Winter: Very high-salt diet
In at least one category, 2014-15 is a match for the snowiest winter on record.
Assuming the forecasts hold, by the end of the workweek Philadelphia will have had measureable snow on more days this season than it did in the record snowy winter of 2009-2010.
Weather-savvy reader Alan Weiss – who keeps a scrupulous database and has never been known to be wrong in these matters -- informs that Sunday marked the 15th day this season of 0.1 inches or more.
That's rather astonishing given that Philadelphia's official snow total stands at a mere 15.4 inches, and let's say you don't have to know advanced calculus to figure what that comes out to per snow day.
The quantity of events is evident in the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation's salt figures.
PennDOT's Gene Blaum reports that in the Philadelphia region, this winter ranks fourth in terms of salt use with 120,467 tons.
As for Sunday, only 0.4 inches measured at National Park/Philadelphia International Airport, barely matching the subsequent ice accumulations in some places in South Jersey.
Still, that was the 15th day meeting that 0.1-inch snow standard, and that matched the number of days on which snow was measured in the winter of 2009-10, when a record 78.7 inches descended upon the official station.
A few more tenths are possible tomorrow, and a better shot at accumulating snow looms for Thursday. Thus this season would pass 2009-10 for snowfall on calendar days.
That winter was No. 2 on the 33-year salt list at 142,738; last winter, during which 68 inches fell, was No. 1, and 2010-11, 44 inches, No. 3.
While it's no match for the others in terms of snow, we suspect that this winter has set a standard for airborne salt particles. You don't have to drive to the Shore these days to get a taste of salt air.