March A Harbinger Of Spring? Ha! Winter Intensifies Even More

Now that March has arrived,  you'd think that winter would loosen it's grip just a teeny, tiny bit.

But, even after the sharp cold waves and destructive winter snow and ice storms we've dealt with since December, things are actually getting worse, if anything.

From WAVY, the big highway pileup in the
snow Saturday in Denver.  

A massive winter storm is sweeping the nation coast to coast. Since it's March, elements of spring are trying to mix in with the wintry mess.

The result is the strange, strange phenomenon of strong thunderstorms with pretty good sized hail while there's freezing rain falling with a temperature of just below 32 degrees in parts Oklahoma and Arkansas.

And shouldn't it be warming up in Oklahoma and Arkansas by now? As of 11 a.m. their time on Sunday, it was 13 degrees in Oklahoma City. On March 2, the normal high temperature there is 59 degrees and the normal low is 37.

Speaking of cold, Billings, Montana, reported its coldest March temperature on record this morning with a reading of 21 below.

In Missoula, Montana, an avalanche swept off a steep hill in a blizzard and down into a neighborhood, demolishing a house and burying three people.

At least report, the three had been dug out of the snow and were hospitalized.

In Denver, snow rapidly iced up a freeway, causing another one of those massive car and truck pileups we've seen this winter. This time, one person died, about 30 were injured and more than 100 vehicles were involved. 

So it's really grim and wintry out there.

Scenes like this might be common from the Oklahoma to
Maryland by Monday as a huge winter storm heads
east across the nation.  

This storminess and cold isn't going to get much better soon.  A damaging ice storm is on its way for tonight in parts of the Ohio Valley. (Haven't we had enough damaging ice storms for one winter?)

It's fairly warm in the nation's Mid-Atlantic region now, but freezing rain, then a lot of snow is due tomorrow.  This could end up being among the largest March snowstorms on record in Washington, DC.

The big winter storm will miss northern New England, but Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine aren't getting a break, either. Temperatures will be well below zero each night through Wednesday.

Record lows are likely the next few nights in some towns from the northern Plains to New England.

It's as if that weather pattern that set up late last fall that repeatedly brings Arctic air from the North Pole into the United States has become semi-permanent. It's very frustrating.

It'll probably turn less cold over much of the nation toward the end of the week, but it won't exactly be mild or springlike anywhere, except maybe in the western third of the country and in the Deep South.

In the Northeast, long range forecasts don't give any real sign of springlike weather through the next three weeks.

Yes, this whole post looks like it was written by Gloomy Gus, but this year is just the (bad) luck of the draw.

Spring, especially in the Northeast seems as if it will range somewhere between reluctant and nonexistent this year.  We can always console ourselves by thinking back to March 2012, when we had weeks of record heat in March.

And maybe next year will be better.