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Alison Stewart: Where were you on this day in 2016? It is likely you were digging out from the biggest snowfall in New York City history. When all was said and done 27 and a half inches were measured in Central Park, the most ever recorded in a single snowstorm in the five boroughs.

Today, seven years later, we're heading for a different record number of consecutive days without any measurable snow. Although that may change this week. John is now the founder of New York Metro Weather, a community weather blog and the founder of Empire Weather Consulting. John Homenuk, welcome back to WNYC.

John Homenuk: Thank you very much. Good morning. I could tell you I was a lot busier on this day in 2016, that's for sure.

Alison Stewart: I'm sure. Listeners, we want to hear from you as well. Do you miss the snow? If so-

John Homenuk: I do.

Alison Stewart: -why? I'm going to get you in a minute, John. Hold on, this is a call out for our listeners.

John Homenuk: Oh, I know, I miss it. I miss it.

Alison Stewart: Do you have a favorite memory of hunkering down during a blizzard? What's one snow day tradition for your family? Give us a call, 212-433-9692, 212-433-WNYC, you can reach us on social @allofitwnyc, or maybe you relieved, there's no snow, happy that rock salt is an accumulating on your little puppies paw, 212-433-9692, 212-433-WNYC social media @allofitwnyc. Let's take your journalist hat off for a second. You missed the snow, John?

John Homenuk: I do. I feel growing up in New York and New Jersey, I really enjoyed all the seasons, and I think having at least one good snowstorm set the tone for the year. It's been really gloomy. I do miss it for sure.

Alison Stewart: Well, give us the forecast. Is our snow drought coming to an end?

John Homenuk: I'll tell you. It's going to be close. It's not looking great though. We've had a couple of chances here. We had some snow showers yesterday and the main chance, the main shot at this is going to be with Wednesday's storm system. We have a storm coming up the East coast on Wednesday. Unfortunately, it's tracking inland. If you want snow, you want the storm generally to be off the coast. There's going to be quite a bit of warm air with it.

We do have a shot at getting some snow on the front end, but it'll quickly change over to rain in New York City. A little bit different in the interior and higher elevations, but in the New York City Metro, any snow is going to be fleeting. It's going to come down to the wire on Wednesday. That's going to be our main shot at breaking the snowless streak in the near term.

Alison Stewart: Let's talk about these records. Last week you wrote in the online local website, the city, that New York City could potentially break two records. What are the two records?

John Homenuk: Yes. The two main records that we're dealing with right now are first of all the latest first measurable snowfall in a winter. How long do you go into the winter season before you see your first measurable snow? In the record at Central Park which is a New York City's official weather reporting station for Manhattan, is January 29th, 1973 which 1973 was also the least snowy winter on record at Central Park. We are coming very close to that as you can tell, that's coming up in less than a week.

The other one is we've gone now 321 consecutive days without any measurable snowfall occurring at Central Park. The longest streak in addition to this one is 332 days. That was for the period ending December 15th, 2020. We are coming up on not only the latest first snowfall of the winter but also the longest streak of days without any measurable snow at all.

Alison Stewart: Measurable, how much snow has to fall for it to be measurable?

John Homenuk: Yes, great question. The best way to describe this is if there are snow showers occurring, and it's not sticking to the ground or even if there's a flake that you see hits the ground and then it melts, that's generally referred to as a trace of snow.

In order for snow to be measurable, there has to be at least a 10th of an inch of snow measured at the weather station. It's the differentiating factor between, is it snowing and just melting like it was yesterday, or is it actually sticking to some surfaces. That's really the big difference.

Alison Stewart: When it is measurable, does it have to be specifically at one of the weather stations for it to count? You can't come to somebody's house who's saying, "Yay, I got this many inches."

John Homenuk: Well, for the purpose of the records, yes, it has to be at the Weather observatory at Central Park. They've been doing the records there since, I think it's 1869. They have to have measurable snow there for this record to be broken for the streak to be broken, but we've seen some snow in elsewhere throughout the five boroughs. There's been obviously plenty of snow in the interior parts of New Jersey and New York. For the purposes of the records, we've been discussing it all hones in on that Central Park weather station.

Alison Stewart: Let's take a call. Michael, calling in from the East Village. Hi, Michael, thanks for calling All Of It.

Michael: Oh, thank you. I love your show.

Alison Stewart: Thank you.

Michael: I was a production coordinator on a Darren Star series called Central Park West, and we had our offices in our studio on 11th Street between Broadway and University. In '96, this was 1996, there was a huge blizzard, and I stupidly put on my boots and trudged over there and the drift, 11th Street hadn't even been plowed yet.

The drift climbing over from Broadway onto 11th Street was much taller than I was. The phones, of course, when I get into the office, were ringing off the hook and the producer was the first one, and she said, "Send a car. Send a car. I need to get down there." I said, "[unintelligible 00:05:56], you're not going anywhere." I don't know why I came in. It was really stupid. Of course, we lost the day and maybe the next one.

Alison Stewart: What would it happen if you said, send a snowplow? You'd be like, well, see what I can do. Michael, thanks for calling in. Frank is calling from Brooklyn. Hi, Frank.

Frank: Hi. I am a sustaining member of WNYC also.

Alison Stewart: Thank you, Frank.

Frank: I think that after what happened in Buffalo, we should be grateful we don't have snow. What they had over there was horrific. Having people dead in cars. We don't need all that snow here. The corners get frozen, seniors can't pass, people with handicaps, children have to go to school, the subway steps going down at all icy and people could fall. It's pretty to look at Central Park and Prospect Park, but you have to be practical. In the large metropolitan area, snow is not necessary. You want snow, go to the Catskills.

Alison Stewart: Frank, thanks for calling in. You heard him, go to the Catskills. 212-433-9692, 212-433-WNYC, do you miss the snow? If so, why? Where were you during any of the favorite blizzard? Big blizzards, I shouldn't say favorite, but where were you during any of these big blizzards?

The one in 2016. Maybe the one in 1996. I remember that one too, with the snow day tradition in your family, 212-433-9692, 212-433-WNYC or reach out to us on social @allofitwnyc, or maybe you're someone like Frank, and you're relieved there's not any snow right now, you can tell us why as well. My guest is John Hammick, founder of New York Metro Weather and owner of Empire Weather Consulting. Just for context, how much snow do we usually have this year, or how much snow have we usually gotten by this time?

John Homenuk: Yes. That's going to vary obviously depending on where you are in the New York City metro area. For instance, if you're in Central Park, or it's a lot different than that you're at JFK, but it's Central Park in particular, the average snowfall annually, it's just short of 30 inches a year. It generally ranges from 28 to 30 inches. If you figure that we're approaching the end of January into early February, and the average on the year is about 30 inches, we are well behind.

Alison Stewart: We all saw that deadly, horrible blizzard in Buffalo. I'm curious about, and Frank said go to the Catskills if you want snow, how local is this snowless? Is this just very much a metro thing?

John Homenuk: It is. It's a little bit yes and a little bit no. There's definitely a little lack of snow from New York down into Philly and DC that general I95 area to the coastline has seen almost zero snow all winter long, but you don't have to head very far inland to see areas that have seen snowfall.

You go into northern New Jersey or southeast New York, like Frank was saying, you don't have to go very far. It's been almost Frank's perfect winter because if there's nothing in the city, as soon as you go inland into the suburbs, there's been plenty of snow. Localized, yes, but not just to New York, it's also the I95 areas of Philadelphia and DC that have really been skunked from snow this year.

Alison Stewart: I saw on your website, New York Metro weather back in November, you predicted New York City should "expect slightly above normal snowfall this season but that" seasonal weather forecasting is one of the most challenging aspects of meteorology. When you think back, what one is that initial prediction? Then if you can share what makes meteorology so challenging.

John Homenuk: Yes, so long-range forecasting, I think in particular is just incredibly complex. There's so many different moving parts to a forecast out several weeks or months. It's come a long way where I think we don't have to go back too far in the past to be appreciative of the fact that we can forecast accurately five to seven days out at this point. In terms of looking at weeks and months in advance, there's so much going on that acts on the weather pattern. The weather pattern in the Pacific Ocean affects what happens here in New York. Things that are happening over Greenland or the North Atlantic Ocean affect us. There's so many things happening all at once, and seasonal forecasting is extremely complex. I think where the forecast came unraveled a bit was, we were fully anticipating that late December cold shot.

That was something that I think easily gets forgotten now at this point because it's been, I guess a week or more of warmth and then we've had just no snow since. That cold shot seems like a distant memory almost at this point, but that was the focus of the forecast and the thought was, we would get that cold shot and have some storms to go along with it.

As it turned out the cold came in, we got that arctic front, and there were no storms. Nothing happened for a week straight. As soon as that cold started to lift out the storm started coming back. It was just a function of the timing and almost a testament to how intricate long-range weather forecasting can be where you can get so much of it right, and then the snowfall forecast is just slightly off.

Alison Stewart: Let's take some calls. Our phone lines are full on this one, Michael calling in from Little Silver New Jersey. Hi, Michael thanks for calling All Of It.

Michael: Hi. Thank you. I'm 79. Winters are boring. I love shoveling snow. I'm a skier, and I can tell the tale of walking to school in knee-deep snow. I loved it and still love it. I wouldn't have it any other way.

Alison Stewart: Michael, thank you so much for calling in. Bruce is calling from Green Brook New Jersey. Hi, Bruce.

Bruce: Hi, thanks for taking my call. Growing up in New Jersey it is only the frustration because you never always drab of snow here, little bit there. I don't think I ever saw more than six inches of snow growing up until this winter of '78, actually it's 45 years ago this week. Weather forecast Thursday night was a big storm coming, going to be start out as snow.

Overnight it's going to turn over to rains, I went to bed crushed again as always, woke up in the morning and the track of the storm had shifted out to the East, and it was just snowing like crazy. I never saw so much snow in my life. I think it had to be at least 18 inches, 20 inches of snow maybe in January 26 or so '78. Of course, school is closed.

We had a fantastic weekend tobogganing and playing. Then we all got up to go school in Monday morning. It didn't occur to anybody. The school wouldn't be in session, but school was actually closed the following Monday. They were so unprepared for it because the Weather Forecast was that, it was going to turn to rain so they were totally caught off guard when the [unintelligible 00:12:43] storm shifted, and we just ended up with a foot and a half or more of snow. It was fabulous.

Alison Stewart: Bruce, thanks for calling in. Let's talk to Matthew calling in from Manhattan. Hi, Matthew.

Matthew: Hey, how you doing? I grew up on Long Island and as a kid, we used to sketch. We used to grab onto the bumpers of cars and use the snow under our feet to get rides. When I moved to Manhattan I was about 20 and it was like 1988 around there. It was a huge snowstorm, and I was walking down Seventh Avenue. There was an oil rig at a light and a big oil truck. I went over, and I grabbed onto the back of his bumper like standing. He just started going, and I was blasting down Seventh Avenue on my feet like skiing, waving at people. It was insane. It was the best memory of Manhattan.

Alison Stewart: Matthew, thanks for calling in. Let's talk to Irish from Brooklyn. Hi, Irish.

Irish: Hi, how are you?

Alison Stewart: I'm great.

Irish: This goes back to '96. I was 23 years old, and I had just moved to the East Village a few months before this big blizzard. I had a friend who lived on the Upper East Side and she called my little Motorola flip phone. I probably had for less than a year, my first cell phone. You're always excited when you get a call on your cell phone. As a co-worker she said, you got to come up and see Fifth Avenue.

They're calling it the Alps of Fifth Avenue because they had plowed the snow up into eight-foot or maybe even high snow banks on both sides. I think I took the sixth up, and we walked around Fifth Avenue for about an hour and then spent another hour still walking through Central Park.

It was just absolutely gorgeous seeing the park in the city under that heavy, heavy blanket of snow. After a couple hours of that and a few drinks, back down to the East Village which had turned into a carnival atmosphere, everybody was out on the sidewalk, drinking and partying, having fun, music glaring from restaurants. I think we partied until we basically couldn't party anymore that night.

Alison Stewart: Irish, thanks for calling in. I remember that '96 snowstorm, I remember walking down Fifth Avenue trying to get home and just feeling like I was in the middle of a snow globe because it was just swirling all around like I was at fifth and 28th. It was so beautiful.

John Homenuk: That was an amazing storm.

Alison Stewart: It was also really cold. It's so interesting. By the way, my guest is John Homenuk, founder of New York Metro Weather and owner of Empire Weather Consulting. In the past few years, there's been this pattern, I don't know if this means anything where we have no snow, no snow, and then boom a giant big storm, two feet of snow, and then we go back to no snow, no snow and then maybe another big boom of snow. Is there any science behind that? Is there anything to explain that?

John Homenuk: Yes, not really. It's just part of the pattern that we're in right now. New York City in general, if you look back at our long history of winter weather, we get larger storms than the majority of places in the country because we are right near the coast, right near where those nor Eastern really tend to strengthen. It's also filled with periods of mild weather in between.

In recent years I think we've seen a little bit of more volatility in the pattern. If you think back to 2009, 2010 2011, we had a lot of snow. Those years were just packed with storm after storm, then obviously we had the blizzard in 2016, and in between, there's been these milder years sprinkled in, this year obviously isn't a league of its own. I don't think that there's any necessarily pattern or science yet to it. It does seem to be anecdotally getting a little bit more volatile, but we'll have to continue to monitor it over the next, I don't know decade.

Alison Stewart: Listeners, we're going to continue taking your calls whether you miss the snow or not maybe you have a favorite memory of one of those big blizzards, a snow day tradition in your family. 2124-339-692, 212-433 WNYC. You can reach out to us on social @allofitwnyc. We'll have more after a quick break. This is All Of It.

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Alison Stewart: This is all of it. I'm Alison Stewart. We're talking about our snowless winter thus far with John Homenuk, founder of New York Metro Weather and owner of Empire Weather Consulting. We're also having this conversation with you listeners. Let's talk to Dennis from Hell's Kitchen. Hi, Dennis.

Dennis: Hi, there how are you?

Alison Stewart: I'm great. How are you?

Dennis: I'm good. Thanks for taking my call. It was 1968 Christmas Eve. I was 12 years old, and it was pouring down rain, and it was 55 degrees. The next Christmas morning we woke up and there was like two feet of snow on the ground, so unexpected. I think the weather forecasting back then was not what it is today. It's Christmas morning and it was all this snow and my parents had given me my first polaroid instamatic camera the kind that pops the picture out and wait for it to develop. It was so much fun.

Night we had a five-person bobsled and my dad drove an old Reno car. He tied the bobsled on the back of the Bruno which is what he did when it snowed in the wintertime. About six or seven neighborhood kids brought their sleds, and we tied them all in the back of the car. He drove us around the neighborhood with the car and all of us out there. It was just so much fun and then when we came back my mom had hot chocolate and popcorn ready for all of us. It was just a really really sweet memory. That's it.

Alison Stewart: That is a lovely memory. Thanks for sharing it, Dennis. Let's talk to Jeff from Inwood. Hi, Jeff.

Jeff: Hi. Good afternoon. Thanks for taking my call. I was walking this morning in Inwood Hills Park and due to the lack of snow and the relatively mild weather we've been having, there are Tulips that are popping up through the ground all over the place up there.

Alison Stewart: That brings me to a question for John Homenuk. Thank you for introducing that. Let's talk a little bit, we know the climate and weather are different things, but in terms of if this matters beyond whether we like it or not or we have nice memories or not, what are some of the consequences of not having a good cold winter and not having snow?

John Homenuk: Yes, it's a great question. I think it's complicated. It depends a lot on the severity it. If it's 15 or 20 degrees above normal that's one thing. Our winter so far has been relatively mild not necessarily record-breaking mild. We've actually had some cold as well, but if the winter tends to be very, very mild, you do get effects on agriculture.

Plants generally work in cycles where they have dormancy during the wintertime, and you can get early blooms. It does tend to mess with the cycle of everything if the winter is extremely warm, and we don't have any snow at all. It's a very complex answer, but generally, there are impacts especially to agriculture. When you have a winter that's extremely, extremely warm and has almost zero snow.

Alison Stewart: In New York City our drinking water comes from [unintelligible 00:19:59] outside the city [unintelligible 00:20:01] and Catskills, Ashokan and Delaware. Does it matter whether we have snow or not as long as we get precipitation in terms of how those reservoirs are full or not full I should say?

John Homenuk: Yes, not really. I think the precipitation is good no matter what. There are some slight differences in the runoff between snow and rain. When it comes to the reservoirs, the good news is that we left this summer and went into the spring with a drought, and we've come out of that pretty well here over the last couple of months. In fact, precipitation in the last 60 to 90 days is slightly above normal in our area.

I think everyone if they think back to actually what the pattern's been over the last couple weeks, it's actually been pretty active. We haven't had any snow, but there's been plenty of rain, we had a thunderstorm last weekend. We've gotten ourselves into a better place here where we have had plenty of precipitation to break us out of that dry spell we were in. Unfortunately, it's not snow for those of us that were wishing for it, but precipitation wise we're doing okay here, and we've broken out of the drought that we were in several months ago.

Alison Stewart: Listeners, we're taking your calls about whether or not you missed the snow, maybe of a favorite memory of snow as a kid. I did some quality sledding in Mountainside Park in New Jersey during my day. 212-433-9692, let's talk to Annie from Carroll Gardens. Hi, Annie.

Annie: Hi. Thanks so much for having me on.

Alison Stewart: What's going on?

Annie: Thinking about the snowstorm of 1996, I lived on the Upper West Side, and I was a high school senior really, really over my head in calculus. We had so many snow days as a result that they canceled midterms, it was like this gift out of the blue.

Alison Stewart: My goodness. Can you remember what you were thinking at the time?

Annie: It seemed like providence. It was amazing. I was just thrilled.

Alison Stewart: Annie, thanks for calling in, weather saved her GPA. Let's talk to Mark from the West Village. Hi, Mark.

Mark: Oh, hi, thanks for taking my call. I grew up in Montclair, I remember sweating in Mountainside Park. That was a lot of fun, very big.

Alison Stewart: Big.

Mark: We probably did two runs, and then we were exhausted. What I wanted to mention was as a kid my dad used to listen to [unintelligible 00:22:27] or we had rambling with gambling on like every morning. When there was a threat of possible school closures, we were just so excited to just sit in the kitchen over our cereal and listen for the list.

Just on and on list of schools waiting to hear if our schools were going to be included in this school closure list which was the idea of getting a snow day was like the best thing that could happen to a little kid growing up in Montclair. Love the snow.

Now not so much because I've got a little dog, and when I have to walk her three times a day, I've got to put those little booties on and she gets the frozen feet. I'm really digging this winter as much as I like the snow, I like the dry sidewalks. Just wanted to let you know.

Alison Stewart: What's the name of your dog?

Mark: Little pip.

Alison Stewart: Little pip. Well, I'm glad little pip doesn't have to rock the booties. Those are hard to get on them too. Woo, Mark, thanks for calling in. Let's talk to Jay calling in from Yonkers. Hi, Jay.

Jay: Hi, I have two reminiscence. The first one was from the blizzard of 1947 where I was six years old growing up in the Bronx. From one side of street to the other someone or some people had dug a trench walkway, and walking through that trench to get to the other side the snow was way above my head.

Alison Stewart: What do you remember thinking about it at the time?

Jay: Oh, I thought it was just great, it was wonderful. The second memory goes to 1996 the funeral home I worked for got a call that someone who had passed away, and the medical examiner would not even come out to release the person. We had to get the public works department to bring one of those large, high-tired front loaders to come up to the residence, and the person that had to be removed in the plow.

Alison Stewart: Did not see that one coming. Did not see that one coming. Jay, thank you for calling in. Let's talk to George in Bensonhurst. Hi, George, how are you?

George: Good, thank you. I got two if you have time. I'll give you the good one. It must have been like 2006, it was just a flurry, but I was walking back home, and there was a store opening on 23rd Street. They had those big Klieg lights pointing up. The snow looked like diamonds coming out of the sky. Even though I was exhausted coming on from work I stood there for at least 10, 15 minutes just gazing at it. It was remarkable.

Alison Stewart: Oh, George thank you for sharing that story. John, anything you want to leave our listeners with about this snowless winter something to keep in mind?

John Homenuk: Oh, no. I think that the main thing is that winter is far from over. We've talked a lot about these records, but it's important to remember New York City, the peak of our snow potential in any given winter over the last 30 to 40 years has been very late January into mid-February. Still have some time to go, and I think obviously there'd be plenty of chances for snow here as we move into February and even March.

Alison Stewart: My guest has been John Homenuk. He's the founder of New York Metro weather, a community weather blog, and owner of Empire Weather Consulting. John, thank you so much for being with us.

John Homenuk: Thanks so much for having me.

Alison Stewart: Listeners thanks for sharing your memories.

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Alison Stewart: When does the imitation exceed the original? We'll talk about great cover songs with a co-host of the Switched on Pop podcast. We also want to know what your favorite is, and if you've ever wanted to come up with your own cover song, have we got a project for you that is just ahead.

 

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