Boston broke their record for the most snowfall in a season with yesterday's storm. And, with more snow on the horizon for later this week, the totals will continue to climb.
Boston’s winter vaults to top of snowfall records
It was close, and there were some doubts as the city finally emerged from its tundra-like state last week, but we did it.
Just after 7 Sunday evening, with 2.9 more inches of fresh snow blanketing Boston, the National Weather Service in Taunton announced that the city notched its snowiest winter since records started being kept in 1872.
The official total at Logan International Airport reached 108.6 inches — one inch more than the previous record, which was set in the 1995-1996 winter, according to the weather service.
“It’s the jackpot,” said Frank Nocera, a meteorologist at the weather service.
Now that Bostonians have bragging rights, was it worth it?
“No, not at all,” said Nick Lenza, a bellhop at the W Hotel, who has endured intense winds and stinging showers of snow over the past two months. “It was a miserable winter, especially here.”
Katie Sack, 20, an Emerson College student, was sharing a meal with a friend, out of the cold in the Theater District. “It’s time for it to stop snowing,” she said. “I’m done.”
But Siobhan Ford of Brighton, who moved to Boston a year ago and said she has been “flabbergasted” by the winter, oozed a certain pride.
“It hasn’t been that bad,” she said as she walked down Boylston Street. “I could break the record again.”
Back in January, it was hard to fathom that the city could set any records for snow this season. The city had accumulated just 4.5 inches up until Jan. 23.
The region cleared other records this winter, with a peak of 46 inches of snowpack at the Blue Hill Observatory in Milton, the deepest in the past 130 years. It has also been the second-longest stretch of days with more than 20 inches of snow on the ground.
And February, with nearly 65 inches of snow in 28 days, marked the snowiest month ever recorded in Boston — by more than 21 inches.
Nocera, the meteorologist at the weather service, noted that the average for Boston is 43 inches all winter.
The records are definitely worth crowing about for some.
“We were miserable, but at least now we’re miserable champions,” said Joe Ferreira, 27, of the South End, while trudging through the slush on Boston Common.
The prolonged misery has required coping mechanisms.
“Alcohol has been my friend,” Bruce Jurgens, 46, said while standing in the sleet on a corner of the Common.
Annie Armstrong, 19, who lives in the Fenway, has sought a kind of transcendence.
“I listened to a lot of beachy music and pretended it wasn’t happening,” she said while hurrying through the Common back to somewhere warm.
The hardest part may be that it’s still not over.
Although the weather will be mild on Monday and Tuesday, yet another arctic front is moving in later this week and temperatures are forecast to plummet, again, and remain cold through next week. Wednesday night could drop to a low of 19 degrees.
And, yes, sadly, the record could rise even more.
“I’m sorry to say that we could be getting more snow on Friday,” said Nocera. “And it looks like there might be more next week.”
http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2015/0 ... id=Top-GNP