Neighborhood kids, including my own two sons, built a substantial igloo out of the Jan. 15 snow that measured a little more than 4 inches in southwest Roanoke County. Young folks also dominated the 2023-24 Cardinal Weather snowfall prediction contest, as Andrew Lewis Middle School eighth graders in Salem accounted for the winner and five of the best six entries. Photo by Kevin Myatt.
Neighborhood kids, including my own two sons, built a substantial igloo out of the Jan. 15 snow that measured a little more than 4 inches in southwest Roanoke County. Young folks also dominated the 2023-24 Cardinal Weather snowfall prediction contest, as Andrew Lewis Middle School eighth graders in Salem accounted for the winner and five of the best six entries. Photo by Kevin Myatt.

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We’ve already moved on to hotter weather — South Boston recorded Cardinal News country’ first 90-degree high temperature of 2024 on Monday — but there still is the Cardinal Weather snowfall contest to wrap up.

Much of the tardiness of revealing this is my own fault, caught up in chasing a shadow in early April after the contest period ended March 31, and various other reasons to delay grading a fairly complex set of entries. It certainly wasn’t large seasonal snowfall amounts or unseasonably late snowfall in March that held me back.

All but one of the adult entrants didn’t have much reason to anticipate the announcement of snowfall winners, anyway, because the kids dominated it.

Five eighth-graders at Andrew Lewis Middle School in Salem placed within two points of each other atop the standings of 121 prognosticators who back in November emailed me snowfall total forecasts for three chosen locations out of 12 in Southwest and Southside Virginia and a first-snowfall date for one of the three.

Tavia Ruley came out the winner with 4 points in the lowest-score-wins contest, based on missed inches and days, while classmates Hali Goad, Holland Taylor, Ashton Semones and Peyton Smith were just 1 or 2 points off.

The best two of each entrant’s three snowfall total predictions and a first 1-inch snowfall date for one site counted. For Tavia, that was Lexington with 3 inches and Roanoke with 1 inch when both of those locations got 4 inches rounded to the nearest whole number. That left Tavia with a score of 4, being 1 off Lexington’s total and 3 off Roanoke’s total. She also picked Jan. 16 for Lexington’s first 1-inch snowfall. Because Lexington is a co-op site with a 7 a.m. to 7 a.m. reporting cycle, its mostly Jan. 15 snowfall was reported as Jan. 16, and therefore she was right on the money by the official book (though I would have counted Jan. 15 also).

Tavia’s score held at 4 to win a $25 gift card, presented in class last week. Below is how her four closely contesting classmates did with their picks:

Holland:  Roanoke 6 inches (2 off), Abingdon 8 inches (1 off), Jan. 17 first snow for Roanoke (2 off), total of 5.

Hali: Abingdon 7 inches (2 off), Roanoke 4 inches (0 off), Abingdon Dec. 15 first snow (3 off as Dec. 18 or 19 count because of 7 a.m. to 7 a.m. observation period at Abingdon co-op site), total of 5.

Ashton:  Bluefield 17 inches (3 off), Roanoke 5 inches (1 off), Dec. 12 first snow for Bluefield (2 off), total of 6.

Peyton:  Lexington 3 inches (1 off), Lynchburg 3 inches (0 off), Jan. 10 first snow for Roanoke (5 off), total of 6.   

(Many thanks to Judith Painter, geography teacher at Andrew Lewis Middle School, for sending me more than 50 entries from the school. I hope to see more regional school classes involved next year!)

Frequent upslope snow squalls pushed Bluefield and Wise to 20 inches or more for the season. The snowiest location among the 10 other sites in the 2023-24 Cardinal Weather snowfall contest was Abingdon, totaling 9 inches.The area in and near Abingdon picked up 5 to 8 inches of snow in the Jan. 15-16 snow event, creating wintry scenes such as this one. Courtesy of Mike Mason.
Frequent upslope snow squalls pushed Bluefield and Wise to 20 inches or more for the season. The snowiest location among the 10 other sites in the 2023-24 Cardinal Weather snowfall contest was Abingdon, totaling 9 inches.The area in and near Abingdon picked up 5 to 8 inches of snow in the Jan. 15-16 snow event, creating wintry scenes such as this one. Courtesy of Mike Mason.

The only adult who dared to challenge them was perennial powerhouse weather contest forecaster Janice Weaver of Roanoke County. Weaver won my 2016-17 snowfall contest at The Roanoke Times and she was one of seven entrants who had the best score in the first Cardinal Weather heat prediction contest last summer. Weaver picked Roanoke for 6 inches (2 off the total of 4), Blacksburg for 7 inches (3 off the total of 4) and a first 1-inch snowfall date of Jan. 16 for Roanoke (it was a day off Jan. 15).  Her missed days and inches totaled 6.

As is typical, the majority of entries picked December first 1-inch snowfall dates. Of the 12 sites used in this year’s contest, only Bluefield, W.Va. (Dec. 10), Abingdon (Dec. 18/19) and Wise (Dec. 18/19) obliged with first snowfall dates in December.

Meanwhile, Appomattox, Danville and Martinsville never had a first 1-inch snow — the latter two of those three never had any measurable snow at all, in fact, amazingly coming in with less snow than the preceding almost regionwide nearly snowless winter of 2022-23.

The remaining sites — Blacksburg, Lexington, Lynchburg, Roanoke, Tri-Cities Airport (Tenn.), and Wytheville — saw their first and only snow of an inch or more officially recorded on Jan. 15 or 16, depending on whether the site was midnight-to-midnight or 7 a.m. to 7 a.m. cycle. (The difference in reporting periods between major climate stations and co-op sites may result in me cutting out snowfall dates for the next contest and just basing on totals.)

Many entrants (including all of the Andrew Lewis students) filled out first snowfall dates for all three of the locations they picked for snowfall totals, but the rules said only one was needed, and only the first one would be considered if more than one was provided (Rule No. 4 in bottom section of linked Cardinal Weather column). So that’s all I did, look at the first one provided. Some entries would have done better with some of the unconsidered snowfall dates in play.

Snowfall totals from Dec. 1 to March 31, rounded to the nearest inch, were zero for Danville and Martinsville; 1 inch for Appomattox; 3 inches for Lynchburg, Wytheville and Tri-Cities Airport, Tenn.; 4 inches for Blacksburg, Lexington and Roanoke;  9 inches for Abingdon; 20 inches for Bluefield, W.Va.; and 21 inches for Wise. Each of these totals were below normal, most of them well below normal, though more snow fell than the previous winter everywhere except Danville and Martinsville.

As a side note, Roanoke and Blacksburg each rounded to 4 inches, but Roanoke actually got slightly more snowfall, 4.1 inches to 3.5 inches. This is the first time since the 1989-90 winter that Roanoke has had more seasonal snow than Blacksburg.

The season's only widespread significant snowfall occurred on Jan. 15 into the early morning of Jan. 16. While 2 to 6 inches of snow was common across the northwestern two-thirds of the forecast area overseen by the National Weather Service at Blacksburg, and extending with some even larger amounts just to the west into more of Southwest Virginia, Southside areas like Danville and Martinsville were left out of the snow almost entirely. A weak warm front lifting north cut off both the moisture and the colder air in these areas, but also focused more intense snowfall than expected on the Blue Ridge and the Roanoke Valley. Courtesy of National Weather Service.
The season’s only widespread significant snowfall occurred on Jan. 15 into the early morning of Jan. 16. While 2 to 6 inches of snow was common across the northwestern two-thirds of the forecast area overseen by the National Weather Service at Blacksburg, and extending with some even larger amounts just to the west into more of Southwest Virginia, Southside areas like Danville and Martinsville were left out of the snow almost entirely. A weak warm front lifting north cut off both the moisture and the colder air in these areas, but also focused more intense snowfall than expected on the Blue Ridge and the Roanoke Valley. Courtesy of National Weather Service.

Back on March 6, we discussed in the weekly Cardinal Weather column how snowfall was at its lowest 5-year average on record at many locations across our region, and whether that was caused primarily by natural factors, climate change, or a combination, leaving a more definitive answer to see how things trend in coming years. Be that as it may, one has to wonder if the recent low-snow winters gave the younger people an advantage in the snowfall contest, as they weren’t picking the big numbers older entrants remember occurring even as recently as 6 to 14 years ago.

I saw a similar trend in snowfall picks by age in the early days of the snowfall contest in The Roanoke Times, when the region had a series of weak winters for snowfall 2006-09 before bouncing out of it with a hugely snowy 2009-10 winter. A teenager won my inaugural snowfall prediction contest in the 2008-09 winter.

We will have to wait till next spring to see if “go low” will again be a winning formula in the snowfall contest. In the meantime, be on the lookout for a summer heat prediction contest in weeks ahead.

Journalist Kevin Myatt has been writing about weather for 20 years. His weekly column, appearing on Wednesdays, is sponsored by Oakey’s, a family-run, locally owned funeral home with locations throughout the Roanoke Valley.

Kevin Myatt has written about Southwest and Southside Virginia weather for the past two decades, previously...