Snow!

By FITSNews || More than eight inches of snow fell on parts of Columbia, S.C. Friday, one of the heaviest snowstorms in the city’s history.  Most of the Midlands region of the state received around five or six inches (editor’s note: “that’s what she said”), making this one of the heaviest snowstorms in the region’s history.

The white stuff started falling late Friday and continued through midnight – part of a storm system that dumped snow all across the Deep South.

That system has now moved out into the Atlantic Ocean, but not before leaving a white blanket stretching from Texas to the South Carolina coast.  More than a foot of snow fell on Dallas, and flakes were sprinkled as far South as the Florida panhandle.

Here are some snowfall totals from around the Palmetto State:

Charleston – 4 inches
Myrtle Beach – 3.5 inches
Orangeburg – 6 inches
Newberry – 5 inches
Sumter – 3 inches

Snowstorms in the South Carolina Midlands and Lowcountry are obviously quite rare.

Charleston, for example, hadn’t seen snow accumulation of more than an inch since 1989. Columbia hadn’t seen snow at all since January 2003, when around 3 inches fell.

Snow in Myrtle Beach - Randall Hill/ The Sun News

Friday’s “blizzard” – while paling in comparison to the mammoth storms that have hit the mid-Atlantic this year – was still the fifth-heaviest snowfall ever recorded in Columbia, S.C.  The record?  A snowstorm in February 1973 dumped more than a foot on the city.

The only other time Columbia received more than 10 inches? 1894.

As with every other occurrence in the world these days, the winter storm was making the rounds on Facebook.  A group called “It snowed in S.C. on February 12, 2010 and I ran around in it” formed Friday had over 13,000 members by Saturday morning.

Incidentally, forecasts are calling for additional flakes Sunday evening.

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