Notable late-January D.C. Area Weather Events

 

January is the coldest month of the year according to NOAA and is a close second behind February for highest average amount of monthly snowfall in the Nation’s Capital.  In the Nation’s Capital there have been many high impact winter weather events during the second half of January.

2016: The Blizzard of 2016 occurred on January 22-23 and tied with “Snowmageddon” of February 2010 for D.C.’s fourth largest snow event on record with 17.8”.  Making this storm even more amazing is how it followed D.C.’s warmest December on record.  Without the “Blizzard of 2016” as it was dubbed, the Nation’s Capital would have finished the 2015-2016 winter season with only 4.8”.  That’s roughly a third of D.C. seasonal snowfall average (13.7”).  This illustrates how the right ingredients need to come together only once to create a major winter storm as was the case with the “Blizzard of 2016.”

2014: January 2014 remains D.C.’s coldest January of the last decade.  Washingtonians endured seven days with high temperatures at or below freezing.  Record snowfall occurred on January 21 with 3.8” at National Airport and 8.5” at Dulles.  It was followed by a record low-high temperature of 19° on January 22, 2014.  That remains the last time Washington, D.C. had a high temperature in the teens. 

2011:  Dubbed “Carmageddon” because several inches of heavy, wet snow snarled the evening rush hour and caused many folks to get stranded in their vehicles overnight or abandon them altogether.  While there weren’t historic snow accumulations, the heavy, wet snow came at the worst time as road crews weren’t able to do much given the high volume of traffic during the p.m. rush.  National Airport officially saw 5.0”, while daily snowfall records were observed at Dulles (7.3”) and BWI Airports (7.6”).  

2000: D.C.’s “surprise” January 25 snow event remains one of the larger failures of numerical weather prediction (computer weather modeling).  Originally expected to stay to our south and go out to sea, this storm instead came far enough north to bring 9”-18” of snow to the Nation’s Capital.  Not until late in the evening on Monday, January 24, did D.C. Area meteorologists update the forecast to include accumulating snowfall.  In an era before social media, most folks who had gone to bed woke up Tuesday morning to a surprise snow day.  Daily January 25 snowfall records occurred at all three D.C. Area airports in what was the largest snow event in the Nation’s Capital in more than four years since the Blizzard of 1996.

DCA (National): 9.3”
Dulles (IAD): 10.3”
BWI: 14.9”