Worst Weather Ever?

How was scraping the frost off of your car this morning? I know I was not too happy to have to get out my scraper as I shivered doing so. Low temperatures this morning fell well into the 30s and at the Aurora Airport, 28 degrees was recorded.

It is hard to want to think about this past week's weather because of the beautiful sunshine we are experiencing today, but these past several days have given us the coldest temperatures we have felt all season. Grumbles of "I hate this weather," or "It's way too cold out," or even "This is the worst weather ever" arose during the past couple days.

But to those people complaining, I ask you this, is this the worst weather ever?

Remember back to these series of radar images...

This may not have been the coldest temperatures you have experienced, but for some, it was the most precipitation they have ever seen. Snowmageddon, the Snowpocalypse, or whatever you want to name the February 2011 blizzard recorded the third heaviest snowfall since 1886.

NCDC

This image shows the snowfall accumulations from the central to the northeast United States. From 6 AM on January 31st through 9 PM on February 2nd, these Illinois sites were selected by the Hydrometeorological Prediction Center for their total snowfall:

Antioch 27.0"

Glen Ellyn 24.3"

St. Charles 22.7"

Beach Park 21.7"

Geneva 21.5"

With La Niña in place for this fall, winter, and spring, it is very possible that we will see and exceed our five year snow average at O'Hare Airport of 52.1 inches.

So even though we do not have snow on the ground yet, make light of these past couple days of "the worst weather ever." Because as sad as it is, the worst part about this Autumn cold, cloudy, and windy weather is knowing that this is about as good as it is going to get for the next six months.


~Meteorologist Heather Brinkmann