We haven’t had measurable snow this season in Springfield/Greene County. That is not unusual.
Although we did have snow on the ground last year with two inches measured on Christmas morning, a white Christmas with at least an inch of snow on the ground is not that common — 12 times in the last 81 years. The 30-year average 1991-2020 is slightly lower.
Typical temperatures for Christmas are in the low-mid 40s for highs and the low to mid 20s for lows. The record high is 74 degrees set back in 1889. The record low is minus 10 degrees in 1983.
The chances for a white Christmas in Springfield seem unlikely this year. Keep watching the day to day forecast and maybe we can beat the odds.
A look back at pre-Christmas 2002: Snow in Springfield snarls holiday traffic
The most snow on the ground on Christmas since 1942 was nine inches in 2002. If you were here and driving that year on the afternoon of Monday, December 23, 2002, you should remember that time well.
Heavy snow quickly accumulated on cold ground during the afternoon, bringing heavy pre-Christmas holiday traffic to a near standstill. Then, after a brief break, snow resumed that night into the predawn hours of December 24 as low pressure tracked through the southern U.S.
I was scheduled for the evening shift that day and my commute to work normally took 25 minutes. With heavy snow, I left early, but my travel time was nearly 90 minutes. I was 20 minutes late to work. There were some elsewhere that were stuck for hours. I considered myself lucky.
Overdue for our first snow
The last time Springfield saw a significantly higher than average winter snowfall was 10 years ago during the 2013-2014 winter season. The average first measurable snow in winter is December 8th, so we are running a little behind.
Nothing like the cold winters of the late 1970s
In the late 1970s, unusually cold and snowy winters in the eastern two-thirds of the U.S. grabbed headlines. Where I grew up on the East Coast, the unusual cold got a lot of media attention. Nor’easters dropped a lot of snow and I missed a bunch of school for snow days (which I loved!!!). Snow flurries occurred in south Florida as far south as the Miami area on January 19, 1977. That was the only time that happened in recorded history.
Yeah, that’s cold.
In Springfield, the two coldest winters since the late 1800s occurred in 1977-78 and 1978-79. The winter of 1976-77 ranked a little lower on the list but was still very cold for this area.
Top 10 coldest winters in Springfield (Dec.-Feb.) since 1888
| Winter | Avg. monthly temp |
| 1977-78 | 26.1 degrees |
| 1978-79 | 26.4 degrees |
| 1917-18 | 27.2 degrees |
| 1904-05 | 27.8 degrees |
| 1898-99 | 29.2 degrees |
| 1935-36 | 29.6 degrees |
| 1976-77 | 29.8 degrees |
| 1909-10 | 30.0 degrees |
| 1901-02 | 30.0 degrees |
| 2009-10 | 30.1 degrees |
| 1911-12 | 30.1 degrees |
From the 1940s to the mid-1970s, there was indeed some lowering of global temperatures with most research pointing to global pollution by sulfate particles from the burning of fossil fuels as the cause. Sulfate particles can scatter sunlight and reduce atmospheric warming.
When the United States and other countries began to lower sulfur emissions in the 1970s to reduce acid rain and respiratory illnesses, the cooling ended. By the late 1970s, global temperatures began to rise again.
Despite a lot of mainstream press concerning global cooling in the 1970s, there was no scientific consensus to support it. The following passage comes from a scientific review of the climate research during that period:
“An enduring popular myth suggests that in the 1970s the climate science community was predicting ‘global cooling’ and an ‘imminent’ ice age, an observation frequently used by those who would undermine what climate scientists say today about the prospect of global warming. A literature review suggests that, on the contrary, greenhouse warming even then dominated scientists’ thinking as being one of the most important forces shaping Earth’s climate on human time scales.”
(Peterson, Thomas & Connolley, William & Fleck, John. (2008). The Myth of the 1970s Global Cooling Scientific Consensus. Bulletin of The American Meteorological Society – BULL AMER METEOROL SOC. 89. 10.1175/2008BAMS2370.1.)
‘Next ice age’ was just hype
Remembering the hype around the “next ice age” in the 1970s, the idea that more scientists were predicting global warming rather than cooling came as a surprise to me. Time and Newsweek magazines, pretty mainstream and prominent news sources of the 1970s, were pretty quick to jump on the ice age train. And when Leonard Nimoy tells you an ice age might be coming, you listen (YouTube Video link).
The journalist who authored the Newsweek article, Peter Gwynne, reflected on his work’s impact decades later.
All the ice age talk pretty quickly disappeared in the 1980s. In 2013, about 97% of actively publishing climate scientists believed that human activity leads to climate change and a general warming of the atmosphere and oceans. A more recent survey in 2021 showed that number was over 99%.
Those who want to cast doubt on the accuracy of the predictions of human-induced climate change are happy to bring up the media hype/scientific minority positions on global cooling from the 1970s. Paraphrasing a familiar refrain: “They said it would get colder, now it’s warmer? You can’t trust any of those weather scientists!!” Well, if you feel that way, now you can’t trust almost all of them.
Pew Research has some excellent polling information about U.S. and global views on climate change and it is no surprise. Politics, education, and social media play a big role in shaping those views.
The drought situation worsens again
Whether rain, sleet, or snow, we can use the precipitation with recent dry weather beginning to worsen drought conditions again.
In winter, you don’t readily see the effects of drought, but the lack of deep soil moisture can hurt agriculture going into the spring. A lack of rain and snow could also allow the fuel for natural cover fires to remain dry.
Hopefully, we can get into a more active and wet pattern soon.
