Here are a couple of photos courtesy of Mike Miller, who works for the Kansas Department of Wildlife and Parks and lives in Pratt. Those glimpses of black fur in one of the photos is actually a labrador retriever weighing about 100 pounds – not exactly a small dog.
The National Weather Service received a report of 28 inches of snow a mile west of Pratt, and there were several reports in the area of at least 2 feet.
Todd Miller went out on Saturday to check the cattle on his farm and ranch north of Sylvia, near the Reno/Stafford county line. He found himself plodding through snow nearly up to his waist.
“I’m not in a drift,” Miller told his friend, Michael Pearce, who is also the Eagle’s outdoors writer. “I’d say we got at least 2 feet, maybe as much as 30 inches. The good thing is that it didn’t drift. I guess it was too wet and heavy to blow. My word, if this would have drifted like a lot of snows it’d have been a mess.”
“We have cows walking and dragging their bellies in the snow,” he added. “It’s the most snow I’ve ever seen in my lifetime.”
Todd’s father, Bud Miller, is in his 80s and was raised in the same area. He’s seen bigger drifts, “but never this much snow just sitting there flat,” Todd said. “That’s what all of the old farmers are telling me…bigger drifts, but they’ve never seen regular snow this deep.”
Official reports of 28 inches came from places not far from Miller’s ranch, and snowfall of a foot or more was widespread in western and central Kansas.
As of noon on Monday, Miller said about half of the snow had melted. And one more thing: At this time last week Miller was worried because his wheat fields really needed moisture.
That’s no longer a concern.
Plenty of sunshine and wind are on tap for the Wichita area today, forecasters say.
Highs should reach the mid-50s, with west winds gusting to nearly 35 miles an hour. That should take care of the last of the snow from last weekend’s storm, though central Kansas may need another day or two to melt the remnants of more than two feet of snow that fell in the region.
After a low near freezing tonight, Wichita should see more chances for rain arrive on Wednesday. Highs in the low 60s are expected.
The melting continued overnight as Kansas and Wichita continued to dig out from a major winter storm. Lows overnight slipped only into the 40s in the Wichita metropolitan area, which was coated with a sheath of slushy ice before snow topped it.
Temperatures are expected to climb into the low 60s today as another storm system pushes into the area, forecasters say. But this round of precipitation should only be widely scattered showers this afternoon and evening. Strong southerly breezes blowing steadily in the mid-20s will ease off to the teens by later this afternoon. Gusts could surge into the mid-30s at times.
Tuesday should be mostly sunny with highs in the mid-50s. But it will be windy again, with gusts into the 30s as the wind shifts around to the north.
Photographer Katherine Bay, with whom I chatted in an earlier blogpost, shared a couple of photos that she took while on a stroll earlier today:
As the snow continues to fall on much of the state, noteworthy accumulations – in some cases startling totals for March in Kansas – are being reported.
Reno County emergency management is reporting 18 inches of snow in Hutchinson, and that’s not even the most in the state. A mile west of Pratt, 28 inches of snow has fallen. Coldwater is reporting 24 inches, with heavy snow still occurring. Inman is reporting 18 inches, Ellinwood 17, Windom and Sterling 15. Hugoton and Ulysses in southwest Kansas are reporting 14 inches. In central Kansas, a foot of snow has fallen at Chase and Great Bend, 11 inches in Plevna and 10 inches at McPherson. Elsewhere in southwest Kansas, 10 inches is reported at Johnson City and 9 inches at Elkhart and Lakin. A blizzard is being reported at Ellsworth, where 9 inches has already fallen.
Persistent snow is falling in Wichita, and the National Weather Service is now forecasting a total of 3 to 6 inches of snow for the city.
I couldn’t help but ask myself that question as I reflected on the forecasts of a foot of snow or more in spots, with blizzard conditions dropping visibility to zero.
National Weather Service meteorologist Jeff Johnson chuckled when I asked him that question.
“Very carefully,” he said with just a touch of sarcasm.
But there’s more truth to that than humor. It’s not easy to measure the snowfall totals in a blizzard, because it’s so difficult to find places that haven’t been affected by blowing or drifting. Yet that’s what it takes to get authentic readings on how much snow actually fell.
It’ll be very interesting to see what kinds of totals emerge from this memorable winter storm.
Meteorologists are detecting lightning in snow bands now located in northern Oklahoma. That’s a bad sign for those hoping Wichita somehow avoids a heavy snow later today.
Thunder snow is a thunderstorm that is producing snow instead of rain, and it produces heavy snowfall rates – 2 to 3 inches an hour. A few hours of that, combined with more snow overnight, and it’s no wonder some meteorologists are saying the record snow storm total for Wichita is under threat.
Snow drifts of two feet were already being reported in northwest Kansas Thursday night, and large drifts can be expected in the Wichita area as well.
Wichita can expect showers and thunderstorms today with highs in the mid-50s and east winds gusting to more than 25 miles an hour. More showers are forecast for tonight, and winds will persist through the night – shifting to the north and intensifying to more than 35 miles an hour.
The winter storm is expected to drop temperatures into the 30s for highs on Friday and Saturday, forecasters say, but a warmup begins on Sunday. Highs should climb back into the 40s on Sunday, the low 60s on Monday and mid-50s on Tuesday.
A major winter storm is expected to bring heavy, wet snow and strong winds to Kansas — including Wichita — for the next couple of days.
“Certainly, anyone from Pratt west needs to be extremely vigilant in getting prepared for this storm,” said Mike Smith, chief executive officer of WeatherData Services, a subsidiary of AccuWeather.
“Some areas could easily get a foot and a half, and there might be some spots that get more.”
The National Weather Service has already issued a winter storm watch for much of western Kansas from late Thursday night to late Friday night, with as much as 10 inches of snow expected near the Oklahoma border and gusty winds creating blizzard conditions at times on Friday.
Wichita can also expect snow on Friday into Saturday, forecasters say — and it could be a lot.
“You can’t even rule out a foot” of snow for Wichita, National Weather Service meteorologist Chris Jakub said. “It just depends on the track.”
See Thursday’s Eagle for more on this story.