On February 11, the city of Baltimore, Maryland surpassed mighty Syracuse, New York for seasonal snowfall with a whopping 80-inches recorded.  The two massive storms that clobbered the mid-Atlantic States in early February set the trend for another "El Nino" weather month with the main storm track still running from Texas northeast across Virginia to the Atlantic Ocean.  In the wake of the storms, Baltimore had amassed 31 inches of snow on the ground.

 

    The Syracuse area largely missed out on both storms but we did regain our overall position as the northeast's snowiest city on February 25 and 26 when a wet, heavy 19 inches of snow fell here.  Many schools were closed but with high temperatures in the upper 30s and an increasing sun angle, the roads were never really that bad.  That said, snow fell on all but one February day.  We picked up 38 inches of snow for the month pushing the season's tally to 106 inches.    The rain and melted snow for February was just about normal with 2 inches recorded.

 

    Temperatures were fairly mild with an average reading of 26 degrees (+1.4).  Temperatures reached 40 twice and only dropped to 8 twice.  One of the things this winter will be remembered for by this weather watcher is the fact that it never really got super cold for any length of time anywhere across the country.  Yes, there was quite a bit of snow but the super cold was absent.  Temperatures remained colder than across the whole of Europe from November through February but even there, the super cold was absent.

 

    Here are a couple of oddities from February.  Snow was reported to have fallen in 49 of 50 United States on February 11.  The only state where it didn't snow was Hawaii.   The AccuWeather forecast team in State College, Pennsylvania came under some fire (again) for overhyping the late-February snowstorm, warning of a "snowicane".   

 

    There seemed to big shift in the national and worldwide viewpoint on climate change and subsequent global warming.  During the latest round of climate discussions in Copenhagen, Denmark this past December, some of the weather data from a couple of scientists had apparantly been enhanced to give the view that global warming was a bit more imminent than otherwise thought.  Thanks to the leaks and the intense media coverage surrounding them, a sea change of public opinion took hold worldwide with and an instant and complete distrust of any new figures coming from any research groups.  It was simply amazing to me to witness this big change.  It seems to me that this "Climategate" was overblown a bit in the media and now we have to find our way back to a more centered and open view. 

 

    Looking ahead, there are indications that March will be a bit cooler and drier than normal.  Readings should be near-normal from April through June with a continuing trend toward fairly dry conditions.