An historic January storm dumped more deep snow along the U.S. Gulf Coast on Wednesday after bringing Houston and New Orleans to a near standstill over the past two days and burying parts of Florida's Panhandle with accumulations more typical of Chicago.
If confirmed, Florida had its highest snowfall total since 1954. As many as 15,000 Duke Energy customers lost power at one point.
Trucker Alexis Barnett was trying to make the trip Wednesday from Destin to Sarasota when Florida shut down I-10 and re-routed traffic onto Highway 90. That’s when the driving started getting treacherous. “Going up the hills and down the hills, it was nothing but black ice. Just a sheet of ice,” she said.
Record-breaking snow accumulation was reported across the Florida Panhandle and prompted the Florida Highway Patrol to shut down some major roadways by early Tuesday evening.
Parts of the Florida Panhandle were coated in a blanket of snow with temperatures at 25 degrees on Tuesday while Miami had temperatures in the 80s, seemingly two different worlds. From Pensacola down to Miami, there was a difference of 55 degrees, according to the National Weather Service Miami .
Florida residents from Pensacola to Jacksonville are bracing for what is expected to be a historic, once-in-a-lifetime winter storm with record-breaking, single-digit temperatures and an
Multiple parts of Florida are seeing snow as a winter storm makes its way across the Gulf Coast. On Monday, Jan. 20, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis declared a state of emergency ahead of dangerously cold wind chills and prolonged freezing and sub-freezing temperatures.
From Pensacola to Jacksonville, snowfall was reported ranging from inches-deep to a light dusting. A whopping 9.8 inches was recorded in Milton, Fla. a city about 23 miles northeast of Pensacola. Satellites from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) captured the snow left behind from the historic storm.
An unusual winter storm is spreading snow, sleet and freezing rain across the southern United States. It’s a once in a lifetime event for most here, but a familiar sight to Yoopers now living in the Florida Panhandle, which picked up around six inches of snow.
“While on scene of a crash on 331 N, a deputy witnessed a driver doing doughnuts in the middle of the roadway and driving at a high rate of speed,” the Walton County Sheriff’s Office reported in a Facebook post.
Snowing on the beach in Florida? See a photo gallery of the unprecedented amount of snow that fell on northern Florida on Tuesday.
The National Weather Service and the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecast model are now in agreement as the chance of snow creeps to 50% in the Florida Panhandle on Tuesday.