Snow: 'Tis not the season?
For second straight winter, snow evades Philly; that's hardly unprecedented.
With 1.1 inches so far in the winter of 2012-13, a grand total of 5.1 inches of snow has been measured officially in Philadelphia in the last two winters.
Unless something changes drastically, that total won't increase tonight, although the Shore could get swiped with a few inches from a storm that will skirt to the south.
The Philadelphia snow season still has yet to peak climatologically, but serious storms and significant accumulations are by no means a given before it's all over.
Sometimes, they just don't happen, and a snow drought laps into the next season.
Looking at the period of record that dates to 1887, we found nine other instances in which the totals for back-to-back winters failed to reach 20 inches, which is near the average for a single winter.
The most snow-deprived combo -- 6.5 inches for the winters of 1949-50 and 1950-51.
The three consecutive winters starting with 1929-30 must have been particularly frustrating for snow-lovers. The seasonal totals were 8.2, 9.1, and 7.7 respectively.
One big snowstorm can skew a seasonal total, as we know, but some years, it just doesn't happen.