Was that really snow in Jacksonville? Here’s the science behind it

JACKSONVILLE, FLA – Not to throw cold water on the excitement of Wednesday’s winter storm in Jacksonville, but chances are it was not technically snowing in Duval County.

The details probably might not matter much for Floridians since any type of frozen stuff falling from the sky brings an amazing camera moment. And with all the photos and videos of the frozen stuff around town, none of it appears like the flakier snow our northern and western neighbors witnessed.

Official snow reports from the National Weather Service Jacksonville:

Location Amount Time/Date

Hazlehurst 5.0 in 0500 AM 01/22

Alma 5.0 in 0800 AM 01/22

Pearson 5.0 in 0811 AM 01/22

Douglas 4.5 in 0600 AM 01/22

Deenwood 4.5 in 0713 AM 01/22

Doctortown 4.5 in 0900 AM 01/22

Hazlehurst 4.0 in 0600 AM 01/22

Pridgen 4.0 in 0645 AM 01/22

New Lacy 4.0 in 0950 AM 01/22

Hoboken 3.8 in 0518 AM 01/22

Surrency 3.8 in 0845 AM 01/22

Waynesville 3.6 in 0930 AM 01/22

Blackshear 3.2 in 0935 AM 01/22

Patterson 3.0 in 1000 AM 01/22

Odum 2.9 in 0835 AM 01/22

Glynn Haven 2.9 in 0849 AM 01/22

Hazlehurst 2.7 in 0838 AM 01/22

Baxley 2.6 in 0845 AM 01/22

Screven 2.6 in 1000 AM 01/22

Nicholls 2.5 in 0800 AM 01/22

Waycross 2.5 in 0930 AM 01/22

Waynesville 2.1 in 0255 AM 01/22

Nahunta 1.8 in 0830 AM 01/22

Statenville 0.7 in 0900 AM 01/22

Florida

Yulee (Sleet) 0.3 in 0819 AM 01/22

Jacksonville International Airport (Sleet) 0.1 in

Blountstown , FL 6 in. 9 am 1/22

FSU Doak Campbell Stadium 2 in (Sleet)

The distinction for snow is nuanced by how it forms and this yields several other forms of frozen precipitation.

Let’s dive into the differences between snow, sleet, and snow grains, and what makes each unique.

Genuine snowflakes occurred through southern Georgia leaving behind snow so thick that the white albedo of the snowflakes left a path on the ground as seen from space in the satellite image. The white outline encompasses snowfall depths ranging from 9 inches north of Pensacola, to 5 inches accumulations just 100 miles northwest of Jacksonville in Alma, Georgia.

Channel 4 reporters showed over an inch of snow on the ground in Brunswick. Just south of the state line flurries were spotted in Fernandina Beach but everything else turned up mostly as sleet.

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Sleet can be compacted into snowballs.

A snowflake requires a completely frozen sky above the ground all the way up. This was not the case in Jacksonville. Conditions never completely satisfied this requirement with a layer of above-freezing air wedged a few thousand feet above the city.

Icy sleet was the mainstay in Duval replacing the true snowflake’s intricate, six-sided ice crystal formation.

Sleet, or ice pellets, is like snow’s tough and resilient cousin. It starts its journey high in the sky as snowflakes but passes through a narrow layer of above-freezing air that partially melts them. Before they hit the ground, the droplets re-enter a deeper subfreezing layer, solidifying into tiny, hard pellets of ice.

When sleet falls, it’s like nature tossing thousands of tiny glass beads onto the ground. Some of you heard their distinct “tap-tap” as they bounced off surfaces Wednesday morning.

In contrast, delicate snowflakes maintain their feathery, branching structures because the air remains below freezing all the way from the cloud to the surface. And it’s true, no two snowflakes are exactly alike.

We briefly witnessed snow grains around 8 in the morning in the Channel 4 parking lot as temperatures dipped below freezing.

Snow grains are quiet and unassuming. They are so small they can almost be imperceivable as they gently fall in a faint drizzle made of ice. These tiny, opaque ice particles form under calm conditions when supercooled water droplets freeze upon contact or grow within clouds hovering near freezing.

The uniqueness of this rare event brings a sense of excitement and wonder. So sleet or snow, those details hardly matter...unless you have to drive in it.