All of this snow in Raleigh has got me thinking about areas even less likely to get the white stuff.
Has it ever snowed in Los Angeles? How about Miami? Corpus Christi? Mexico City?
Is there any area in the United States (and Mexico) that has never seen snow at all?
For the areas that don’t seem likely, what are the record snow-falls there? What on earth could it have been like? I’m trying to picture San Francisco, with it’s hilly terrain, with four inches of snow, and laughing my ass off doing so!
Factual data and personal anectdotes appreciatted.
Side question: Seattle is really north. What is it about the climate there that makes snow such a rare event, when areas far to the south of there on the other coast get a decent amount of the stuff? I realize that the midwest has snow farther south because the temperatures change more when not near an ocean whose temperature doesn’t change much (relatively), but even on the East Coast, say, Philly, gets a decent amount of the stuff, and it’s way south of Seattle.
Well, you won’t see 4 inches of snow in San Francisco because it is never cold enough in winter in coastal California to maintain that snow long enough for 4 inches to pile up. During the day temps rise well over freezing (to about 40-50 degrees by mid morning).
It HAS snowed in San Francisco, but it’s not been more than a few short snow falls that melted when they hit the ground. I remember last year it snowed here. It wowed everyone, but it wasn’t more than a novelty. The coastal mountains can get enough snow to last til mid morning, but it’s not more than a few inches, and the people who live on the mountains have chains, and vehicles that can deal with treacherous roads anyway.
Coastal California occasionally will get cold snaps into the mid 20’s but they are rare. Our usual temps fall around freezing early in the morning, and quickly rise to where the frost melts by the time the sun comes up. Our coldest weather is on clear nights, so we very rarely ever will get snow with a storm (i hear the last time it snowed in coastal California where I am was 20 years ago).
It’s worth the risk of burning, to have a second chance…
It snowed in Phoenix once when I lived there, in late December, 1991, I think. Only dropped about an inch overnight, and most of it melted by 10:30 the next morning.
Please bear with me, I’m only human, and still evolving.
Well considering Seattle is right on the ocean my guess is that the water in the air coming off the ocean (prevailing winds from west) never really gets cold enough to freeze until it gets further inland where it gains some altitude.
The reason the west coast of the US gets less snow than the east coast is that the Pacific has a current similar to the Gulf Stream in the Atlantic. These currents flow in a clockwise direction, bringing warmer water from the southwest to the northeast. The Gulf Stream keeps northern Europe (British Isles, France)
relatively mild for their latitudes.
Satan: Is there any area in the United States (and Mexico) that has never seen snow at all?
Most of Hawaii hasn’t seen snow, I imagine. But I know the top of its highest peak (on the big island, IIRC) has snow.
Judges 14:9 - So [Samson] scraped the honey into his hands and went on, eating as he went. When he came to his father and mother, he gave some to them and they ate it; but he did not tell them that he had scraped the honey out of the body of the lion.
we had sleety snow in phoenix last spring. some parts of town had hail to 1/2". accumulation was maybe 1/2" in a 1/2 hr, after which it was washed down by the rain.
the snow doesn’t happen often & there isn’t usually an accumulation to speak of, but i’ve seen it here maybe 4 times over the 2 times i’ve lived here, ~18 yrs.
we regularly had 3-6" snows in salt lake city, which is built up the side of the wasatch range & is all hills. it would melt during the day, freeze solid at night, & snow again. it always got dumped on because the mountains at that point are so high the clouds have to drop their moisture in order to lighten up & keep going.
I don’t believe freezing temperatures or snow have ever occured in Key West.
The ocean current warming Seattle is the Japanese current. A few years ago it changed course and people were catching warm-water fish all along the west coast.
It seldom snows in San Antonio, but in the 80’s they had a real snowfall, 8" or more.
I have friends from Miami. I know they have had at least snow flurries there, and I believe even some accumulation. I am certain that all of Texas has experienced snow at one time or another. They get those massive cold fronts sweeping down from the plains.
How 'bout Death Valley, CA? That seems like a place where snow might be unlikely.
I’d say it’s snowed in Death Valley before–it gets pretty cold in the winter. Also, on a side note, there’s an area in Death Valley where rocks have been moving around, seemingly by themselves. One of the main theories is a combination of wind and ice causes it.
There is a picture in my Dad’s High school yearbook, (1943 IIRC), and the buildings are covered in about 1 - 2 inches of snow. So snow can accumulate in the Los Angeles basin on rare occasions. It has not in my lifetime, the last 40 years.
Miami got what could be very loosely classified as “snow” in about 1976. Regardless of this quirk, I can say definitively that it does NOT snow in Miami. The coldest it’s been down here in the past few days is 45 degrees and that’s at night.
lived in west palm beach many yrs ago & it was lovely, but don’t they get frost warnings for the parts of the state w/ the orange groves? is that in the northern part?
yah…the ocean has a mediating effect on the weather. It doesn’t get too hot in the Summer or too cold in the Winter. On the other side of the Cascade mountains it get Very cold and very hot because the mountains block the mediating effect of the ocean.
Look at the weather of Spokane and you’ll see!
Hope this helps.
Oh and PS when it does snow here, Maybe once a year…the whole city shuts down…its amazing to this boy from Michigan!
-Frankie
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-Bad Religion
Seattle is technically about 80 miles from the ocean. I don’t know if the the Japanese Current has any effect that deep into Puget Sound. My guess is that the lack of many snow storms is mostly due to the moderating influence of a relatively flat body of water and being in the lee of the Olympic mountains. By the time any Alaskan storms get to Seattle they must first cross a mountainous pennisula and a relatively warm (40+F) body of water.
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The last recorded snowfall at the Los Angeles Civic Center weather station was January 10, 1949.
There was also some snow that fell in the San Fernando Valley, the northernmost section of Los Angeles back on February 8, 1989. I remember that well because I got a “snow day” from work.
An Alaskan storm was blown way south by a low pressure area that had wandered away from its usual home in the Pacific Northwest.
It’s not that unusual for there to be a lot of snow in California. The Sierra Nevadas are at a very high altitude. The area around Lake Tahoe can get quite cold. Truckee, CA often is the coldest spot in the Lower 48.
I’ll second that. The high sierras get snow regularly in winter. In fact, a lot of the water that swells the rivers in California (that originate in the Sierras like the Merced) come from snow melt in the high Sierras. The first time I ever played in snow was up in Badger Pass near Yosemite valley (the snow then was about 3 feet deep). Lake Tahoe is also a big Ski Resort area. There are a few other ski resorts all along the Sierra Nevadas (and yes, that’s where Californians go to play in the snow during winter).
It’s worth the risk of burning, to have a second chance…