ORLANDO, Fla. – Typical thoughts regarding hurricanes include flooding, extreme winds, and tropical downpours. What about snow? Yes, it’s rare, but it’s happened. It’s still a hurricane although the terms “snow-i-cane” and my personal favorite “snurricane” have been used when referring to the rare event.
The first snowy tropical cyclone on record dates back to October 9, 1804. The hurricane made landfall near Atlantic City battering the coast with roughly 110 mph winds and heavy rain. Meanwhile to the north snow blanketed the ground in New York all the way to Maine. Some spots getting as much as 2 feet of snow that ruined crops and even killed livestock.
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More than 150 years passed before another hurricane brought snow to the northeast. Hurricane Ginny came close to Central Florida, but no snow. The hurricane chugged up the eastern seaboard pulling in colder air from the north. The bands of rain wrapped around the storm, eventually getting so cold snow started falling over Maine. As much as 13 inches of snow fell in late October of 1963. There were even traces of snow that fell as far south as Grandfather Mountain, North Carolina.
Almost 50 years later, Hurricane Sandy made landfall near Brigantine, New Jersey in late October of 2012 as a post-tropical cyclone. It had moved over cooler water and into a colder section of air too. It didn’t hinder the power Sandy had. In addition to the near 9-foot storm surge, there was widespread heavy snow from the Appalachian Mountains in North Carolina all the way to southwestern Pennsylvania. Richwood, West Virginia was hit the hardest getting 36 inches of snowfall during the blizzard conditions.
Roughly 50 of the 87 deaths associated with Sandy were from hypothermia, seniors falling in the dark, or carbon monoxide poisoning from badly placed generators resulting from extensive power outages. Near 8.5 million residents lost power during the brutally cold conditions. The damage assessments showed at least 50 billion in losses including almost 650-thousand homes damaged or completely destroyed.