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Epic Snow to Rain or Rain to Snow Events


Hoosier

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Post any that you know of or have personally experienced. I'm not talking a little rain which changes to a lot of snow or vice versa, but events where there were large amounts of both types of precip.

Can't think of many off the top of my head but the mid December 1929 snowstorm is one event. The nearby COOP recorded a whopping 3.29" of precip. Here are daily highs/lows/precip:

17th: 44/39...1.77"

18th: 39/15...1.02"

19th: 15/13...0.50"

Based on that, it may have been like a 60/40 split between rain/snow. 20.5" of snow was recorded, which is LAF's biggest snowstorm on record.

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I'm terrible with dates. For that to happen around here it usually takes a deepening low pressure out of the sw to pass right over central OH. We start out with heavy rain that can quickly/dramatically change to accumulating snow. It's been a very long time since we had that scenario here. I know it happened a couple of winters back in the early 90's. I'm thinking Jan '92 for one.

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I'm terrible with dates. For that to happen around here it usually takes a deepening low pressure out of the sw to pass right over central OH. We start out with heavy rain that can quickly/dramatically change to accumulating snow. It's been a very long time since we had that scenario here. I know it happened a couple of winters back in the early 90's. I'm thinking Jan '92 for one.

January 13-15, 1992. Rain to TSSN in Toledo, ~7" here, a foot at DTW. Very interesting storm really, especially with the rapid intensification- 1004mb to 976mb in a day

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January 13-15, 1992. Rain to TSSN in Toledo, ~7" here, a foot at DTW. Very interesting storm really, especially with the rapid intensification- 1004mb to 976mb in a day

thanks! I was just coming to post January 14, I ran thru surface maps for the month of Jan in 1992.

I remember going to bed, it was pouring out. Woke up about 4am it was sleeting, then it went to heavy snow. I think we got around 4". If I remember correctly an Alberta Clipper came thru 2 days later. We had 2 winterstorm warnings in 3 days....

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This is an easy one for me. The epic 4 day storm of Christmas 2009. We had quite a bit of glazing on the 23rd in the WAA wing. Then over an inch of regular rain on the 24th going into early on the 25th. This was then followed by several inches of snow in the overperforming high-ratio snow as the cyclonic circulation sent several waves through on the 26th. Sorry, kind of a run-on sentence but i aint no good at fancy spellin englesh.

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Only thing of significance that comes to mind was back east at the coast and thus the blizz of 96. 10-12 heavy duty snows to a driving rain/sleet ( along with some coastal flooding to help the cause ) which wiped out all of the snow imby and then it went back to/ended as snow and dropped 8-10...

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Those seem to be a thing of the past in Detroit. We rarely have to deal with those...I mean we get the occasional rain ending as an inch of snow, or a little snow to start before turning to rain events....but its been YEARS since weve had such a storm. The most epic I can recall would be Jan 30-Feb 1, 2002...I had 3.01" of precip and 9.5" snow...started as light rain, turned to 9.5" snow, then like 1.75" freezing rain, but that was really more ice and snow rather than rain and snow.

Whats funny is we had many such events in the old days, though more often than not it seemed to be snow turning to rain. Actually had quite a few in the '50s if i recall. Another example of the good times weenies have had recently here....when we get a snowstorm, we get a snowstorm. Even when storms track west of us we seem to be more inclined to get dryslot than rain. Thank your lucky stars for that dryslot and a few sleet pellets rather than a soaking rain that is washing away the snow you just received! Of course way west and we get rain...but in that case its a rainstorm to begin with.

Cool thread idea will look up some stuff later.

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Only thing of significance that comes to mind was back east at the coast and thus the blizz of 96. 10-12 heavy duty snows to a driving rain/sleet ( along with some coastal flooding to help the cause ) which wiped out all of the snow imby and then it went back to/ended as snow and dropped 8-10...

crazy. So you had like 20" of snow with only 10" to show for it lol

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crazy. So you had like 20" of snow with only 10" to show for it lol

Yep.. Went from a blizzard warning to a winter storm warning and even dropped to a advisory ( may have been nothing but coastal stuff briefly? ) and back to a winter storm warning.. Something along those lines.. They did not expect the back end snows.. Thankfully Feb 2-4 1996 came along which made up for it imby/at the DE coast/S.DE..

My biggest rain to snow was Vets day back east.. Another was system 1 of the infamous back to back snowstorms in the winter of 86-87 back east..

On the flip side i have seen more then my share of heavy snow to heavy rain events which you probably tend to see more of living by/at the coast.. Was one during that epic cold stretch in late fall/early winter 89. Started with about 8" inches of snow which switched to a driving cold rain while less then say 10 miles away stayed mostly snow and they ended up with 12-18+... Just the beach areas ( where i lived.. OC MD) switched to rain.. And yes it was that 33 and rain all fears..

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Don't remember the exact day but it was the first week of January 1996. I went into work which at that time was 5 minutes from my house and it was raining pretty good that morning. I had a winter storm warning so i knew it was going to change to snow sometime soon. Got to work at 11am with a moderate rain falling and by noon it was an all out blizzard. Got sent home just before 1pm and it took 30 minutes to get there.

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Don't remember the exact day but it was the first week of January 1996. I went into work which at that time was 5 minutes from my house and it was raining pretty good that morning. I had a winter storm warning so i knew it was going to change to snow sometime soon. Got to work at 11am with a moderate rain falling and by noon it was an all out blizzard. Got sent home just before 1pm and it took 30 minutes to get there.

That was the blizzard of 96 i do believe which nailed parts of Ohio as well as i95/the coast?

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Only thing of significance that comes to mind was back east at the coast and thus the blizz of 96. 10-12 heavy duty snows to a driving rain/sleet ( along with some coastal flooding to help the cause ) which wiped out all of the snow imby and then it went back to/ended as snow and dropped 8-10...

haha, that's crazy.

And yeah, I wouldn't be surprised if the snow to rain events (talking big events) are more common near the east coast. That marine air is just waiting to come inland given the right setup.

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haha, that's crazy.

And yeah, I wouldn't be surprised if the snow to rain events (talking big events) are more common near the east coast. That marine air is just waiting to come inland given the right setup.

Seattle and Portland are known for this more then anywhere.. Near certain of that..

Never seen ( before or since ) snow come down so heavy as it did when that first got cranking. Gave someone a ride home from the bar ( 10 mins away ) right when it started and as soon as i headed back for the house it was a whiteout. To wake up to the pingers and heavy rain the following morning made me wish i had had a hangover so i could go back to sleep. lol Then when it went back to snow ( even as it was ending ) i was thinking what could have been..

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Those seem to be a thing of the past in Detroit. We rarely have to deal with those...I mean we get the occasional rain ending as an inch of snow, or a little snow to start before turning to rain events....but its been YEARS since weve had such a storm. The most epic I can recall would be Jan 30-Feb 1, 2002...I had 3.01" of precip and 9.5" snow...started as light rain, turned to 9.5" snow, then like 1.75" freezing rain, but that was really more ice and snow rather than rain and snow.

Whats funny is we had many such events in the old days, though more often than not it seemed to be snow turning to rain. Actually had quite a few in the '50s if i recall. Another example of the good times weenies have had recently here....when we get a snowstorm, we get a snowstorm. Even when storms track west of us we seem to be more inclined to get dryslot than rain. Thank your lucky stars for that dryslot and a few sleet pellets rather than a soaking rain that is washing away the snow you just received! Of course way west and we get rain...but in that case its a rainstorm to begin with.

Cool thread idea will look up some stuff later.

Here in CMH what has become rare are the decent backlash events. It seems several good snows came on the heels of warm storms and frontal passages in the winters of the 80's and 90's. I can't remember the last true backlash snow event here since the early 90's.

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The big lake effect event of November 1996...Back in Nov 9th of 1996, I remember it raining hard most of the day (thunder too) and the temps were falling from the mid 40s down to the mid 30s at the time I was going out to eat which was in the evening. On the way to the restaurant downtown, it was pouring rain with more thunder and lightning. When we arrived at the restaurant, the rain was mixing with big, fat snowflakes.

We were in the restaurant for almost 4 hours (someone's birthday party). I remember hearing occasional claps of thunder and the lights blinking closer to the time we were going to leave.

When we finally got out of there (I really wanted to because I was anxious about how bad the storm was and I wanted to see it.) and I will never forget opening the door to 8 inches of wet snow!! There were huge ruts in the parking lot and trees were weighted down almost to the ground. It was autumn and leaves were on many trees, especially the lake. It was snowing lightly then.

Well, we fought our way home...thankfully we were in a Jeep Cherokee but the person driving had to put it in 4 wheel drive on I-90! As we drove further east on 90, the snow came down harder and harder. The lightning and thunder came back.

After about a 2 hour trip, I got home to over a foot on the grown with my birch tree all the way bent to the ground. I shook the snow off of it so I wouldn't lose it.

The event went on to dump anotner 3 - 4 feet thru the next week. Incredible!

Here is a link to info about the LES event of '96.

http://ww2010.atmos.uiuc.edu/(Gh)/arch/cases/961109/home.rxml

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Usually around here it seems like it's one or the other. Usually these kind of events are inland from the lake a bit more or south. I remember one event off hand during January of 1998 where there was a stalled out frontal boundary stretched from Texas to northern MI due to a blocking Bermuda High. Waves of low pressures formed and the area was getting rain in the upper 30s or so. But the last s/w to go through shifted a little further east, and Boom! - we had about 8" of surprise snow overnight.

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March 19/20, 1996. After a cold, dry winter where EVERYTHING missed us, a pouring rain developed late afternoon the 19th. The TV news stations (my then source for weather forecasts) said the rain would turn to snow, and would drop 1-3" of snow (1 station said 2-4" was possible) overnight. I went to bed with rain pounding on the roof, and woke up to silence. Just a light whistle of wind. Power was out. I looked outside, everything was PLASTERED in wet snow. The red house across the alley was white. We ended up with 7" of snow after a half inch of rain, and I still remember the storm vividly. It was gorgeous, and easily the biggest storm of that meek season. DTW official total March 19/20 was 1.03" precip, 5.8" snow.

February 13, 1950 heavy snow developed over Detroit and turned to freezing rain then rain. The storm initially dropped 5.0" of snow, but by the time the storm ended on the 14th 2.43" of precip had fallen and only 1" of snow remained on the ground.

On November 6, 1951, very heavy snow developed, crippling Detroits rush hour with blinding snow before turning into heavy rain. The Nov 6/7 storm total was 2.19" precip, 5.7" snow. Though nearly 6" of snow lay on the ground by the evening of the 6th, by the time the storm ended on the 7th only 2" remained, after all the rain. Areas NW of Detroit had over a foot of snow.

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It looks like we may be able to add Dec 19 - 21, 2012 to the list for some areas of our subforum.

ORD: (Thanks, Tim)

21 12/20 21Z 41 41 2 10 0.34 0.02 543 531 2.3 -21.8 984 100 -TSRA 012OVC225 0.0 2.7

24 12/21 00Z 33 32 331 19 0.44 0.00 537 528 -3.1 -22.0 988 100 SN 008OVC231 4.0 0.6

27 12/21 03Z 32 31 319 23 0.25 0.00 534 529 -6.0 -21.4 993 100 SN 009OVC249 2.5 0.4

30 12/21 06Z 32 30 316 23 0.10 0.00 531 530 -7.6 -22.9 998 100 -SN 005OVC136 1.0 1.7

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It looks like we may be able to add Dec 19 - 21, 2012 to the list for some areas of our subforum.

ORD: (Thanks, Tim)

21 12/20 21Z 41 41 2 10 0.34 0.02 543 531 2.3 -21.8 984 100 -TSRA 012OVC225 0.0 2.7

24 12/21 00Z 33 32 331 19 0.44 0.00 537 528 -3.1 -22.0 988 100 SN 008OVC231 4.0 0.6

27 12/21 03Z 32 31 319 23 0.25 0.00 534 529 -6.0 -21.4 993 100 SN 009OVC249 2.5 0.4

30 12/21 06Z 32 30 316 23 0.10 0.00 531 530 -7.6 -22.9 998 100 -SN 005OVC136 1.0 1.7

Exactly what I was thinking!

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When I was much younger, we had an epic snow/rain/freezing rain/sleet storm in the St. Louis metro area.

We had about 6 inches of snow on the ground, I can't remember if that was the same storm, or if it was from a previous storm, though. The storm started with sleet in the warm sector, and we totaled out about an inch of sleet (On top of the 6 inches of snow). It changed over to freezing rain for about 30 minutes, fusing all of the sleet and melting the snow beneath it. It completed it's change over to rain for a very short time before a the cold front roared in and dropped the temp to well under freezing. When I awoke the next morning, there was a layer of ice hovering 4-6 inches off the ground that supported my body weight. Needless to say, I proceeded to lace up my ice skates and see what it was like to ice skate on a hill, then my friends and I built an ice fortress by making ice bricks out of my yard.

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Looking at the Toronto data, the biggest mixed precip event appears to be Jan 1-2, 1932 when a total of 13.0" of snow and 1.32" of rain fell in temperatures that remained close to freezing throughout.

I wasn't around for that one, but I do recall a storm around Jan 14-15, 1968 that started with 10 to 12 inches of snow and changed to about an inch of freezing rain. This did enormous damage to trees in Toronto and closed down the university where I was studying for the better part of a week.

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