Winter Weather — Hinds, Mississippi

2015-02-23 to 2015-02-24 · Hinds, Mississippi

Event narrative

Light freezing rain of two tenths of an inch or less fell across the county. This brought down some powerlines down to the west of Raymond. Power outages occurred around Jackson, affecting 900 customers. Power lines were also down at Highway 18 and Ellis Avenue in Jackson. The light freezing rain brought down a tree, which blocked the right land of I-20 westbound at mile marker 26 in Clinton. A tree was brought down on the campus of Mississippi College in Clinton. Another tree was brought down, blocking a railroad, along Highway 51 to the south of County Line Road. A traffic accident occurred in Utica on Highway 18, which resulted in the fatality of a 24 year old male on the morning of the 24th.

Wider weather episode

Multiple rounds of wintry weather had occurred prior to this snowfall event. A cold front had moved through the region four days earlier on February 21st with a cold airmass in its wake. Several waves of upper level disturbances moved through Mid-South, over the course of the next three days. The first, on the night of the 22nd, brought mostly rain to the region but some light icing occurred in the far northern Delta early on the 23rd. A second, more potent disturbance, moved through Central Mississippi during the afternoon and evening hours on the 23rd. This brought a more significant icing event to locations generally along and north of I-20, causing some power outages and accidents.

With the cold remaining in place, the final round of wintry weather moved in on the morning of the 25th. A strong upper level disturbance moved across the region, which induced a low pressure system to move east across the northern Gulf of Mexico. With the cold air already entrenched over the region, this brought the moisture and atmospheric lift needed to generate precipitation. At first, the precipitation started as rain and freezing rain, with some light icing reported across the ArkLaMiss. As the atmosphere cooled through the late morning, the rain began to change to snow in the early afternoon across southeast Arkansas, northeast Louisiana and the Mississippi Delta. The changeover line from rain to snow slowly progressed from northwest to southeast across northern portions of the ArkLaMiss region. By the time the changeover occurred near the I-20 corridor, the precipitation was moving off to the east into Alabama.

Those who got snow north of I-20 saw several heavier bursts, which led to some high snowfall totals. The highest totals were generally along and north of the Highway 82 corridor. Locations from Grenada to northern Lowndes County saw the highest amounts in our county warning area, with totals ranging from six to eight inches. Those who saw the higher totals also dealt with trees being weighed down by the heavy snow. This led to snapping trees and numerous power outages.

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 561193. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.