Snow Depth Days
of the Northeast: 2000-2001

Daily/Monthly Data

The following table summarizes the snow fall and depth days from sites that are posting that data on the old wxobs-sne mailing list. If people also prepare Web pages for daily information for their site, I'll include links to them. Cells under the "snow" column are the snowfall for the site in that month, under "SDD" are the depth days for the month.

Location October November December January February March April May
Snow SDD Snow SDD Snow SDD Snow SDD Snow SDD Snow SDD Snow SDD Snow SDD
Collinsville CT 0.6 0 1.1 0 16.7 38 13.2 265 27.2 378 26.3 470 0.0 40
Ashland MA 11.4 27 13.3 245 15.7 162 30.1 110
S Attleboro MA 7.9 15.5 12.3 147 12.9 50 15.1 47.5
Fairhaven MA 0.1 0 5.2 10 10.2 53 10.9 15 17.5 20 0.1 0
Marlboro MA 0.3 0 16.5 36 16.4 296 20.4 358.5 35.7 415 0.0 1
Milton MA 0.1 0 5.4 2 13.6 75 13.2 46 31.9 105 0.2 0
Pepperell MA 0.3 0 0.1 0 18.9 44 14.8 374 24.2 398 43.3 442 0.0 29
Sterling MA 20 39 17 368 19 464 36 652 0.0 89
E Walpole MA 5.7 7.85 11.8 149.1 11.1 71.9
Poland Spring ME 1.3 1 17.7 43 9.7 330 25.7 604 56.3 908 0.4 472
Derry NH 20.6 52 14.1 377 22.7 445 41.5 592 0.1 54
Penacook NH 17 40 20 234 22.5 470 38.1 630 0.0 127
Charlestown RI 8.3 17 8.6 110 10.6 21 10.1 29
Woonsocket RI 10.9 34 10.2 225 14.4 123 21.5 74.4

1999/2000 season to end of last month

The persistence quotient is lower than the ultimate value if there is still snow on the ground at the site. This data will be updated each month.

Location Snowfall Depth Days Persistence
Quotient
Collinsville CT 85.1 1191 14.0
Ashland MA 70.5 544 7.7
S Attleboro MA 48.2 260 5.4
Fairhaven MA 44 98 2.2
Marlboro MA 89.3 1106.5 12.4
Milton MA 64.4 228 3.5
Pepperell MA 101.6 1287 12.7
Sterling MA 92 1612 17.5
E Walpole MA 28.6 228.85 8.0
Poland Spring 111.1 2358 21.2
Derry NH 99 1520 15.4
Penacook NH 97.6 1501 15.4
Charlestown RI 37.6 177 4.7
Woonsocket RI 57 456.4 8.0

Contributors

Name Location Email name Email domain
Dennis Bollea Fairhaven MA 76624.2745 compuserve.com
A Cadoret Woonsocket RI cumulus att.net
Matthew Carow E Walpole MA Mattcarow aol.com
Jim Corbin S Attleboro MA ah728 osfn.rhilinet.gov
Wayne Cotterly Poland Spring ME cotterly prodigy.net
Matthew Douglas Milton MA mdouglas mediaone.net
Paul Hansen Marlboro MA phhansen ma.ultranet.com
Jim Hilt Derry NH JHilt drc.com
Paul Himottu Sterling MA Paul_Himottu stratus.com
Andrew Plona Collinsville CT nwconnecticut comcast.net
Jot Ross Ashland MA jotspot ma.ultranet.com
Chris Seeber Charlestown RI ctseeber home.com
Paul Venditti Pepperell MA paulvenditti prodigy.net
Ric Werme Penacook NH werme mediaone.net

Credits

Jim Corbin, a meteorologist from Rhode Island, proposed the concept of both snow depth days and the persistence quotient, but he didn't have good names for them.  After a bouncing around various ideas, I came up with Depth Days.  It seems to fit into colloquial speech well, e.g. "When mired in the Depth Days of February, she thought fondly of the Dog Days of August." Of course, none of us snow lovers would ever think that. I picked Persistence Quotient while putting this page together, we'll see how it wears with time.

Musings

I think depth days is a great statistic, and I'm surprised that it is catching on slowly outside of the wxobs-sne mail list. I never expected that the NWS would embrace it quickly, but I had hoped that TV meteorologists would start using it, in monthly summaries, if nothing else. It would be nice if ski areas would use it, but they may not wish to if they are not likely to be #1 consistantly. (And if only one area reports depth days, it would not be a good comparative statistic.) I see that UVM has graphs of snow depths at Stowe through many seasons.

Last update: 2004 March 5
Ric Werme

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