Since early October, it has hardly rained or snowed in eastern Nebraska and western Iowa. Barring the snow we saw Thanksgiving weekend, and some rain sprinkled in we have been starved of moisture. This all changed on perhaps the worst day for travel impacts, Christmas. For four days, the KMTV area was hit with rain (even a few thunderstorms) and snow from Sunday morning to Wednesday afternoon. Now that the event is finally going into our rearview mirror, here are the snowfall totals for the Christmas 2023 snow event.
A RECORD-BREAKING CHRISTMAS EVE
Before the snow fell, we saw lots of rain on Christmas Eve. In fact, it was the wettest Christmas Eve on record in Omaha with 0.84" of rain falling through the day. The previous record was 0.79" of rain and/or snow that fell back in 1875! There was even some thunder associated with the rain, certainly a rare occurrence for this time of year.
CHRISTMAS SNOWFALL
The snow began in eastern Nebraska early Christmas morning, and the storm system did not move out until Wednesday afternoon. The snowfall totals were heaviest in the western and southwestern sections of the KMTV viewing area. Amounts ranged from just a dusting of snow in west-central Iowa, to upwards of 6" in cities like York and Norfolk.
Here are some additional totals in the Omaha Metro:
Eppley Airfield - 2.1"
Bellevue - 2"
Papillion - 2.8"
Elkhorn - 2.5"
Valley - 2.4"
Gretna - 2.4"
Here are some additional totals from Nebraska:
Shelby (Polk Co.) - 4.7"
Bradshaw (York Co.) - 8"
Friend (Saline Co.) - 4.3"
Hallam (Lancaster Co.) - 5"
Tecumseh (Johnson Co.) - 3"
Auburn (Nemaha Co.) - 1.4"
Hastings - 3.7"
Grand Island - 2.7"
Ord - 7.5"
O' Neill - 5.5"
North Platte - 7.1"
Valentine - 6"
Chadron - 10"
Ogallala - 8.2"
Scottsbluff - 0.9"
Here are some totals from Iowa:
Little Sioux - 3.8"
Oakland - 1.3"
Clarinda - 0.6"
Corning - 1.2"
Mount Ayr - 2.5"
Osceola - 3.5"
Indianola - 2"
Chariton - 1.7"
Centerville - 1.1"
Cedar Rapids - 1"
Sioux City - 2"
With the amount of moisture in this Christmas system, we went from being a very dry December to above-average for moisture! Snowfall is lacking with around half of what we typically see by this point.
The 1.4" of snow seen in Omaha on Christmas Day is the 21st time since 1884 that Omaha has seen over a trace of snowfall on the holiday. 16% of Christmas Days have seen snowfall, and only 3% of Christmas Days have seen snowfall above 1". Only 6 Christmas' have seen snowfall greater than 1.4". The snowiest Christmas Day in Omaha was 5.8" which fell during the Christmas Blizzard of 2009.
