CPcantmeasuresnow

With a seasonal average of 5 inches I guess they're always in a snow drought. LOL It's almost like saying Atlanta is in a snow drought. When is it a snow drought and when is it just your climate norm.

This time of year I find 30's have very little impact on snow pack, even when sunny. Add to it that the current snow pack wich is 12 inches here, Orange County, has a LE of 1.5 inches. The late December sun, even in the 30's will do very little damage to that. It's a different story of course in urban areas with all of the blacktop, higher daytime highs, traffic etc. However rain and high 40's to low 50's on strong southerly winds, that would be a snow killer on Christmas Eve if it happens as currently depicted.

That could really kill a lot, it not all of the snowpack on Christmas Eve. Boy would that suck.

I'm not sure, but Toronto averages 47 inches of snow a season and Seattle averages about 5 inches a season. I'm assuming long periods between 10 inch snowfalls in Seattle are pretty common.

I lived in Madison Wisconsin for several years and people never believe me when I tell them it snows a lot more here in the Hudson Valley then it does there. It's colder there, but cold and dry. A big storm to them is 6-8 inches, but of course it does stay on the ground longer than places in and close to NYC. Big storms are a rarity in the Midwest, the perfect example is Minneapolis. They have been keeping weather records almost as long as NYC, since the 1880's. They average about 50 inches of snow per season, similar to Toronto, but In that time they have had 5 storms with more than 17 inches of snow, New York City has had 16 storms over 17 inches in the same time span. I wish I could remember the exact length of time because I heard it in the last year, but the gap for 10 inch snowfalls in Toronto is incredibly long right now. I forget how many years but maybe Bluewave, Don, Uncle W or someone of that ilk knows.

Someone may have already posted this but the 1:00pm update in Central Park was 10.5 inches for the storm. The city now needs only 0.8 inches by the end of the month to reach a 30 inch average, when the new 30 year averages are calculated next month. Amazing when it looked like that was a lock 2 and half years ago and it's coming right down to the wire.

There have been 29 Decembers with 10 or more inches of snow in NYC, but stupidly this morning I included this year being the 29th December with 10 inches or more in the calculations below. So there have been 28 full seasons in NYC with 10 or more inches of snow in December and here's how they fared. I'm sure most don't care but I do strive for accuracy, so here's the corrected percentages. 24 of those winters have then had 30 or more inches for the season or 85.7% 17 of the 28 have had 40 or more inches of snow for the season or 60.7% 9 of the 28 have had 50 or more inches of snow for the season or 32.1% 4 of the 28 have had 60 or more inches of snow for the season or 14.2% 1 of the 28 have had 70 or more inches of snow for the season or 3.6%

Revision of first post There have been 29 Decembers with 10 or more inches of snow in NYC 24 of those winters have then had 30 or more inches for the season or 82.8% 17 of the 29 have had 40 or more inches of snow for the season or 58.6% 9 of the 29 have had 50 or more inches of snow or the season or 31.0%

It does appear that Central Park did officially record 10 inches of snow from this storm. A couple of things of note about that. This becomes the 66th storm since 1870 of 10 inches or more in NYC and the 13th in December. The breakdown by months as seen below. This now brings the December 30 year average (1991-2020) to 5.1 inches. December now needs 1.3 inches of snow to get the December average to 5.2 which will bring the 30 year average to 30.0. I hope it's in the cards.

6.5 inches in Central park as of midnight. Will see how much falls on the 17th but this leaves the city now 4.8 inches short of getting Decembers 30 year average to 5.2 which will then bring the 30 year average to 30 inches. The average for December now stands at 5.0 inches, 4.99 to be exact, which if no more snow fell this month would put the 30 year average at 29.8 This will make it an interesting last 2 weeks.

These are the top 20 storms in NYC, with the storms of the 2000's highlighted in red. Amazing how they have filled the top ten in the last 20 years. To get on the list this storm would have to exceed 15.2 inches in Central Park. I'd love to see it happen but doubting it does. More realistic is the 11.3 inches I keep touting so the 30 year average gets to 30 inches for the Jan 1991 to Dec 2020 calculations to come out next month. It would be nice to get both but I'll take the 11.3 and hope for the top 20 after that. Of course the way they measure in the Park we may not know final totals until early Friday morning, after settling and compression takes its toll.

I would never accept that, unless we in the N&W/N&E sub forum were allowed to then conquer and annex the southern New England Forum into the NYC forum. We must keep a balance, there's already to many south of I78ers here., and I don't like their climate.

Hey Uncle thanks for the input. I believe our differences are due to rounding and how NOAA will handle that I'm not sure. Also I'm calculating December right now as if no snow will fall for the month which will give it a 4.8 inch average for 1991-2020. Here are the averages carried out past the one tenth decimal. I'm assuming they round January down to 8.7 and February down to 10.1. On the other months I'm rounding up and we agree and that accounts for our.differences. As to what NOAA will do who knows. They had the calculation for 1981-2010 incorrect for 4 years at 25.1 inches. I had to e-mail them several times over the course of a year until to their credit they finally checked and corrected their data in March 2014 and posted the average at 25.8. I still calculate 25.9 for that period but I let it go at that point.

Here's the list since official records began. Many interesting things of note here. As I noted when this discussion began. NYC needs to record 11.3 inches of snow this December to get the December average to 5.2 and thus the 30 year average to 30.0. It may be close and depend on who is working the ruler the next three weeks and how much they really care about accurate snow measurements in Central Park. It's been a very inexact science through the last several decades.

The answer to that is never. The closest was the period 1891-1920 when the seasonal average was 32.2 inches and February averaged 9.8 inches for that period. The monthly breakdowns for that time period which as stated earlier was the last 30 year period to average more than 30 inches per season was as follows: ......November........December........January..........February...........March.............April................Total..........

I've touched on this subject quite a bit the last two years, but now that we're down to the last three weeks I thought it would be a good time to review where NYC, Central Park specifically, stands in the quest for a 30 inch snowfall average when the new 30 year averages are calculated next month. For those not aware how it works the 30 year snowfall averages will be calculated for the period from January 1991 through December 2020. In short this will mean say goodbye to the 1980's from the averages, which hold the record as the least snowiest decade recorded. Assuming NOAA calculates the averages for each month by rounding up or down to the nearest tenth of an inch, the months who have their 30 years completed look as follows: October..........0.1 November.....0.5 December.....4.9 (29 year avg) final number to be determined January.........8.7 February......10.1 March............5.0 April..............0.4 May..................T The 30 year average calculated now would be 29.7 inches. To get December to a 5.2 average, or in this case 5.15 which should round up to 5.2, Central Park will need to record 11.3 inches of snow this December, which is what will be needed to get the 30 year average to 30.0 inches. Currently the December 1991 -2020 period averages 4.773 inches which would round to 4.8 and would make the 30 year average 29.6 inches if no snow falls this December. Here's to hoping that if Wednesday is indeed a surprise heavy snowfall for the city, the Conservancy? doesn't measure 11.2 inches and leave us hanging for the rest of the month.

Oh God I hope not

My response to your map is in the same spirit as you drew the map. Just having fun.

Very passive aggressive to those in CNE and NNE. However I'm good with it. Extended out to the HV I'm guessing I'm in the 24-36 inch band. That might even be enough for me not to gripe about the 48-60 inch totals 50 miles to my east. Upon reflection probably not, I'd be annoyed.

Following one of the great cold waves of all time in January 1961. Poughkeepsie set their all time record low of -30 during the stretch your referring to. I believe the closest they've come since was -23.

Great stats. I have this April as number 9 in NYC though, not 8. You might want to double check that, one of us is wrong on that one. Top 10 Snowiest Aprils NYC 1....1875....13.5 2....1915....10.2 3....1982......9.6 4....1924......8.5 5.....1917.....6.5 6.....1944.....6.5 7.....1938.....6.4 8.....1907.....5.8 9....2018....5.5 10....1887....5.0