The Green Bay (Wis.) Press Gazette reported this week that as of March 12 a record was broken.
(No, this has nothing to do with Brett Favre.)
So far this snow season, Green Bay has had 80.3 inches of snow. This is the first time in recorded history - 117 years of snowfall data - that Green Bay received more than 80 inches of snow.
Normal seasonal snowfall for Green Bay is 53.1 inches.And it's probably not finished snowing in Green Bay quite yet, if I had to venture a guess.
After reading this, I decided to call Mike Sabones, the meteorologist-in-charge at the National Weather Service office in North Webster.
Intuitively, it seemed to me like this was a long winter, so I wanted to find out what's been going on in our area.
Right off the bat, Sabones characterized this as, "a winter to be reckoned with.
"There were a couple interesting things about this winter that may surprise some people," he said.
First of all, he said, it wasn't really that cold. "Our temperatures were fairly close to normal."
But, and this is a pretty significant but, "we were way above normal on snowfall and precipitation, which makes it seem like a really tough winter," he said.
Sabones noted that the weather station at North Webster recorded almost 80 inches of snow - coincidentally, that's as much as Green Bay.
In addition, "we had heavy snow, followed by a warmup, followed by heavy rains. All in all, it's made it kind of a mess and a tough winter to get through," he said.
While there are no long-term records for North Webster - the weather station opened in 1999 - Sabones noted the average snowfall for the area is around 40 inches.
The average annual snowfall for South Bend, with all its lake-effect events, is 70.8 inches. Fort Wayne gets an average of 32.4.
So it looks to me like this may have been a record snowfall year for out county.
I'm going to say it was, anyway, based solely on the number of times I had to shovel my driveway and clean off our cars.
Here's part of a public information statement about this past winter from the NWS:
"La Niña, which is a cooling of ocean waters in the equatorial Pacific Ocean, is being considered as a strong event this winter. It has been enhanced by other oceanic and atmospheric conditions, which have led to a very active season of storm systems in the Midwest and Great Lakes region. Northern Indiana, southwest lower Michigan and northwest Ohio all have experienced above normal precipitation, above normal snowfall and near normal temperatures for December 2007 and January and February 2008. Record flooding occurred in two of the three months. Precipitation across the entire area was was well above normal. Arctic air following heavy rain and flooding created ice jams that further complicated the flooding situation."
OK, that's what's happened so far. What can we expect looking ahead?
"We're watching a system early to mid-week next week, maybe Tuesday or Wednesday," Sabones said.
"This time of year, the computer models we rely on for forecasting are giving a couple of scenarios," he said.
One of those models shows a significant rain event. The other shows that the system will shift to the south, which, Sabones notes, is becoming a favorite storm track as of late.
But then, "It looks like we could have a nice dry stretch of a week or so following that if we can slip through," he said.
A significant rain event next week could cause some flooding problems because the ground remains frozen.
Sabones said he would like to see the ground thawed a little more to unlock frozen groundwater before we see any more rain.
I asked him what kind of spring we could expect.
"It's not a cop out, but the way we refer to it is that there are equal chances of above, near or below average precipitation and temperatures," he said. "There is no clear-cut driving force to drive the weather one way or another."
He noted that the 90-day forecast across the south calls for warmer and dryer-than-normal weather patterns.
Beyond that, it depends on La Niña.
"The La Niña we're experiencing now has caused slightly warmer temperatures and very active weather patterns (precipitation).
"The question is, 'will it weaken or stay active?' We'll be watching and seeing," he said.
Is any of this weather weirdness related to climate change?
"It's almost impossible to look at one given season and relate that to climate change," he said, noting, "There are always variables from year to year."
When scientists or meteorologists talk about climate change, they're talking about long-term trends, he said.
All this is very interesting, and I am grateful for the insights provided by Sabones.
It's nice to have a NWS office right here in our county.
Be that as it may, I'm just really tired of winter this year. I am so looking forward to sunshine and motorcycle trips and golf and all manner of outdoor activities. (And I even get an extra hour to engage in these activities thanks to Mitch Daniels and the Indiana legislature. They can take that as a thank you.)
The calendar says spring is only a week away and I'm impatient, skeptical and optimistic all at the same time.
Were the 50-degree days we had this week just taunting me?
