1 to 3 inches of snow fall in Austin
Published 3:58 pm Saturday, December 27, 2014
It was a little late for Christmas, but Austin and southeast Minnesota is once again blanketed by snow after a system moved through the area late Friday night, early Saturday morning.
The National Weather Service out of La Crosse, Wisconsin has recorded varied nowfall totals across the region as the narrow band swept through. Two to 3 inches of snow fell on Austin while over near Grand Meadow spotters reported 6 inches according to NWS meteorologist Todd Shay.
“It was about the right area,” Shey said referring to earlier predictions. “It was a little deeper — more on the order of three to six from just east of Austin into west central Wisconsin.”
While not technically considered a storm, the light snow did impact travel as the Twin Cities saw snowfall totals between 3 and 6 inches.
The Minnesota State Patrol reported 100 crashes overnight. A dozen involved injuries. No fatal accidents had been reported.
“I don’t think we would consider it a storm,” Shay said of the system. “There was some impact on travel. That’s what we do with these advisories. Just give people a heads up to take a little more time.”
Snowfall for this winter is currently sitting at about three inches below normal Shay said, but total precipitation for the year is about an inch above normal.
Snowfall up until now had been barely half of the 30-year average of 21.2 inches for November and December, with just 10.8 inches recorded in Minneapolis since Nov. 1.
Attention now turns to this coming week as cold air follows this latest system. Temperatures are predicted to dip below zero in the overnight hours both Monday and Tuesday night and remain below 20 degrees the rest of the week.
—The Associated Press contributed to this story