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How NYC's 2020-2021 Snowfall Stacks Up Against Other Years

By

Jen Chung

and

Jacob Dobkin

Published Feb 11, 2021

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Snow-covered trees on both sides of a path in Riverside Park, with two people walking

 

Jen Chung / Gothamist

By

Jen Chung

and

Jacob Dobkin

Published Feb 11, 2021

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By the end of the first week of February, New York City had nearly 20 inches of snow for the month. And more arrived overnight for Thursday.

NY1 meteorologist Chris Bianchi pointed out this is the snowiest February in five years, noting we'd need another 3.7 inches to crack the top 10 snowiest Februaries and 6.5 inches to break into the top 5 Februaries. This got us curious about overall snowfall statistics.

For the 2019-2020 snowfall season, NYC only had 5" of snow. In 2015-2016, we got 28 inches in January (on the 23rd of that month we got a Snowpocalypse) and the ol' winter of 2013-2014 brought us 20 inches in January and 29 inches in February. That season, we also got a fight between Mayor Bill de Blasio and NBC weatherman Al Roker over calling snow days, an eternally controversial subject.

When we look at historic snowfall, you'll see that the 2020-2021 winter is, so far, a little above average. Our snowiest winter was 1995-1996, with 75.6 inches, while the winter of 1972-1973 was the least snowy, at 2.8 inches.

Here you can see the range of snowfall and five-year average.

For the real weather nerds, here's an all-time ranking of snowiest winters... dating back to 1868-1869. (Our current winter is in the middle of the pack, but since Punxsutawny Phil says we're in for more winter, we'll probably move up!)

Have other ideas or data sets for us to visualize? Email [email protected] with your suggestions and questions!

It's 5.75" of snow according to Jake Dobkin

Courtesy of Jake Dobkin / Gothamist

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Jen Chung

Jen Chung is a former WNYC and Gothamist editor.

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Jacob Dobkin

Jake Dobkin co-founded Gothamist with Jen Chung. In 2019, Jake released Ask a Native New Yorker, a book based on his Gothamist advice column.

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Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations

Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations

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