By Dar Danielson (Radio Iowa)
State Climatologist Justin Glisan says this winter is going to end up being in the top five in the weather record book for a lack of snow.
“We had about five inches of snowfall on the ground in February, and that’s about two inches below average. But if you look at December, January, February, meteorological winter, only about nine inches of snowfall across the state. That’s about 13 inches below average,” Glisan says.
Glisten says the month of February will also be in the record books for lack of snow or rain.”Precipitation for February below average, about three quarters of an inch below average. So near the top 20th driest February is in 153 years of records. Now, if we think back to last February, the warmest and second driest on record,” he says. Glisan says the lack of snow is good if you don’t like to shovel, but it could have some impact later in the spring. “We get a deeper frost depth, because you don’t have that insulation of the snow pack on the ground, and that can lead to some the potential for localized flooding, given this event that we’re going to see Tuesday into Wednesday, with rain fall and possible snowfall,” Glisan says.
Glisan says February had some hot and cold spells that evened out. “About four degrees below normal, not anything record breaking. Of course, we warmed up at the end of the month. Actually pulled up the average slightly,” he says. Glisan says the warmth at the end of the month pulled February out of what had been a very cold run. “If you look at that seven day stretch in the middle of the month, we were running about 21 degrees below average, so very cold conditions,” he says. “February is a transition month, as we transition from winter cold season moving into the growing season in March, April, May. So we do see a lot more meridional activity or more waves and troughs in the jet stream.”
He says those troughs give us the up and down temperatures. “Between the middle of the month towards the end of the month, we had temperatures in the 50s and low 60s, a temperature swing of, you know, 40, 50, 60, degrees. You know, generally we see that type of behavior in the February March time frame,” he says. Glisan says we can expect to see that variability until we move out of spring.
