Winter's revenge

COEUR d’ALENE — Don’t count winter out. Not just yet.

“This morning was a real honest-to-goodness blizzard,” said Climatologist Cliff Harris on Monday. “About 8 this morning it was brutal out there.”

Thirty-five mph winds, 17 degrees and nearly two inches of snow by late morning in Coeur d’Alene laid to rest talk of an early spring and yard work.

Such was the pent-up fury of Mother Nature that more than an inch of snow fell in 35 minutes.

“The powdery stuff,” Harris called it.

The sudden snowstorm caught drivers by surprise. Several slide offs were reported in the area, including one on Highway 97 when a driver went down an embankment near Arrow Point, but no major injuries.

Combined with Sunday’s snowfall of nearly an inch, the last two days of 2.7 inches topped the previous 45 days, when just 2.4 inches of snow fell.

So little snow fell from Jan. 7 to Feb. 20 that it beat the record low of 2.9 inches for that same time frame dating back to 1929.

“That’s a long time in the middle of winter,” Harris said.

But he said that six-week cycle of dry conditions has moved on to the east, taking with it visions of shorts and tank tops in North Idaho.

Next, Harris said, the area can expect cooler and wetter conditions, with up to 20 inches of snow through mid-April.

“One extreme to another,” Harris said.

Despite some calling for him to alter his prediction of 83 inches of snow this winter, Harris is holding fast. Fifty-five inches has fallen and he believes March could bring a lot more.

“We’re in a different cycle now,” he said.

The forecast calls for a high of 20 today and a low of 1 degree tonight, reaching -11 with the windchill. Highs are expected in the 20s through Friday, with lows in the teens.

Winter, Harris insists, is not done.

“Back to winter,” he said. “This is winter number two.”