Snowiest January On Record

According to the National Weather Service, as of 1 AM, New York City broke its record for the snowiest January on record, with 32.3 inches in Central Park compared to the previous record of 27.4 inches in 1925. Similar records were broken across parts of the area. As this was released as the storm was still ongoing, however, New York City saw more snow afterwards, and there is the possibility that if the weak clippers that will affect the area tomorrow and Saturday bring at least an inch or more of snow, New York City might break its record for the snowiest month on record, which was set in February of last year with 36.9 inches. Central Park is still far from reaching the snowiest winter on record, which was 1995-96 with 75.6 inches of snow, however if we also see a snowy pattern for February, which is a reasonable possibility, it could be possible that we may approach this record, as at least 20 more inches are needed to reach this record.

As new totals continued to come in after this morning into the NWS list of snow reports, it appears that the highest snow totals came in from the immediate NYC area, with a reported 19 inches of snow in Central Park, 19.5 inches in Rahway, NJ, and there is also a 20 inch report in Richmond County.

Looking more into what happened last night, if the snow bands had remained with 1-2 inch per hour rates as expected, then my forecast amounts of 7 to 14 inches for the immediate NYC area would have verified, however the bands that set up over New York City were much stronger than anticipated, even nearing 40 dbz, with snowfall rates as high as 3 to even 4 inches per hour! Similar conditions were observed further southwest where the storm also ended up overperforming across the Interstate 95 corridor including Washington DC and Philadelphia.


A storm summary will be posted on this event sometime over the next few days, and tonight's update will focus on the longer range, discussing the light snow events for Friday and Saturday that will bring a total of a dusting to 2 inches of snow across the area, and a potentially bigger storm on Wednesday, where there is uncertainty with solutions ranging from a storm well to our west with rain and warmth to a coastal storm with yet another major snowstorm.