Ice World: Record snowfalls inundates cities across the globe

Japan's record snowfall still

not the deepest ever

Parts of Japan have been covered in more than five metres of snow this week. But the world record is still more than double that

the Guardian,

3 March, 2013

This is proving a freakish year for weather, but Japan is having an odder time of it than most. The country has had a record winter for snow, and northern Japan is currently coated by unprecedented volumes of the white stuff – more than five metres at higher altitudes, with houses turned into igloos and roads into snow tunnels.

In the Hakkoda mountains the depth of snow has been measured at 5.61 metres – a record for Japan. Even lower down, in the city of Aomori, snow is standing at almost 1.5 metres and bulldozers are having to work round the clock.

Heaped snow in Red Square, Moscow, 21 January 2013. Photograph: Sergei Karpukhin

This has also been a record year for snow in parts of Russia – a couple of weeks ago snowpiles of more than five metres caused gridlock in Moscow – and Switzerland, too, has been experiencing dramatic snowfalls, with depths of up to three metres.

These snowfalls, especially those in northern Japan, are remarkable by any standards. But they still fall well short of the all-time record-breakers. Tamarack in California claims the record for the deepest snow ever recorded: 11.5 metres on 11 March 1911. That was clearly some year in the Sierra Nevada, as Tamarack also recorded the largest snowfall in a single month in the US: almost 10 metres.

A snowblower removes snow from train tracks at the southern Swiss Bernina mountain pass. Photograph: Arnd Wiegmann/Reuters

The ski resort of Mount Baker in Washington State had more than 30 metres of snow in the 1998-99 season, and almost eight metres in one month alone. Mt Fidelity in Canada gets almost 15 metres of snow a year, and the town of Stewart in British Columbia gets an average of almost six metres.

The deepest snow ever recorded in the UK was in the Forest of Teesdale in County Durham during the great freeze of 1947: 2.1 metres. In towns, the greatest depth recorded is 1.65 metres – at Ruthin in north-east Wales in March 1947, and Tredegar in south Wales in February 1963. Whether any attempt was made to keep trains running and schools open is not recorded.

Record snowfall in Amarillo, Texas

ABQ Journal,

26 February, 2013

The blizzard that hammered the nation’s midsection broke a 120-year-old record in Amarillo for one-day snowfall in February with 19.1 inches.

National Weather Service meteorologist Krissy Scotten in Amarillo says the snowfall total Monday bested a record set Feb. 16, 1893, when 19 inches fell.

She says the city’s snowfall was the second-most in a 24-hour period, just behind the 19.3 inches that fell March 25, 1934. The storm that moved across the Texas Panhandle also was the third all-time snow event. The most snow in one event was 20.6 inches that fell March 25 and 26, 1934.

Scotten says Amarillo normally receives 17.8 inches of snow for the winter.

Roadways across the region remained icy and snow-packed early today. Warming temperatures throughout the day are expected to improve conditions.

Toronto breaks snowfall record for Feb. 27

680 News,

27 February, 2013

TORONTO – It’s another sloppy drive to work and school Thursday morning as the slow-moving storm system that dumped record amounts of wet snow on the GTA Wednesday continues to hang around.

Snowfall record

Toronto broke a snowfall record for Feb. 27, according to Environment Canada.

At Pearson International Airport, 12.4 centimetres of the heavy wet snow covered the ground, breaking the record of 7.1 centimetres set in 1967.

Storm cleanup

The slush is still flooding some city streets. City officials are asking homeowners to stop shovelling the slushy snow onto the road as it’s blocking the catch basins.

According to a report in the Toronto Sun, the city said the cost to clean up Wednesday’s slushy mess is around $2.5-million. However, that figure doesn’t cover any potential plowing, Thursday.

Toronto had set aside $82-million for snow removal this winter.

Peter Noehammer, director of Toronto’s Transportation Services, told theSunthat despite Toronto’s rough winter, the snow budget is still in “pretty good shape.”

Ice Boulders Go Viral

Leda Olmstead came across dozens of ice boulders during her daily walk along the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore near Good Harbor, Michigan. Olmstead posted photos on Facebook, and they quickly went viral.