I spent the weekend in Collegedale for a scheduled homeleave from Highland. Unfortunately, I was unable to submit reports from my CoCoRaHs weather station because it is in Sumner County. I did follow the storm carefully though, and provided many updates on Facebook as to the current track of the event.
Snow was a guarantee for northern counties in Tennessee, but the forecast was much more difficult for southern counties such as Hamilton and Marion. According to weather blogs posted on newschannel9.com, The snow/rain line was predicted to be at the TN/GA state line, so the difference in a couple degrees would make or break the winter storm for those in extreme-southern Tennessee/extreme northern Georgia. Those south of Catoosa County in Georgia was forecast to have a rain event from the storm system.
Snow flurries began to fall at our house in Apison, TN around lunchtime, and it did not take much time to pick up intensity. Within an hour, the snow was beginning to stick in grassy areas. Throughout the rest of the day, bands of heavy snow passed through causing accumulation to quickly add up. Because of the borderline temperatures, our snowfall mixed in with sleet and freezing rain periodically to add to the mess.
Most of the heavy snow had passed through by the time it started to get dark, and temperatures went on a slight increase overnight causing the precipitation to fall as mainly freezing rain and sleet. Just before it got dark, I took about a dozen readings in an open area of our front yard in Apison, and the average of those readings was about 2.7".
Fortunately, we did not have a major ice event overnight. However, the difference in a couple hundred feet elevation made the difference in seeing more ice. An example would be Old Camp Road between East Brainerd Rd. & High Point Baptist Church. A half-mile section of that road is located on a hill, and all the trees up there were coated in ice. One tree in the icy section fell bringing down some wires along with it.
We never lost power at our house, but several thousand people in Hamilton County did lose power as trees fell on power lines.
The following two maps are generated from volunteer CoCoRaHs observers in Hamilton & Sumner Counties. I picked these two counties because they represent my house in extreme southern Tennessee & the school where I work in extreme northern Tennessee respectively.
When comparing these two maps, it is evident slightly more snow was reported in the north. The big difference is the temperatures during and after the storm for these locations. The south was very borderline while the north was well below freezing. Moisture was less abundant in the south than in the north.
The snowfall is going to last longer in the north due to temperatures not forecast to reach above freezing until Monday. For the south, temperatures were in the mid-upper 30s beginning the day after the storm resulting in significant melting across the area.
HAMILTON COUNTY
Unfortunately, Hamilton County does not have many CoCoRaHs members willing to submit reports. The few reports that were submitted tend to consistently say between 4 - 4.5" in the mid-section of the county. Again, I recorded 2.7" at my home in extreme-southern Hamilton County...which is near Collegedale.
SUMNER COUNTY
A very distinct difference can be seen here, which illustrates why CoCoRaHs information is so useful. It is very evident where the heaviest snow fell. Southern parts of the county report 2.5" - 3". The northern half of the county report 4.5 - 6".
The National Weather Service in Nashville provided a very detailed graphic of snowfall totals in the middle Tennessee area. These totals were reported by Law Enforcement and Emergency Management agencies.
I will research some past snowfalls to see how this storm ranks compared to other notable storms in the past such as 1993 & 2003. I may write-up another blog post to reflect what I found.
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