56% of the Continental U.S. Has Snow on the Ground
56% of the contiguous U.S. had snow on the ground Saturday morning. You can see the paths of the two storms that put down west to east swaths of snow from Kansas to Delaware and from New Mexico to North Carolina.
The heaviest snowfall totals I saw in northeast Texas were at Dierks (12”) and Smithville (11”). Snow fell down to the northwest corner of Louisiana, where there was at least a trace of snow on the ground this Saturday morning. Snowfall totals included 9” at Little Rock AR, 7.5” at Memphis TN and 4.3” at Huntsville AL.
Snowfall depths Saturday morning included 2” at Atlanta GA and 4” at Boone and Beach Mountain SC.
The above webcam grab is from Mt. Lemmon, Arizona. This is near Tucson. There’s actually a ski lift there. Looks like there’s a little snow, at least on the north side of the hill. I would imagine there might be a little snow on top of Mt. Wheeler. Keep in mind that this is a desert and they not only don’t get a lot of snow, they also don’t get a lot of rain.
So, maybe Florida is the only one of the contiguous United States where you can’t find at least a trace of snow somewhere in the state.
Not that it’s warm in Florida. This weather map shows temperature in the red color on the upper left of each weather station plot. It was still in the low 70s down around Miami, but only 56° in Tampa and it was in the mid 40s in northern Florida.
On the map above, the two weather stations east of Florida are Freeport and Nassau in the Bahama Islands. I was in Nassau for a few days in winter a couple year ago and the weather was perfect. We had temperatures of 75° - 80° in the afternoon and 65° -68° at night.
How about Hawaii? There are the two mountain peaks, Mauna Loa and Mauna Kea on the big island of Hawaii. Not only do they sometimes get snow, but on rare winter days, you can actually ski or snowboard a ways down the mountain. The combination of high sun angle and high altitude means it’s easy to get sunburn on the mountain.
The webcam pic. above is from the summit of Mauna Loa Saturday afternoon, 13,803 above sea level. If you start at the bottom of the mountain, which is way below the ocean surface, the mountain is 30,610 feet tall, the tallest mountain on Earth.
At the summit, the warmest temperature ever recorded was 75° and the coolest 12°. The average high temperature in July is only 51°.
I don’t see any snow in the picture above, but…
…this pic. seems to show some snow. There is steam coming from a “lava lake” on the right side of the picture. So Florida may be the only state in the U.S. without at least a trace of snow on the ground some place this weekend.
Because of the high sun angle and the high altitude, it’s easy to get sunburn skiing or hiking near the summit of Mauna Loa or Mauna Kea in Hawaii.
BTW, I have never seen a report of any snowfall at Key West or Fort Myers, Florida, but there were a few snow flurries in Miami one time, on January 19, 1977. It was only trace amounts and the flakes melted as they hit the ground, but it was the most rare of weather events in Florida’s second largest city. Another interesting fact, Miami is not the biggest city in Florida. That’s Jacksonville, which has a bigger general area and about twice the population of Miami.