National Weather Service Weather Forecast Office

December 2009 the Snowiest on Record at Topeka

Two large snow storms affected Northeast and North Central Kansas the 7th and 8th and the 24th and 25th of this month, which brought northeast Kansas its fair share of snowfall.  In fact Concordia has had at least 2 inches of snow on the ground since December 7th.  So how does snowfall this month stack up with previous Decembers?  Topeka has received 19.2 inches of snowfall in December 2009, as of 8am, December 30th.  This is the greatest amount of snowfall in the month of December in Topeka on record!

As for Concordia, the 20.3 inches of snowfall received through the 28th of December has already shattered the record for most snowfall during the month.  The previous record was 16.7 inches from December 1983.  In fact this is only the fifth time since records began for Concordia in 1948 that snowfall totals for the month of December have reached double digits.  Updated totals will be included later this morning.

Below are tables showing the snowiest Decembers.

Topeka :                              Concordia :

19.2  -  2009                         20.3  -  2009*

18.8  -  1983                         16.7  -  1983

16.5  -  2007                         15.1  -  1966

15.6  -  1914                         11.7  -  2007

15.2  -  1973                         11.3  -  1973

* through December 28, 2009

Below are records from selected Cooperative Observers.

Manhattan KSU :            Emporia 3NW^ :           Marysville^ :

19.0  -  2009*                   9.2  -  2009*                   20.8  -  2009*

14.9  -  2007                     7.1  -  2000                     12.3  -  2007

14.6  -  1983                     3.9  -  2008                     10.0  -  1985

13.9  -  2000                     3.2  -  1987                       9.0  -  1969

12.3  -  1914                     3.0  -  1983                       7.0  -  1981

^ record may be incomplete or have missing data