Cold to linger over weekend after a few inches of snow
Victoria E. Freile
Rochester area residents woke up to several inches of snow on Thursday. As of 8 a.m. Thursday, 3.3 inches of snow was measured at the Frederick Douglass Greater Rochester International Airport, where Rochester’s official snow tally is recorded, according to the Weather Service.
Another inch or two of snow was expected to fall in the Rochester region Thursday morning, before the snow was predicted to taper off, said Weather Service meteorologist Jim Mitchell.
The normal high for the third week of March in Rochester is around 45 degrees. If the temperature does not surpass 30 degrees as predicted for Thursday, the last time the high dipped that low in Rochester was three weeks ago – on Feb. 29, when the high was 29 degrees, according to the Weather Service.
Mitchell said that the high is expected to remain in the 30s through the weekend before rising again to the 40s and 50s next week.
As of 8 a.m. Thursday, 48.7 inches of snow had been measured at the Rochester airport for the 2023-24 season, according to the Weather Service. Last winter, 50.4 inches of snow fell in Rochester, with the snowiest month of March tallying 20.5 inches at the Frederick Douglass Greater Rochester International Airport. The normal seasonal snowfall average is around 102 inches.
Rochester’s snowiest season in the past two decades was in 200203, when 135.2 inches fell. The least snowy season in the last 20 years was this past winter, according to the Weather Service. The least snowy winter on record was in 1932-33, when 29.2 inches fell.