# Here we are!!



## AC2717 (Jun 20, 2009)

Well, just sitting here in MA twiddling my thumbs waiting for it to snow, have all the customers lined up, have all the equipment double and triple checked, This is killing me, need to get out there and start pushing snow, Any of our weather gu-ru's have any indication of when all this will change???


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## grandview (Oct 9, 2005)

Buffalo, where's the snow?
Snowless streak is 4th-longest ever
By Gene Warner
News Staff Reporter
Updated: November 28, 2009, 9:20 AM / 17 comments
Story tools:

The streak continues.

Don't look now, but Buffalo and its immediate suburbs have carved out their fourth-longest snow drought since the National Weather Service began keeping records here in 1884.

Through Thursday, the Buffalo area - not including the Southern Tier - had gone 233 days without any measurable snow, and the streak was expected to survive through Friday.

"We're getting pretty close to the top here," National Weather Service meteorologist David Thomas said of the snowless streak. "If we make it through today [Friday], it will be the longest in 61 years."

The granddaddy of them all occurred in 1946, a whopping 277 days without any measurable snowfall at the weather service office. There was no measurable snow from late February to early December.

The second-longest streak is 245 days, in 1948.

Think about that. Those years had eight or nine months, without snow, in Buffalo, N.Y.

Many outsiders think it snows 10 months per year here. Or they quip that Buffalo has two seasons - winter and the Fourth of July.

The reality, though, is that our snow seasons typically last anywhere from about four to less than six months.

But don't look for our national image to change.

"Most people outside the Buffalo area would be quite surprised when we tell them we haven't had any measurable snow so far," Thomas said. "We probably need a few more years [like this] before we can change our image."

So what was the latest date on the calendar for a measurable snowfall in the last 125 years here?

Dec. 3, a-way back in 1899.

This year, Dec. 3 falls next Thursday, but don't expect any champagne or party hats at the National Weather Service for breaking that record.

"We have a couple of chances of snow over the weekend that could end our snow drought," Thomas said.

That could happen early today, or tonight, or sometime Monday or later in the week. So the chance of extending the streak through Thursday seems minimal.

The streak, of course, depends on both an early end to snow season in the spring and a late start in the fall. That's what happened this year.

The last measurable snow at the National Weather Service office in Cheektowaga was 1.1 inches on April 7, close to eight months ago.

"One of the reasons for the late snowfall is we haven't had any major cold outbreaks," Thomas said. "We've been unable to tap into the cold air that's well up into Canada."

This region also logged one of its longest dry spells back in September, with a 22-day period without measurable rainfall. That streak ended with a deluge in late September, turning the month from one of the driest in history to the ninth-wettest.

What's that say about our weather?

"The weather is never normal," Thomas replied. "There's always something different."

While the Buffalo area has been mostly snowless this fall, a trace amount of snow was recorded on four days: Oct. 15 and 16, Nov. 5 and Friday morning, according to National Weather Service reports. And the Southern Tier got belted, with up to 5ù inches of snow in some spots Oct. 15 and 16.

The lengthy snow drought says nothing about what kind of winter it will be.

Lake Erie was at 49 degrees on Friday, about four degrees above average for that date. That suggests the lake could freeze later, allowing for more lake-effect snow.

But the records, over the last 60 years, don't back up that fear of a balmy lake reading leading to more snow.

"There's almost no correlation between a warmer lake and more or less snow," Thomas said.

The drought, with no huge snowfall in the short-range forecast, also calls into question when local ski resorts will open. It's not clear when there will be enough snow and cold temperatures to allow them to open, with most hoping to begin their seasons either Dec. 5 or 12.

While no one knows when this year's snowless streak will end, forecasters don't believe there will be any snow for the Bills game with Miami on Sunday.

The forecast calls for mostly cloudy skies Sunday, with highs in the mid 40s and a chance of rain showers.

Not exactly a day at the beach. But Miami residents watching the game on TV might be shocked that there won't be a thick blanket of snow covering the Ralph Wilson Stadium carpet on Nov. 29. Not this year, anyway.

Buffalo's longest snowless streaks

The longest streaks without any measurable snow in Buffalo and immediate suburbs

Year	Number of days Last snowless day
1946	277 Dec. 1
1948	245 Nov. 28
1922	239 Nov. 24
2009	233 (through Thursday)	???
1998	233 Nov. 10
Source: National Weather Service

Note: Dating to 1884, when these records were first kept


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## SuperdutyShane (Mar 6, 2009)

Off to Alaska...


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