Once in a while, a weather record occurs which makes you really sit up and take notice. And sure enough, we just had one. In November, in Caribou, the low temperature failed to fall below 20 at any point during the month. This had not occurred In 77 years of record-keeping there. Of course keep in mind that 77 years is also just the blink of an eye in terms of geologic time, but that said, it’s an impressive record!
The first occurrence of a temperature below 20 degrees finally came at 5 p.m. on December 4th when Caribou recorded 19 degrees. That’s just amazingly late! And that very same same night, Caribou fell to 1 below zero, without having yet been in either the teens or single digits!
The other thing I was following with great interest was snow, or lack thereof, as we had a potential challenge to both the latest measurable snow (defined as at least 1/10th of an inch) at Caribou (record to beat was November 23rd), and the lowest November monthly snow total. That record was 1.5 inches. We missed tying the latest measurable snow by two days, with 0.4” of snow falling on the 21st, and by Thanksgiving we knew we would not have the least snowy November, though still, we were at a paltry 2.5 inches.
But then came the snow blitz! A quick 1-2 punch from two storms, the first of which put the Snow Bullseye on southern Aroostook. Ludlow received a whopping 15 inches! The second storm took the ideal track that is very favorable for heavy snow to reach The Valley, which is a track up through the Bay of Fundy. Many Valley communities received at least a foot of snow, with Fort Kent buried by 17 inches!
Central Aroostook got its share, too! At the NWS Caribou office, afternoon total snow depth on December 1st was 22 inches. And the seasonal total, which, again, had been only 2.5 inches through Thanksgiving, had vaulted to 31.4”. In the 48 hours, from 2 p.m. Tuesday, Nov. 29th to 2 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 1st, Caribou received about 21 inches of snow.
Also, NWS Caribou calculated that through December 1st, this has been the third snowiest start to the season (32.3”), behind only 1949 (33.2”) and 1974 (36.2”). Again, all of these values were calculated through December 1st. Records at Caribou go back to 1939.
Of note is that in 1974, the “record holder” for snowiest start to a season, November ended up being the snowiest month of that entire winter!
Back to our snow season in progress, this year’s 32.3 inches through Dec. 1st is about 30 percent of Caribou’s seasonal average of 108.5 inches!
So we are certainly off and running, with a nice early-season base down. This year I think we’ll do a lot better than last, in terms of consistency of snow cover for the ITS (snowmobile trail) system.
Looking ahead, here are the December, January, February and March snow averages. These averages are based on a 30-year period that resets every 10 years. We are currently using the period 1981-2010. In December, Caribou averages 22.9”; in January, 25.2”, in February, 22.2”, and in March, 18.3 inches.
A final note, it’s rather unusual to have this deep cover of December snow, with the snow having come late, yet have the ground still be unfrozen.
I’d be eager to hear from readers of this column if they can recall other specific years where we got good snow that stayed, before the ground had a chance to freeze up. I can be reached at the email listed just below the end of this column. Thanks!
Ted Shapiro holds the Broadcast Seal of Approval from both the American Meteorological Society and the National Weather Association. An Alexandria, Va. native, he has been chief meteorologist at WAGM-TV since 2006. Email him at tshapiro@wagmtv.com.
