May Snow, Two Days Before Mother’s Day?

Wait a minute—isn’t Mother’s Day on Sunday? Rusty Dawkins tweets this pic of about six inches of May snow in a Rushville, Nebraska back yard.

Becky Kellogg of Wunderground.com tells us:

May snowfall is nothing unusual for the Rocky Mountains, but pretty much everywhere else, it’s rare. One of the more recent May snowstorms outside the Rockies was on May 18, 2002, in Upstate New York. After hitting 91 degrees on April 17, Albany had its latest snowfall on record as two inches of snow blanketed the city….

Weather.com meteorologist Nick Wiltgen says that it is “very difficult to get a major snowstorm in the lower elevations of the U.S. in May.” Rushville, in the Great Sand Hills on the western side of the state, is about 3,740 feet above sea level.

“Even on May 1 you’re only seven weeks away from the summer solstice, and with that comes strong sun and long days adding heat to the atmosphere. But if you can get some really cold air to pair up with a storm, there’s usually plenty of moisture in the air by May so those rare snowstorms can happen.”

And in Rushville, it’s still coming down!

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