Winter Storm Atticus Dumped Up to 21 Inches of Snow in the Twin Cities; Great Lakes Damaging Wind Threat

This was the first winter storm to be named by The Weather Channel this season. It marks the latest in the season the first winter storm has developed since the naming process began in winter 2012-2013.

(MORE: How Winter Storms Are Named)

Storm Recap

Winter Storm Atticus developed in the Southwest on Dec. 9, bringing some snow to California, Nevada and Utah, then moved over the Rockies on Dec. 10.

Atticus delivered Salt Lake City its first measurable snow of the season, one of the longest waits for their first snow on record.

Denver finally picked up its first measurable snow of the season on Friday morning with a 0.3-inch dusting. That crushed the Mile-High City's previous record (Nov. 21) for its latest first accumulating snow on record.

The system's storm track took it over Las Vegas and the Colorado Rockies, then to near Kansas City on Dec. 10 and Chicago that night.

Atticus dumped up to 21 inches of snow in the Twin Cities metro area. Officially, 11.8 inches was measured at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, their heaviest snowstorm since April 13-15, 2018. Banded snow produced heavy snowfall rates in this zone for hours early on Dec. 11.

But there was a sharp north-to-south contrast in snowfall over the metro. The far northwest Twin Cities suburbs reported only 3 to 6 inches of snowfall. And just north of the metro area, just an inch or two.

Parts of Upper Michigan picked up 6 to 12 inches of snow as Atticus' wrap around snow pulled lake-effect snow from the western Great Lakes on Dec. 11. Some freezing rain fell from New Hampshire to Maine early in the day before warmer air pushed into northern New England.

Damaging winds were also a threat. Wind-driven water pushed eastward across lakes Erie and Ontario, causing a 6-foot rise in the water level at Buffalo in under two hours at Buffalo, New York.

These winds are triggering a seiche similar to what happened Monday, a sloshing of the lake where lake levels are low along the west end near Toledo, but, as mentioned above, higher than normal along the east end near Buffalo.

Earlier, gusts from 50 to 60 mph have been reported in parts of Lower Michigan and northern Indiana. Trees were downed and a roof was reportedly damaged in Grand Rapids, Michigan, Saturday morning.

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