ST. LOUIS – This winter hasn’t been too bad when it comes to accumulating snow. Monday’s system brought a lot of rain and even some thunder, with the heavy snow missing us to the north.
Many factors go into precipitation type when it comes to winter storms in St. Louis, but a critical factor is the track of the low-pressure system.
Monday’s low-pressure system basically moved right overhead here in St. Louis. This kept the region in the warm sector for much of the day. With temperatures above freezing, we just had rain.
Some of St. Louis’ biggest snows happen when the center of the low tracks further south over Memphis. This is the sweet spot for our region to get an impressive snow. This is the track of the storm system that cause the Blizzard of 1982.
What would have happened Monday if the track would have been further south and temperatures were colder? How much snow would we have gotten?
Today at Lambert we got 1.19 inches of rain. One inch of liquid precipitation is about equivalent to 12” of snow.
If today’s system had been all snow, we would have seen it pile up to about one foot.
If you’re a snow lover, don’t worry, we have the entire month of February and even March where we can get some decent snows.
