Philly ends its snow drought with a whopping 0.3 inches

It didn’t close any schools, but an official 0.3 inches of snow was measured at Philadelphia International Airport early Wednesday, ending the season-long snow drought.

“It’s over,“ declared Alex Staarmann, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service in Mount Holly.

With that, in the 139 years that official snow records have been kept, the winter of 2022-23 at least clinched a tie for 138th place. In the winter of 2019-20, the seasonal total was 0.3 inches; the champ, 1972-73 is officially out of reach.

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That season only a “trace” — defined as the observation of a single flake or sleet ball at the airport by a contract spotter or automated observer — was entered into the record book.

Wednesday’s snow began in the early-morning hours, falling at the vigorous rate of an inch every 10 hours, before ending around daybreak, Staarmann said.

It began about 12 hours after an intrepid contract observer at the airport detected snow mixing with rain at 2:27 p.m. on Tuesday, ruining Philly’s shot at experiencing its first absolutely snow-less, trace-less January on record.

Asked if the sighting generated excitement in the office, Staarmann said, “For the people who like snow there was.”

Last month was the warmest January since 1932, with an average temperature of 43.3 degrees, settling for second place on the all-time list.

According to the updated monthly outlook by the government’s Climate Prediction Center, regardless of what the groundhog decrees Thursday morning, the odds favor a warm February around here. The center’s two-week outlook has warm look for the entire eastern half of the country, with the strongest chances for above-normal temperatures in Philly and most of the Northeast.

But after a month in which not a single day featured below-normal temperatures, the region is about to experience its coldest stretch since Christmas week, with forecast temperatures during the weekend not getting out of the 20s and wind chills in the single digits and teens.

Temperatures in Philly will fight to reach freezing Friday, the weather service says, then fall to 10 degrees Saturday morning, and that could end up being the lowest reading for all of February, said Paul Pastelok, AccuWeather Inc.’s lead seasonal forecaster.

Temperatures are expected to rebound well into the 40s on Sunday.

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No snow is on the horizon, and the impending warmth aside, Philly may well eventually build on that 0.3 total, said Staarmann.

“We still have a couple months left,” he said. In the meantime, he added, “It’s nice to feel like winter for a little while.”