On this day in 1988, a calendar-day record 6.3 inches of snow blanketed the District. The previous day 1.7 inches had fallen, producing a storm total of 8 inches. This was a well-predicted, powdery snow that forecasters saw coming for days as it tracked across the southern United States and then turned up the East Coast. Temperatures hovered in the teens and 20s as the fluffy flakes piled up.
“Washington took the day off yesterday as a major winter storm dumped up to nine inches of powdery snow on the city and its suburbs, shutting down government offices, businesses and schools, but creating few of the traffic nightmares that have plagued the region during past snow emergencies,” The Washington Post reported the next day.
And on this day in 1780, the D.C. region was in the midst of one of the coldest times ever documented. Both the Potomac River and much of the Chesapeake Bay were frozen solid; people walked from Annapolis to Kent Island in Maryland. “This winter was so cold that ice was piled 20 feet high along the Virginia Coast and stayed there until spring!,” the National Weather Service wrote.
Here are other notables for the day:
- Average high: 45
- Average low: 31
- Record high: 73 (2008)
- Record low: 0 (1878)
- Record precipitation: 2,21 inches (1884)
- Record snowfall: 13.0 inches (1996)
