A Tropical Storm And Winter Storm At The Same Time Isn't As Weird As It Sounds

 Jonathan Erdman

Published: November 8, 2022

A​ winter storm will hammer the Northern Plains at the same time Nicole approaches Florida and the Southeast, in a seemingly odd juxtaposition of weather on opposite ends of the spectrum in the United States.

T​hat may sound weird, but it's not all that unusual to have both a tropical cyclone threat and a winter storm in the U.S. at the same time.

This can happen in two ways: near the end of hurricane season, when it overlaps with a fall snowstorm, or when hurricane season starts early and a late-spring snowstorm is still on the map.

Here are a few examples from the past when winter and hurricane seasons clashed.

October 2020

P​rior to Nicole and the Northern Plains duo, this was the most recent example.

In the last week of October 2020, snow fell as far south as Midland, Texas, and a crippling ice storm knocked out power to hundreds of thousands in Oklahoma, including the Oklahoma City metro area – all while Hurricane Zeta was hammering Louisiana and the Southeast.

I​t was North America's most expansive October snow cover since 1967, according to the Global Snow Lab at Rutgers University.

I​ncredibly, the center of Hurricane Zeta over southeast Louisiana was only about 500 miles away from the Oklahoma ice storm.

Mother's Day Weekend 2015

Mother's Day weekend 2015 had virtually everything but the kitchen sink weatherwise: a winter storm, severe thunderstorms, flash flooding and a tropical storm making a U.S. landfall.

I​n fact, the map below may look eerily close to the Nicole-plus-winter-storm scenario, minus the magnitude of tornadoes and flooding rain that occurred in May 2015.

Winter Storm Venus, Tropical Depression Ana, and severe thunderstorms in the Plains states are shown in this satellite image from the Suomi NPP satellite on May 10, 2015, at 2:15 p.m. EDT.

Other than a weird Groundhog Day 1952 South Florida landfall, Tropical Storm Ana was the earliest tropical or subtropical storm landfall along the Atlantic seaboard on record.

Because it happened so early in the calendar relative to the Atlantic hurricane season, Ana's landfall happened during a time of year when the Rockies and High Plains can still get snowstorms.

Sure enough, Winter Storm Venus dumped up to 2 feet of snow on the High Plains.

As a result, we had an odd marriage of heavy snow and coastal flooding photos shared with us on Mother's Day 2015.

19 inches of snow piled up in Crawford, Nebraska, while Tropical Storm Ana soaked Ocean Isle Beach, North Carolina on May 10, 2015.

Superstorm Sandy

It's one thing to have an ongoing snowstorm somewhere else when a tropical cyclone is making landfall; It's quite another for the tropical cyclone itself to initiate a snowstorm. In this and many other respects, Superstorm Sandy was odd and exceptional.

Yes, Sandy was "officially" no longer a tropical cyclone as it roared ashore in New Jersey in late October 2012.

However, this former hurricane produced an epic snowstorm in the Appalachians, where the air was just cold enough when intercepted by Sandy's moisture.

Up to 3 feet of snow fell in the Appalachians of West Virginia and North Carolina. Some roofs collapsed due to the weight of the wet, heavy snow in parts of West Virginia. Two people died trying to shovel the feet of snow.

Members of the West Virginia Army National Guard traveled to an apartment complex in Summersville, West Virginia, to assess the structural damage incurred after Superstorm Sandy brought over two feet of snow to the mountainous region.

Sandy was the only storm in which you could find a discussion of a snowfall forecast within each National Hurricane Center advisory as it was nearing landfall.

Other Cases

Tropical Storm Tammy (Oct. 5-6, 2005) meandered near, then tracked into, the Florida Peninsula. As that occurred, the season's first snow fell in Billings, Montana (10.8 inches), and Minot, North Dakota (4.5 inches).

Hurricane Irene (mid-October 1999) tracked over South Florida, then just offshore of the Carolinas. Light snow was blanketing parts of the Rockies, including Cheyenne, Wyoming (3.3 inches); Casper, Wyoming (5 inches); and Denver (4.8 inches).

Hurricane Gordon (mid-November 1994) tracked through the Florida Peninsula not once, but twice (though as a tropical storm and depression). As Gordon ramped up to a hurricane off the North Carolina coast, powerful low pressure cranked up near the Boundary Waters of northern Minnesota. Bismarck, North Dakota, picked up 6 inches of snow, while Grand Forks tallied 3.5 inches.

Daily weather map from Nov. 18, 1994, illustrating Tropical Storm Gordon off the coast of North Carolina (red circle) and the strong low-pressure system responsible for snow in the northern tier of states (blue circle).

May 14, 1916: A tropical storm was tracking up the spine of the Florida Peninsula as a multiday snowstorm was pounding parts of the northern High Plains. Lead, South Dakota, in the northern Black Hills, picked up 41 inches of snow from May 12 to 16, including 8 inches on the day of the Florida tropical storm landfall.

The Weather Company’s primary journalistic mission is to report on breaking weather news, the environment and the importance of science to our lives. This story does not necessarily represent the position of our parent company, IBM.

The Weather Company’s primary journalistic mission is to report on breaking weather news, the environment and the importance of science to our lives. This story does not necessarily represent the position of our parent company, IBM.