"Bench" marking Washington's historic snows

I wonder if the temporary fence behind the benches in the storm of '03 made any difference.

Great article & photos, Kevin!

I was thinking about why the 2003 storm seemed so much more than the Dec 09 one, and I remembered that the winter of 2002-2003 there was a lot of little snows, because I recall that by the end of the winter even I, a huge snow lover, was done with having to clean off my car. However, I could not recall if we already had any snow on the ground before the President's Day storm hit. If so, that may have been the difference. Like if there was already 3 or 4 inches, it would have made the total appear larger.

kallieh,
ha! were you shorter in 2003...?!

my daughter remembers '03 as being almost up to her waist....! oh my gosh that was a great storm. naturally, these three are my favorite storms ever. the 96 one was when i made my first sculpture... been hooked ever since. both the 96 and 03 storms "seemed" a lot bigger than the 09 storm to me....

Seems like we hit some sort of "limit" AOA 15 inches of snow, broken only in rare instances.

I think it has something to do with the situation of DCA right on the river.

There should have been another storm on the recent list of historic snowstorms...the March,1993 "Superstorm". The reason it isn't here is obvious...all that darned rain and sleet down here at Potomac River level at the height of the storm!

in what month was the 96 storm?

blizzard of 96 was in january

walter-

good point, but no I wasn't shorter. Though I did live further west then and now I'm right on the river so maybe I really did have more in 03. But looking at the bench pictures above, it also appears that 09 was less than 03. Just thinking of other possible solutions then just National Airport being a poor place to measure.

kallieh: In the immediate DC area, there was no snow on the ground before the Presidents' Day Snowstorm of 2003. The night before the storm we had rain that ended as a dusting of snow.

Thanks Kevin!

It must have been the more west vs more east thing then.

The 2003 storm paralyzed the area because it was one of those typical DC "cusp" storms, where we could have gotten 4 inches or 24, and jurisdictions just weren't prepared. My husband and I took the metro from Arlington to Silver Spring to visit family when there was about a foot of snow on the ground (and it was still running!), and we were still there three days later because all the Potomac bridges were closed.
With the 2009 storm, it was clear from about 48 hours out that we were in for a "major to historic event," and they were able to deploy crews effectively. (I was able to make it from Silver Spring to National Airport early Sunday morning with very little trouble this year. Not that my plane took off...)
It also didn't hurt that this was only the second real snow event of the year, and it was earlier in the season. The 2003 storm was later in a season that had already seen several snowfalls, and jurisdictions were being more cautious with their resources in an uncertain situation.

What buzzes my curiosity, is why are the airport readings from our December 2009 snowstorm so off from backyard measurements? Everyone that I know of around the IAD area measured between 18" to 20" at least, but the Airport only recorded 16" even. Around DCA, acquaintances of mine measured anywhere from 22" to 24", yet Reagan National only published a snowfall report of 16.4". Why are there such considerable differences, especially when those who measured on their own did so in an accurate manner? Are the airport officials measuring from the middle of active runways lol?

TheAnalyst: Your question has been asked after every major snowstorm. Reagan National has been consistently low on their snow measurements for years compared to nearby locations. My theory is that it's a combination of their low elevation and being located next to the Potomac River. It's also possible National Airport does not have a good, sheltered area for measuring snow. If DC had their official weather station in the hills of NW DC, the city's snowfall average would be higher.

American University, which is nearly 400 ft. above sea level had 16 inches in the Dec. 2009 storm. And places in Alexandria only had 12 inches, so DCA did pretty well, considering, although another inch at DCA would have put this storm among the D.C.'s top four.

The 2003 storm was actually two separate snowfalls: a preliminary snow Saturday afternoon, then about an 8-9 hr. break before the heavier snow came. But they were (unfairly, I think) lumped together. In the first snowfall, DCA had only about one inch of show, although I was at Congressional Mall that afternoon and there was about four inches on the ground. The second part of the 2003 storm was 15-plus inches at DCA, and broke all-time records in Baltimore, Berkeley Springs and other places.

The mother of all D.C snows in the years I've lived here was in 1979. 18.7 inches of snow fell atop an earlier snow of about six inches, and it was very cold, in the lower teens, for much of the big storm.

Jumping to the 1996 storm, there was an initial big storm from Sat. night - Monday a.m. (which was also a two part-snowfall, the second part being wraparound snow, so it was technically the same storm). Then three smaller snows in succeeding days so that by Friday, the city was buried and the U.S. government only attempted to open on Thursday that week.

While impressive, the so-called Dec. 2009 "snowpocalypse" was something of a wannabe', compared to the 1979 and 1996 storms, because there wasn't any snow on the ground before the storm began and no additional snow ensued. But as noted, another inch and it would have been up there in the big, big time.

On average we get one 15-inch-plus snow around here per decade, at least since I moved to Washington in mid-1966. We may see a few one-foot snows in the next few winters. But statisically, it may be awhile before another "snowpocalypse" happens in Washington.

Finally, I want to mention a very unique situation, when I was a kid living at Camp Lejeune, NC. This semitropical location had 13.4 inches of snow in March, in three separate snowfalls. And it was so bad in western NC, that food had to be air dropped to folks living in the mountains. For someone who lived most of their childhood in central Florida, it was awesome.

In the above post, I forgot to include the year of the heavy North Carolina snowfalls; it was in 1960.

JerryFloyd1: I agree, the December 2009 storm fell just short of the all-time great storms in recent times, but the fact that it was a December storm made it truly impressive for this area. Regarding National's snowfall, I was on the Mall after the storm and it did seem like 16" of snow to me. I live near Dulles, however, and I think they were on the low side. I measured 21" to 22" of snow in my backyard and Dulles measured 18".

Kevin, as so often happens hereabouts, during the December 2009 storm, there were great differences in the amounts of snowfall from place to place, e.g., 24" in Bethesda and I believe Columbia.

Re: December snowfalls, the very first December I spent here, in 1966, there was quite a bit of snow, including a significant Christmas Eve storm. Then a mild January, with only 1.8 inches of snow. Then all hell broke loose in February (by our standards), with a 10.6" DCA snowfall earlier in the month and later, a "twofer" snow of 6-7" at DCA. I vaguely recall other, smaller snowfall that month.

Anyway, the photos you took are great. It's just a shame there aren't more opportunities to "benchmark" snow hereabouts.

But... so far this winter has seemed remarkably like 1966-67 and the Arctic Oscillation may be reverting back to a negative phase, so quien sabe? Unless El Nino rules, February could be a good snow month hereabouts. So keep the camera handy!