic mountains of Hawaii melted -- so only 49 of the 50 states in the Union have snow cover at the present. See below for the map:



Evidently the news media has picked up on this story.

Patrick Marsh who, like myself, is aiming for a doctorate in meteorology is trying to find photographic evidence of all of this snow fall. Check out his blog for more information.

Snowfall in all 50 States

Well it's official (almost) there is snow on the ground in all 50 states. Snow has been reported this hour at two sites in the panhandle of Florida (near Crestview, FL). This snowfall is associated with the system that dumped nearly a foot of snow in Dallas, TX before racing across Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama. Heavy snow is being reported intermittently across Georgia and southern Alabama, amid a larger region of moderate snow. Snow in the south coupled with the coastal storms that have pummeled the mid-Atlantic region means that there is likely snow on the ground in all 50 states at the same time. This is, needless to say, quite rare.

The image below shows a satellite derived computer estimate of snow cover as of last night (Thursday into Friday) around 2am. Snow has since overspread Alabama, Georgia and South Carolina -- meaning that assuming there is some documentation of snow on the ground in Florida, all 50 states (including Hawaii) will have snow on the ground.



Still waiting for some good graphics, before I write up a little something on the "blizzard that wasn't" that affected the Mid-Atlantic and Southern New England earlier this week. Enjoy your weekend everyone.

Below: a radar image showing the snow currently affecting the southeast. The rain snow line runs nearly through the triple point between Florida, Alabama and Georgia, then runs NE just south of Albany, GA then continuing NE to about 50 miles south of Columbia, SC.

Snowfall Shifted to Coast This Season

It's been a weird year in terms of snow in the New York Metropolitan Region. Coastal regions, including Long Island, southern Connecticut, New York City and coastal New Jersey have been hammered with snow. Inland regions, like the Hudson Valley have generally seen less snowfall accumulation. The majority of snow has fallen in two large snow storms, the blizzard that came through late in December and the large storm that passed through just yesterday (more on this storm tomorrow). Both of these storms passed out at sea, and precipitation was heaviest near the coast. This snowfall pattern is atypical. The map below shows the annual mean snowfall over the New York Metro Region.



In general snowfall follows topography -- with higher amounts falling in higher elevations inland, away from the (generally) warmer ocean. New York City averages near 25" a year. Long Island averages between 20" near the south shore and 30" near the north shore. There is a steep gradient in the lower Hudson Valley with locations nearest to Long Island Sound and New York City receiving 30" a snow per year, while locations just inland like Northern Westchester receive upwards of 45" per year on average.

The reason for the gradient as seen above is temperature. Locations nearest to the ocean are usually the warmest, and when the wind blows off the ocean temperatures tend to creep above the freezing mark of 32 F. This season, that has not been the case. Storms have passed further to the south and east allowing nearly all of the region to stay below freezing. Instead this season areas closest to the storm have received the most snowfall -- yielding high snow totals near the ocean. The map below shows the snowfall for the December 18 - 21 Blizzard. As you can see snowfall is maximized near the shoreline, nearest to the storm. Temperature was not an issue in this storm, allowing for high snowfall near the coast.



With more snow in the forecast for early next week, will the interior sections begin to make up their deficiency in snow? Will the heating power of the ocean change the snow to rain along the coast? Or, will this storm follow the track of other systems and dump heavy amounts of snow along coastal locations leaving those snow fans inland wondering where there snow has gone?