Snow?! In April?!?!? Yup…it happens….quite often. When looking at Boston snowfall data going back to 1891 and look at 125 years of snowfall data you find that seeing snowflakes in the month of April is not odd. Seeing some snowflakes—but not enough to accumulate/measure (or melts on contact) has happened 84% of the time. Where it becomes more unusual is accumulating snow.
We deem that *measurable* snow—any amount equal to or greater than .1" of snow. Of the past 125 Aprils that Boston has been a part of, 46% of them have seen measurable snow. Let’s increase the amount of snow…..when looking at 2" of snow (or more) in the month of April, that’s only happened for 28 of the 125 years….22%. When Boston picks up 6" (or more) of snow in April, you enter "very unusual" status. Only 9 of the 125 years (7%) has there been 6" or more inches of snow in April for Boston.
Over the past two days, Boston has picked up 6.6" of snow making April 2016 the 8th snowiest April on record. #SolidEffort. The snowiest is thanks to that infamous April Fools storm back in 1997, where the total for the month (and storm) was 22.4" of snow….I can assure you, that record will stay in the books!
The reason for so much snow these past two days is the temperature. Normally, when it snows in April the temps are in the low to mid 30s which prevents the snow from accumulating (falling but not enough to measure due to melting) but today we saw very cold temps—mid & upper 20s–which allowed for the snow to fall & pile up.
OK….when are we melting this junk? Well……slowly at first as the next two days will start cold–low 20s and only reach the upper 30s to around 40. These temps are way below the normal high of 53 but that sun is strong so direct sunlight will really chew up the snow the next two days (if you can, shovel & move the snow into sunny areas–out of the shade where it will do its thing). By late week, we will see our temps recover to normal with highs in the 50s both Thursday & Friday. Unfortunately, more cold is head this way for the weekend—not like today but below normal.
Stay warm.
~JR