Monday, February 19, 2007

February 13-14, 2007 Winter Storm

The following comes from the Wilmington NWS...

An intense winter storm developed over the Southern Plains and moved across the Ohio Valley on Tuesday, February 13, 2007. Widespread rain developed ahead of the storm late on Monday February 12. The moisture moved into colder air as it crossed into northern Kentucky, southern to snow, and dropped anywhere from 1 to 5 inches of snow on much of the region by daybreak Tuesday. As the storm intensified, it drew in warmer air from the south, which caused the snow to quickly change to sleet and freezing rain Tuesday morning and afternoon across much of the I-70 corridor and points south. Areas from Dayton to Columbus received several inches of sleet on top of the snow, which later turned into freezing rain with up to a quarter inch of ice on trees and power lines. Further south, snow had quickly changed to freezing rain Tuesday morning. This included areas from the northern Cincinnati suburbs into Wilmington and areas south of Columbus. The temperature never warmed above freezing across these areas, which allowed ice to accumulate to between a half inch and an inch. This resulted in significant tree damage and numerous power outages. Southern portions of Cincinnati and far northern Kentucky saw temperatures warm to near or slightly above freezing which alleviated some of the icing, but still allowed up to a quarter of an inch of ice accumulation and several downed tree limbs and power lines.

Further north, the intensifying storm caused the pressure gradient to tighten across western and northern Ohio and resulted in very strong winds with gusts up to 45 mph. This caused significant blowing and drifting of snow across areas from Troy to Marysville, and further north into Celina, Wapakoneta and Bellefontaine. As a result, road crews had a very difficult time keeping roads clear, and by Tuesday afternoon, travel across west central Ohio was nearly impossible. By Tuesday evening, a level 3 snow emergency had been declared in many counties in west central Ohio. The snow continued late Tuesday night, and by Wednesday morning had accumulated to anywhere from 8 to 15 inches. The wind caused snow to drift substantially, and in some cases drifts were over 4 feet high.

Click on any of the pictures below for a larger image.




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