OT: Storm of the Century - 31 years ago this week
- Thread starter MadRU
- Start date
That’s when I was working in Newark. Fortunately I commuted by train so I walked from the office past streets full of gridlocked cars. Talked to our PR guy the next day, he stayed in the office til 6, then left to drive home to PA. Took him an hour to drive around the block, back into the parking lot and slept in the office overnight.
Also the storm of 1888 similar dates that year
https://www.wunderground.com/cat6/the-blizzard-of-1888-americas-greatest-snow-disaster
https://www.wunderground.com/cat6/the-blizzard-of-1888-americas-greatest-snow-disaster
That was quite a storm, it occurred on a Saturday. I remember there was a lot of discussion during the week and there was some question of how bad it would be for NJ/NYC. On that Friday I had gone out for a few drinks with some work friends to watch some of the NCAA tournament games. It was a beautiful day , sunny and temps in the 50s. Then on the bar tv , there was a message scroll stating that the NWS had issued a blizzard warning for the next day for the area. I couldn’t believe it.
Wouldn't that be the Storm of Last Century?
I was gonna ask “which” storm of the century. There are so many…this one was well before climate histrionics became a sport
I was working in NYC at the time. I left at about 3pm but trains stopped running from Penn Station to NJ. Got on a train and then it didn’t run for more than an hour. Six hour commute home, got to the station and obviously nothing plowed. I had a snow shovel in the trunk and shoveled a path in my business suit to get out.
I expected to say the same, but looks like it qualifies due to how widespread it was - from Texas up through Northeast. Plus, some eastern locations getting almost 5 feet of snow.
I remember the 96 storm well. I was sick during finals week and had make-ups scheduled for the first week in January. All those make-ups needed to also be made-up. LOL!
January 6-8 1996 stands out as the GOAC (Greatest of the Antecedent Century). Was working in NYC at the time, and shut NYC down. People who lived in Manhattan said people were cross-country skiing on the Avenues.
But kudos to the storm in OP for being a the great late blooming storm of last century. But early March snow was more common 30 years ago. I'm doing my part by having an EV and solar panels to bring that back.
In our area from a storm accumulation total that is true. However, it was a tremendously powerful storm from the Gulf coast to Canada. There was near hurricane force winds and a high storm tide along the Florida panhandle and very strong wind driven snow of over 2ft in many areas from NC to Maine. The storm tracked directly over NJ , snow totals were held down due to a changeover to sleet. Where I live, we got about 14 inches of snow (blown sideways) in about 6 hrs. I also think that storm recorded the lowest barometric reading ever recorded in NYC before Sandy broke that.
It 100% does. Scope and size was off the charts. Severe weather down south, foot of snow from the deep south all the way to Maine. Brutal cold temps.
I believe this is the last storm jn the northeast to phase all 3 branches of the jet stream. Was also the first storm weather models did a really good job of predicting.
Not necessarily the storm of the century here in the Tri-State. But nationwide, including the South, it may well be.
North Carolina with 50" of snow, with 14 foot drifts.
A spot in Tenesse with 53 inches.
Snowshoe WV with 44"
A spot in PA with 36"
Syracuse with 43.
That is a swath right there.
I remember cruising around in my 85 Grand Wagoneer, but got stuck in a drift with the snow up above the bumber, then I guess some moisture got up into something because the truck then just completely cut out.
I think we had 2 ft.
I was managing a data center in Southbury Ct. We ran 24/7. So, we had to plan ahead for about 30 employees to work through the storm. Figured it would be 2-3 days.
Had any of the team that had sleeping bags and cots at home bring them in and bought a bunch from the local stores. The IBM site had generators so, we were able to pre purchase food and store in the cafeteria- the cafeteria kept 3 employees on so we had nice meals.
It was a long run but in a way- a lot of fun.
Had any of the team that had sleeping bags and cots at home bring them in and bought a bunch from the local stores. The IBM site had generators so, we were able to pre purchase food and store in the cafeteria- the cafeteria kept 3 employees on so we had nice meals.
It was a long run but in a way- a lot of fun.
The problem with that storm was that cars on the street became encased in ice for days.
On that Monday night,Ray Lucas and I were pushing cars to clear a path for the traffic on a main street in Harrison.(I was only 42 at the time.)
I was thinking what Doug Graber would say were he to see this.
On that Monday night,Ray Lucas and I were pushing cars to clear a path for the traffic on a main street in Harrison.(I was only 42 at the time.)
I was thinking what Doug Graber would say were he to see this.
This was on top of Mount Mitchell which is the highest peak east of the Mississippi. But, everyone in Western NC still talks about how much snow there was in lower elevations, the loss of power and a complete shut down of everything.
This is the one I remember the most. Was dating my now wife who lived in downtown Jersey City. My car was trapped. There was just no where to put the snow and the streets were so narrow they didn't plow for days.January 6-8 1996 stands out as the GOAC (Greatest of the Antecedent Century). Was working in NYC at the time, and shut NYC down. People who lived in Manhattan said people were cross-country skiing on the Avenues.
But kudos to the storm in OP for being a the great late blooming storm of last century. But early March snow was more common 30 years ago. I'm doing my part by having an EV and solar panels to bring that back.
Same here. We'd been to a wedding the afternoon before in North Jersey and you could just tell it was going to snow. I'm pretty certain that I ran a race in Central Park Sunday morning and it started to snow at the beginning. By the end (a 5k, 4m or 5m race) it was starting to stick and getting slippery. Hope I'm remembering that correctly.
Regardless, it was a hell of a storm.
Tennessee too. Topped out at 56" on Mt Leconte.
Major coastal flooding at the Jersey Shore. 2nd only to Sandy as far back as I remember.
There was a storm sometime in the early 90’s the night of a Super Bowl. I was in Ct and had to drive home into NY and it was a nightmare. Maybe 5 hours for a 45 min drive on Rt 84
I know it snowed in '87 when the Giants beat Denver. Someone I know who was a producer for NJN was there in LA and couldn't get a flight back for 2-3 days iirc.
It was clearly the Storm of the Century for the eastern US, looking at total impact of snow, sleet, rain, tornadoes, winds and record cold in its wake across the entire eastern US from Florida to Maine, including 6" of snow in the FL panhandle and up to 10" or more across much of the deep south, including 300 killed by the storm (vs 153 for Jan 1996). That's why it has the highest NESIS (northeast snowfall impact scale) rating of any storm in history, with only Jan 1996 also scoring as a Cat 5 snowstorm for the NE US.
https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/access/monitoring/rsi/nesis
However, I will agree that Jan 1996 was a bit more impactful for much NJ and the 95 corridor from DC to Boston, based on snowfall amounts, as Jan 96 didn't change to rain along the coast or sleet up through 95, but where March 1993 was all snow it was close to Jan 1996 with 18-27" across most of NWNJ, plus even though we "only" got 10-18" across most of CNJ, most of our area saw nearly 3" of sleet, which would've made the CNJ snowfall 18-25" if it had been all snow (and 3" of sleet on top of a foot or more of snow did provide the same frozen mass as 18-25" of snow). However, the winds and coastal flooding were significantly worse with the March 1993 storm, which was simply more powerful than Jan 1996.
https://www.raymondcmartinjr.com/weather/1993/13-Mar-93.html
Yep - look at the map I just posted with 10-20" across much of the deep south and 4-10" across almost the entire deep south and even several inches down to the LA/MS/AL/FL Gulf coasts, which is just nuts.
At the time, it was a bit of a breakthrough in weather modeling, as models were showing a likely major snow/winter storm 4-5 days in advance, when most previous major storms were not predicted nearly that well. That was still pre-internet, so I recall being glued to TWC and watching local TV mets and checking the radio forecasts on 1010 WINS and 880 WCBS every 10 minutes, lol. Was an insane storm for how powerful it was, with over a foot of snow falling in Edison in under 6 hours before the change to sleet. My wife and I were living in Edison and decided to walk to the Diner for lunch in the snow and then it changed to sleet while we were eating, making the walk back pretty painful with heavy sleet blasting us. It was a few weeks before we moved to Metuchen, so I didn't have to shovel (other than our cars which were buried by the plows), but I recall helping several motorists out while on that walk.