Since I moved to Syracuse, a little over 26 years ago, we have not seen such as winter as we just had, Winter 2015-16. This has been a winter with the least amount of snow in a very long time. Some said this winter was similar to that of 1966. On the other hand, I do remember the other extreme of excessive amount of snow in the winters of 1993 and 1994. One of those years we had a 4 day blizzard during which school was cancelled for its duration.
This past winter we were in the El Nino weather system. In the Northeast we generally see more bitter cold and less precipitation during the El Nino winters. However, it was a very mild pattern in the sense that we didn't see much of the bitter cold, only about 3-4 times and we were definitely light on the precipitation aspect.
According to Goldsnowball.com here are the stats for this past winter: Syracuse
| GSB Cities | This Year 2015 | Normal Average to Date | This Time Last Season | Normal Seasons Average | All Time Season Snowfall Record |
| Syracuse | 80.5 | 122.1 | 119.1 | 123.8 | 192.1 inches (1992 - 1993) |
| Rochester | 63.7 | 97.5 | 101.4 | 99.5 | 161.7 inches (1959 - 1960) |
| Buffalo | 55.1 | 93.4 | 112.9 | 94.7 | 199.4 inches (1976 - 1977) |
| Binghamton | 31.9 | 81.3 | 92.9 | 83.4 | 134.0 inches (1995 - 1996) |
| Albany | 16.9 | 59.2 | 75.9 | 59.1 | 112.5 inches (1970 - 1971) |
When speaking to your average Syracusean, almost everyone was excited that we had a very mild winter. On the other hand, those that snowmobile and ski, weren't very thrilled with the snow levels.
Looking back at all of the months starting in October 2015, we had at least one 70 degree weather day with an additional 2-3 days of temperatures in the 50's and 60's.
12/18/15
12/19/2015
I was excited about a potential weather system hitting Syracuse but as seen on the Doppler, both systems missed us by a long shot.
12/24/15
Christmas Eve: I had to run some errands and it was in the low 70's so it was nice to wear some shorts.
January 1st 2016
With the snowmobile all ready to go, I finally got my first snow. It started on first day of the year and over the course of 4 hours (photo below) we had 5 inches fall. In less than a week were back to green grass and no snow.
1/5/16
We barely had snow and the deer were already on our property pick at our decorative pear trees. Apparently there were still some dried pears on the branches which they picked off pretty well.
1/12/16
We had a litte clipper system on 1/12/16 which brought a minimal accumulation.
1/13/16
1/17/16
At last we got our snow. The predictions made on 1/17 were correct and we got almost a foot of snow on 1/19. Some snowblowing in the morning and a nasty commute to work. I was eager to get back home and go sledding.
1/19/16
1/19/16
1/19/16
Although we had so little snow, Lesya, my lovely wife, expressed an interest in learning how to snowblow. With the kids in bed, we had a little date on the front driveway, taking care of the fresh snowfall.
1/20/16
With so little snow this past winter, I didn't have to get on my garage roof and shovel off 2 plus feet of snow. A week later it was all gone.
1/26/16
2/2/16
2/12/16
2/13/16
A day before Valentine's we got a few more inches of snow. There was enough to go sledding for the last time this winter.
2/14/16
2/19/16
From this point forward we had very little snow, instead it was rain.
The first week of April we had a few inches of wet snow for 3 days however it has melted since then. We are back to green grass, as we have seen so often this past winter.
