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Wintry Favorite winter storms of all time

I'd have to agree with Jon and Brick and put Jan. 2000 at the top of the list. Both the biggest surprise snowstorm and biggest snowstorm I've ever experienced. And I was in college at the time. It was a lot of fun. I'd probably put the 2010 Christmas storm 2nd, but only because it was Christmas. It wasn't a surprise, but it was nice. The Dec 2002 ice storm was the worst ice storm I've been through, so it makes the top 5. I moved all around the state growing up. There was one big storm in Asheville that I remember...sometime back in the 80s.

I got shafted here in Raleigh with the 1993 one. And I don't remember the 1996 one being all that good here either. I'm hoping a Winter 2018-2019 one makes the list. I feel like we got a shot this year, anyway.
 
Just realizing how few people from the Charlotte area are on this board...lol. Nobody's mentioned February 2004! Thought we were going to have another one this week, but not quite cold enough. 2004 certainly was. No mixing, no sleet, forecasted a week out. Started 9 am pure snow, and didn't stop till overnight the next night. 14 inches in my back yard. Just love playing in the falling snow, and watching it pile up in daylight.

The only other one that really stands out is January 88 that was mentioned. Out of school for a week and it hung around a long time. It kept refreezing on the roads making sheets of ice for sledding, good times.

December 2010 for clt was sad. 3-4 inches of slop that quickly melted. Mountains and foothills were good, we were actually skiing so yeah it was good on the drive home, but couldn't enjoy it at home.
 
I'm too young to remember much of 2004 so I don't count that.

March 2009 was a great one, I lived in NW Charlotte at the time so I think I jackpotted with six inches. I was in fourth grade and the snow stuck around for days.

February 2014, I was a freshman in high school at the time. Unfortunately because of stuff going on with an at the time sick family member I couldn't enjoy that storm as much.

January 2018 was amazing, snowed all day. And at the end of it all I saw perfect dendrites for the first time in my life.

And this past storm was awesome, as I said in the main thread. It made me love sleet.

Sent from my Z983 using Tapatalk
 
Jimmy Hypocracy said:
View attachment 9048 January 2011

Highest ratio snow I’ve ever experienced south of
85. 8” of pixie dust with .2 wraparound ZR later that night
Click to expand...

Finally folks are mentioning the 2011 storm on here. What an amazing storm and NWS said Atlanta only got 4 inches. I lived in downtown on the GSU campus at the time and it felt like a lot more snow then that. The initial frontegenetic band dumped like 2-3 inches of snow the first hour. It was crazy. The last 3 inches or so fell the rest of the storm. It literally felt like we lived in a northern city considering how long the snow was on the ground for. I personally think downtown got 5-6 inches of snow.

Look how wide spread it was too. Heavy snow from SC to MS/TN.
 
LovingGulfLows said:
Finally folks are mentioning the 2011 storm on here. What an amazing storm and NWS said Atlanta only got 4 inches. I lived in downtown on the GSU campus at the time and it felt like a lot more snow then that. The initial frontegenetic band dumped like 2-3 inches of snow the first hour. It was crazy. The last 3 inches or so fell the rest of the storm. It literally felt like we lived in a northern city considering how long the snow was on the ground for. I personally think downtown got 5-6 inches of snow.

Look how wide spread it was too. Heavy snow from SC to MS/TN.
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I remember watching The Weather Channel's coverage of this storm and Stephanie Abrams mentioned live on air there was an unofficial report of 8 inches in the downtown area, but there lies the problem it was unofficial. So whoever recorded that measurement didn't report it to the NWS to make it official.
 
My avatar photo explains it, 1993 Blizzard! I barely remember it because; I was very young at the time. However, over the years I learned more and more about the storm. It became personally, the most studied winter storm.
 
Definitely have to go with January 9-10, 2011 for the first one. It barely beats December 8, 2017 since it stuck around for just around a week and was cold all throughout that time period. That storm dropped around 8 inches here and since I was younger and in public school, they closed it for a whole week.

As mentioned, last year's storm was a close second as it didn't last on the ground for as long, and the forecast busted horribly in a good way. Instead of an inch or two we had 9" due to the deformation band that developed.

Third most notable storm was definitely the Christmas 2010 storm because it's rare to witness a white Christmas in this part of the country, and it had been 128 years since the one before that.
 
Feb 2014 or last january, Feb 2014 was a very complete storm with 5-6 inches of front end snow, 1 inch of sleet, .6 of zr, and then that amazing upper level low at the end that amounted the total snow to 9.7 inches of snow. Last January snowstorm was good because it snowed all day, started out as snow and ended as snow, ended up with 8 inches and the snow was powdery in nature
 
Hands down December 8, 2017; specifically the late afternoon/early evening hours of that day; hours of the most intense snowband I'd ever seen setup over my location. I was in total awe/shock of the constant heavy cotton balls that kept falling. Finished up with around 8" with my deepest measurement around 9.5", ill never forget that evening. I needed someone to pinch me to make sure I wasn't dreaming (that morning the forecast was for around a half inch to inch which made it that much better). Also it was the first time I had anything over half a foot since January 2011. Second is January 2011. Snowed all night with large drifts. It was topped off with some sleet and alot of freezing drizzle that kept it on the ground for a long time. Blizzard of 1993 comes in third. I was young though and not nearly as much into weather back then. I just wish that monster had occured later in my life so I could have enjoyed and followed it more closely.
 
Well I'm really going to date myself here:

January 1970
March 25th 1971 complete surprise
February 1973 - my all time favorite, and the highest snowfall accumulation ever recorded in South Carolina, and a complete surprise.
February 1979
March 1983 complete surprise
January 1988
March 1993
January 2000 complete surprise
January 2002
February 2010
January 2011
February 2014
 
tonysc said:
February 1973 - my all time favorite, and the highest snowfall accumulation ever recorded in South Carolina, and a complete surprise.
February 1979
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I was a baby during the former, and forgot to mention the latter as I do recall the February '79 storm. There was another storm that was somewhat of a two-part winter storm in January 1982. I recall it, as it was during the same time as the plane crash in the Potomac River in DC.
 
I guess blizzard of 93 was the best. There have been many in years past. Seem like we had a good snow from Dec 31 to Jan 1st in 1963/64. Anyone remember that one. I think I have my dates right. Please correct me if am wrong.
 
Being able to prove my 6th grade teacher wrong about the snowstorm in ‘88 in Huntsville was awesome. (I told her it was gonna snow and she said the weather weatherman was wrong. Under my breath I Warterboyed her and said she was wrong) We were only back at school for 1 day and then it hit that night followed my freezing rain. Missed a whole week of school. 12-25-10 was awesome too
 
GaWx said:
Mack,
That was a great storm at KATL, where there was 4” of sleet, a Tony dream!

Ironically, Jan 1988 was during a solid +NAO. And it wasn’t just a +NAO blip. Practically every day of that winter had a +NAO, including 64 straight days 12/25/87-2/26/88:

ftp://ftp.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/cwlinks/norm.daily.nao.index.b500101.current.ascii

I’ve said in the past that a -NAO is overrated for major SE US winter storm chances, including for the Carolinas. If folks would look at the data in this link, they’d realize this. I’m not saying it hurts the chances, but I am saying that it doesn’t help all that much per looking at all major winter storms since 1950. The edge with a -NAO has been only slight at best.

Big Carolina winter storms during a solidly +NAO period:

2/1973, 2/1989, 3/1980, 3/1983, 1/1988, 3/2009, 2/2014, the 2 big snows of 1/2018

There has been a significantly greater correlation of big Carolina snowstorms with +PNA than
-NAO though not near a perfect correlation as that is not the case with any index:

ftp://ftp.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/cwlinks/norm.daily.pna.index.b500101.current.ascii

My favorite ATL major snow actually experienced: probably snowjam 1/1982. Favorite ATL sleet: 2/1979. Favorite ATL ZRs: the back to back weekend 1/2000 storms.
SAV major snows experienced: 2/1968 and 2/1973 though I was just a kid and didn’t enjoy them as much as I would today as an adult. Favorite major SAV storm (and possibly favorite anywhere): 1/2018 hands down. This was a combo of .5” ZR and 2” of sleet and snow, the largest liquid equivalent for a winter storm there (0.75”) since 1922! And it was 100% wintry with temps under 32 the entire time.
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79 is tops for me, then the late 50's/early 60's storm we can't nail down, then the blizzard. Didn't get so much snow, but it was a white out. Can't beat a blizzard in Ga., unless it's 4 or more inches of sleet, lol. Then 82, and the 10 3/4's of March snow down here in the 90's. And the 88 sleet storm down here. Yep, you can count the really goods ones in a life, on one hand in the south, lol. Maybe two if you live during the right stretch :)
 
‘93 was great too. Leaving the school is was pouring down rain. By the time I reached home 10 minutes later it was blizzard like conditions. When it ended we had 13 inches. We missed a whole week of school and played a baseball game the following Saturday with a snow bank as a warning track. Good times.
 
'93 of course all time #1, lived near BHM at the time. #2 was 2009 Christmas Eve when we lived in Texas. Had a "blizzard warning" all afternoon that day with winds gusting to 50 and snow blowing/falling heavily into early evening. Only ended up with 4" I think, but easily the most memorable because of it being Christmas Eve.
 
I was a college student at UGA during the March 1, 2009 ULL storm and it remains one of my favorite to this day. However, my all time favorite remains December 23, 1993 (AKA: "the other 93" storm in GA). I was in kindergarten and and developed a fascination with weather after the event that was only cemented a few years later whenever Hurricane Opal occurred.
 
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