Snow Depth Days
of the Northeast: 2004-2005

The season in review

The first snow of the 04/05 season in November brought several inches of snow to southern New England, and cold weather kept the snow around for several days. That was the only snow of the month and the month closed out with no snow at all in much of New Hampshire. December also favored southern New England with many areas getting more than a foot of snow. Penacook had only 5" (8 SDD), the least for a December since 1998. January brought some significant snow to Penacook, but the big story was the Blizzard of '05 that clobbered Massachusetts, many sites reported over four feet of snow. The fabled snow stake near the top of Mt Mansfield only saw three feet. Snow continued through February and March with much of eastern Massachusetts breaking 100" of snow for the season.

March was a very odd month by several reckonings. It averaged 3.6 degrees below average in Pepperell MA (5.9 degrees below average in the first half) and low dew points kept the snow from melting. The dew point in Penacook was above freezing more in January (8.1%) and February (10.61%) than in March (6.56%) and most of that was in the last four days of the month. The low on March 10th was below zero over much of the area. A warm April was followed by a cold May. Even though climatology reports that period features the fastest rising temperatures of the year, Blue Hill's average high temperature in April was warmer than May's!

Daily/Monthly Data

The following table summarizes the snow fall and depth days from sites that are posting that data on the WHDH weather observations mail list and a couple others. 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 4 6 7.3 16 30 197 14.5 175 23.3 279.0
Ashland MA 5.9 10 10 31 36 178 17.5 139 16.6 118.0
N Berlin MA 5.25 13 11 32 44 217 20.75 263 27.25 343.0
Fairhaven MA 1.7 2 12 41 42.8 231 19.1 137 17.1 114.0
Manchester MA 5.1 12.1 14.4 55.4 56.3 298
Marlboro MA 5.6 11.5 10.7 29 39.6 204 21.9 234 18.9 207.0
Milton-BHO MA 7.8 21 16.2 49 44.8 226 25.4 225
Monson MA 5.2 16 9.75 22 28.25 160 12.65 130
Newburyport MA 3.3 5
Pepperell MA 2.6 4 11.9 31 46.3 225 18 258 33 323.0
Poland Spring ME 11 59 21.6 118 29.9 415 41.8 802.0
Bow NH 0.1 0 11.5 31 35.1 246 28.9 390 23.9 572.0 25
Deerfield NH 0.1 0
Penacook NH 8 20 26.2 176 19.7 258 20.7 324.0
Peterborough NH 2.25 3 17.75 44 37.5 221 21.25 264 45.25 275.0
Charlestown RI 1.4 1 8.9 27 29.9 136 20.2 134 15 107.0
Woonsocket RI 5.9 17 11.9 38 38.5 201 16.1 137 17.5 86.0
Mt. Mansfield VT 14.7 110 37 692 38.5 1202 50.7 1536 33.5 2319.0 14.1 1671 2 691

2004/2005 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 79.1 673 8.5
Ashland MA 86 476 5.5
N Berlin MA 108.25 868 8.0
Fairhaven MA 92.7 525 5.7
Manchester MA 75.8 365 4.8
Marlboro MA 96.7 685 7.1
Milton-BHO MA 94.2 521 5.5
Monson MA 55.85 328 5.9
Newburyport MA 3.3 5 1.5
Pepperell MA 111.8 841 7.5
Poland Spring ME 104.3 1394 13.4
Bow NH 99.5 1264 12.7
Deerfield NH 0.1 0 0.0
Penacook NH 74.6 778 10.4
Peterborough NH 124 807 6.5
Charlestown RI 75.4 405 5.4
Woonsocket RI 89.9 479 5.3
Mt. Mansfield VT 190.5 8221 43.2

Contributors

Name Location
Dennis Bollea Fairhaven MA
A Cadoret Woonsocket RI
Wayne Cotterly Poland Spring ME
Matthew Douglas Milton-BHO MA
Tim Fisher Peterborough NH
Todd Gross N Berlin MA
Paul Hansen Marlboro MA
Jim Hilt Bow NH
Christopher McCray Monson MA
Andrew Plona Collinsville CT
Jot Ross Ashland MA
Chris Seeber Charlestown RI
Jim Spillane Deerfield NH
Don Towle Manchester MA
Paul Venditti Pepperell MA
Ric Werme Penacook NH
Ray Whitley Newburyport MA

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 WHDH Weather Spotters 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.) The University of Vermont has graphs of snow depths at Stowe through many seasons.

Last update: 2005 November 25
Ric Werme

Back to home page.