February snowfall in Toledo is second highest on record

Mannoleto Gilmore, 14, cleared the family car on Delaware Avenue in central Toledo on Feb. 10, in the midst of a month that produced the second-highest snowfall for any February on record.

The Blade/Dave Zapotosky
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Mannoleto Gilmore, 14, cleared the family car on Delaware Avenue in central Toledo on Feb. 10, in the midst of a month that produced the second-highest snowfall for any February on record.

For five days last week in Toledo, the light snow just would not go away.

And it was the inch here, two-tenths there, and a surprise 3.4 inches on Friday that got February's local snowfall into the No. 2 position on record for the month.

The 23.9 inches that fell at Toledo Express Airport was second only for Februarys to the 25.1 inches recorded in Toledo in 1900 and beat out the 23.6 February inches from two years ago for second place.

While slightly more than half the month's snow - 12.1 inches - fell during a storm that struck Toledo on Feb. 9-10, the kicker was Friday's snowfall of several inches more than had been predicted.

Bill Randel, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Cleveland, and Chris Vickers, a meteorologist with WTOL-TV in Toledo, both said Friday's storm was more productive than expected because a huge storm center off the mid-Atlantic coast moved farther west than expected.

"The forecast models have a hard time predicting" that sort of track, referred to in weather parlance as a retrograde, Mr. Vickers said.

It was not significantly colder than normal for February in Toledo: the 26-degree average temperature was just one-tenth of a degree below average.

"Those normal temperatures kept us near the right temperatures for snow," Mr. Randel said.

It'll take a bit more snow this winter before the entire season shows up on any Top 10 lists, though.

Toledo's season total now stands at 38.9 inches, which while slightly higher than normal for a complete winter is still 13 inches shy of No. 10 on the records list. No. 1, of course, is 1977-78, when 73.1 inches fell in Toledo.

No significant snow is likely in Toledo this week, forecasters said.

"We might have some flurries from time to time" early in the week, Mr. Randel said, but later on there will be "a slight warmup" and sunshine, which has been in short supply here of late, may pay a visit.

"It's looking pretty good, actually," Mr. Vickers said.

And if you felt burdened by Mother Nature's frosty bounty this month, don't be disappointed if folks in Columbus, Cincinnati, or especially the East Coast don't feel your pain.

Both Columbus and Cincinnati got more snow than Toledo did in February - 30.1 inches in the state capital, 26.1 in the Queen City - and also had much colder weather than normal for them.

And in metropolitan New York? Fugghedaboutit: some northwestern suburbs got more snow last Thursday and Friday than Toledo did all month.

More than 200,000 homes and businesses remained without electricity yesterday after the late-week storm's heavy, wet snow and high winds tore down trees and power lines throughout the Northeast.

Half the outages were in New Hampshire, while Maine and New York state also had widespread blackouts.

This report contains information from the Associated Press.

Contact David Patch at:

dpatch@theblade.com

or 419-724-6094.