Chinook Posted January 25, 2022 Share Posted January 25, 2022 Several significant weather features came together for a large storm in the Mid-Atlantic area on January 30, 1966. This was a strong phasing situation, that is, a combination of troughs at 500mb. The western lobe of the polar vortex was over the Great Lakes and then dropped in to the Mid-Atlantic, combining with a southern disturbance, which looks like a smaller bump in the 500mb plot. The southern disturbance carried most of the moisture northward. The large divergence at the jet stream level helped to intensify the surface low coming up from the Gulf of Mexico. The low pressure went east of Washington DC and moved northward to Vermont at about 975 mb. On one of the maps posted below, you can see that a combination of multiple events gave over 30" to central Virginia and Maryland within Jan. 20th- Feb 2nd. Lake effect snow under the polar vortex went nuts later in the storm and gave Oswego NY, 60" to 100" a lot coming on January 31st-February 1st. January 30th official NWS Analysis http://greatlakes.salsite.com/maps/jan2931_1966_500_loop.gif http://greatlakes.salsite.com/maps/jan2931_1966_sfc_loop.gif http://greatlakes.salsite.com/Phasing/1960s/Jan_29_1966/500mb_speed_loop.html http://greatlakes.salsite.com/maps/jan2931_1966_850_loop.gif 5 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aldie 22 Posted January 25, 2022 Share Posted January 25, 2022 And 9 months later I was born 1 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maestrobjwa Posted January 25, 2022 Share Posted January 25, 2022 5 minutes ago, leesburg 04 said: And 9 months later I was born If you're serious that is hilarious, lolol Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aldie 22 Posted January 25, 2022 Share Posted January 25, 2022 1 minute ago, Maestrobjwa said: If you're serious that is hilarious, lolol Yep I was born a little early September 1966 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maestrobjwa Posted January 25, 2022 Share Posted January 25, 2022 6 minutes ago, leesburg 04 said: Yep I was born a little early September 1966 Haha That is awesome! Also explains alot Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ji Posted January 25, 2022 Share Posted January 25, 2022 1 hour ago, leesburg 04 said: And 9 months later I was born the one time dc gets lucky with a storm...... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Amped Posted January 30, 2022 Share Posted January 30, 2022 On 1/24/2022 at 11:15 PM, Ji said: the one time dc gets lucky with a storm...... Guess you're not old enough to remember 2010 or 2016. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Amped Posted January 30, 2022 Share Posted January 30, 2022 The 60s had a lot of awesome storms. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fozz Posted January 30, 2022 Share Posted January 30, 2022 1 hour ago, Amped said: Guess you're not old enough to remember 2010 or 2016. I think he's talking about a situation where the overall setup was much more flawed. 2010 and 2016 had damn near perfect upper air patterns with a very juiced up STJ. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jacindc Posted January 30, 2022 Share Posted January 30, 2022 Yep I was born a little early September 1966Close for me, too. August 1966. I've shared this before, but the first part of this clip is home movies from Capitol Hill for the January 1966 storm. (second half is from 1967, since I'm there.) 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Roger Smith Posted January 30, 2022 Share Posted January 30, 2022 The 100th anniversary of the Knickerbocker storm of 1922 came and went. I guess with the death toll that might not be seen as worthy of a thread. Also there was a recent 250th anniversary of the Washington-Jefferson storm of Jan 1772. And today is 12 years from the onset of the great run of snowstorms in 2010. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WEATHER53 Posted January 31, 2022 Share Posted January 31, 2022 Only this 1966 matches Snowmaggedon, I was 10 in Salisbury MD Sideways snow falling , blowing snow, we had packed it down for sledding but just got overwhelmed by drifting. 6’ drifts not uncommon, 3-4’ everywhere. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eskimo Joe Posted January 31, 2022 Share Posted January 31, 2022 Great write up @Chinook 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GramaxRefugee Posted January 31, 2022 Share Posted January 31, 2022 On 1/24/2022 at 9:54 PM, leesburg 04 said: Yep I was born a little early September 1966 One of my sisters was born Feb '66. Don't know the exact day my mom was driven to Providence hospital in NE, but I believe it was at least a day earlier, basically the day or 2 after the storm hit. She always said they were about the only car on the road. My (Canadian) Dad probably drove his mighty 1960 Rambler. Hardly had power to get out of it's own way, but seemed unstoppable in snow; proven in several upstate NY winters. I'm sure we got off school, but can't remember how many days. Drifts formed on lee side of houses. Quite unusual for our area, even during the snowy '60s. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WVclimo Posted January 31, 2022 Share Posted January 31, 2022 I dated a woman who was conceived during the 1966 blizzard lol. Seeing photos of the insane drifts in Maryland, it’s one of the storms that I regret missing, as I was not quite 3 years old and have no recollection of it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WEATHER53 Posted January 31, 2022 Share Posted January 31, 2022 23 minutes ago, WVclimo said: I dated a woman who was conceived during the 1966 blizzard lol. Seeing photos of the insane drifts in Maryland, it’s one of the storms that I regret missing, as I was not quite 3 years old and have no recollection of it. My 2nd nearest drifter was 1996 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AU74 Posted February 1, 2022 Share Posted February 1, 2022 Those accumulated snow maps don't come close to what fell in my neighborhood in the White Oak area of Silver Spring. We had drifts of at least 8 feet, blocking a neighbor's front door all the way up to their front porch roof and lots of 3-4 foot drifts. Not sure how 10-15 inches would have made that possible, even given the prior snowfall. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WEATHER53 Posted February 1, 2022 Share Posted February 1, 2022 In Salisbury it was constant sustained 30mph with persistent gusts to 50 for about 18 hours. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heisy Posted February 1, 2022 Share Posted February 1, 2022 On 1/24/2022 at 11:15 PM, Ji said: the one time dc gets lucky with a storm...... This storm was what March 2001 was supposed to be. Carbon copy just this one phased on time Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jebman Posted February 2, 2022 Share Posted February 2, 2022 I was only 2 years old in 1966. I was probably living with my mom up in Palatine Illinois! Now THAT's a Snow Town! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
snowmagnet Posted February 2, 2022 Share Posted February 2, 2022 I’ve never heard of this storm and I’m surprised my parents had never mentioned it. They were both living/working in DC at the time. How is this not in the top 10 storms of DC? I know the DC has a snow hole, but the cutoff couldn’t have been that different if people were experiencing this in Silver Spring! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JayT Posted February 2, 2022 Share Posted February 2, 2022 I had just started working at a grocery store in Kensington. I had also just earned my drivers license. I remember the start of the storm and having no trouble driving the one mile home. I was due in at 4 am to unload the weekly truck and no one else showed up. At 8 am we usually changed clothing and opened the front doors for customers. I was naive enough to let the few in and opened a register. Around noon the manager showed up having walked about two miles and upon seeing the lights on and me manning a register he let out with a “how the hell did you get in here”? He made the decision to lock up the store so I headed south on Connecticut Ave which was down to one passable lane, made a hard right into my neighborhood, left the car next to what felt like a curb, and walked home. Four years later, after Vietnam and such, I was hired by the police department and heard stories from old timers about this snowstorm. One guy, a veteran of Guadalcanal, said that the chief ordered two officers to respond to the upper county fire stations and they lived there for the duration. One officer said he didn’t go home for six days and responded to emergency calls on a fire truck. The upper parts of Montgomery County were particularly hard hit because of the northwest winds that kept over drifting the north-south roads. 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WEATHER53 Posted February 3, 2022 Share Posted February 3, 2022 The depth in Salisbury was not a 20”-30”monster but more like 18” max but very dry, very windy, very cold, very drifty Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GramaxRefugee Posted February 3, 2022 Share Posted February 3, 2022 16 hours ago, JayT said: I had just started working at a grocery store in Kensington. I had also just earned my drivers license. I remember the start of the storm and having no trouble driving the one mile home. I was due in at 4 am to unload the weekly truck and no one else showed up. At 8 am we usually changed clothing and opened the front doors for customers. I was naive enough to let the few in and opened a register. Around noon the manager showed up having walked about two miles and upon seeing the lights on and me manning a register he let out with a “how the hell did you get in here”? He made the decision to lock up the store so I headed south on Connecticut Ave which was down to one passable lane, made a hard right into my neighborhood, left the car next to what felt like a curb, and walked home. Four years later, after Vietnam and such, I was hired by the police department and heard stories from old timers about this snowstorm. One guy, a veteran of Guadalcanal, said that the chief ordered two officers to respond to the upper county fire stations and they lived there for the duration. One officer said he didn’t go home for six days and responded to emergency calls on a fire truck. The upper parts of Montgomery County were particularly hard hit because of the northwest winds that kept over drifting the north-south roads. Thanks for your great recollection. (I hope our youngsters will get to read it). It may be hard for readers to know how different MoCo was in 1966. The (3 lane) Beltway was only a few years old, and all these multi-lane highways were just 2-lane connectors traveling through farms and forests. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Miss Pixee Posted February 5, 2022 Share Posted February 5, 2022 DC Major Storms: 1899 1922 1936 1958 1966 1979 1983 1987 1996 1999 (ICE / snow) 2000 2003 2009 2010 2016 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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