Stormtracker 16 Meteorologist John Hickey
Did you know that the WNEP backyard serves as the official spot for snow measurements for the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton International Airport? This came to be a couple of years ago when the National Weather Service office in Binghamton approached us with the offer. Naturally, our band of weather geeks jumped at this opportunity! When it snows, we give our friends at the Binghamton National Weather Service office a call to report how much snow has fallen for the day.
Today someone from the office called because they were missing some data from us. I filled the gaps for them, but we got to chatting about the big storm from last week (weather geeks are so predictable). This discussion lead to a bigger topic about how much snow we’ve had this year compared to last year. It turns out that in Binghamton, it’s quite the contrast! Last year, they only had 32″ of snow, their least snowy on record. This year, they’ve already seen 132.6″ of snow, their most snowy on record. That’s a 100″ difference from this year to last year! Incredible! Talk about a wild swing! Data at the Binghamton airport goes back to 1951.
Although we’ve turned the page to spring, there is still the opportunity for more snow. The cold blast of air coming Wednesday may be accompanied by a few flakes. That won’t add much to the snowfall stats for the year, but it serves as a reminder that we might not be done with Old Man winter just yet!
