One year ago today began a remarkable sequence of wild weather swings that would lead to the worst flood in our region's history.
The weather the first week of March had, like this year, been mild and calm. But on March 9, we awoke to the snow and blowing snow of a severe blizzard. Ten inches of snow fell over the two-day storm, and north winds peaked on the second day at
48 mph. The wind was so strong that it scoured area fields clean of most of the new snow as well as old, crusty snow, and piled it up high along shelter belts.
We didn't know it at the time, but this would prove to be significant a few days later when March sunshine returned. The open, black fields absorbed sunlight and warmed the air into the 40s and 50s, producing the rapid snowmelt that was a major contributor to last year's record river crests.
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