The March 1993 Snowstorm

On Monday, March 8, 1993, I was an on-camera weather person at Channel 42 in Birmingham. I filled in when the Chief Meteorologist Fred Barnhill was not around. Fred called me that evening and told me that the numerical prediction models were indicating a hurricane strength low in the Gulf of Mexico by the end of the week, with an Arctic airmass in place over Alabama. It was the recipe for a major snowstorm. But a hard solution to swallow at first glance, since we had been in the 70s. The high in Birmingham that day was a balmy 73F.

Since I was in charge of a major local hotel management company, I began alerting our hotels in Alabama that they would need to lay in supplies and have staff prepared to move into the hotel on Friday to stay the weekend since everyone would be stranded. The model runs consistently painted the same picture of the storm through the week, but a lot of people began to think I was crazy when it was 75F on Wednesday. But things began to change on Thursday, when a cold front arrived, holding the highs in the 50s.

Early on Friday the 12th, everything seemed to be in place. The National Weather Service had warnings in place. A huge mass of clouds was over the western Gulf near a developing low pressure center. We had northerly winds across North and Central Alabama with readings in the 30s. But who could believe the forecasts that a foot of snow was going to fall somewhere across Alabama? It was beyond our imagination. People stocked up on supplies for what would hopefully be a fun weekend playing the snow. We got a little more than we bargained for.

It began to snow late that afternoon. I packed up my computer and got ready to head home. Someone poked their head in the door as I was leaving and said, “Ain’t gonna do anything.” After all hype, I hoped they weren’t right. Channel 42 did not have much of a commitment back then, and they planned to even tape the ten o’clock news at 6:30 p.m. and no news operations were planned for the weekend. I prepared to play in the snow.

The snow fell quickly through the evening hours and the wind began to increase. There was a brief period where the snow changed back to rain, but we knew wih the explosively deepening low south of Pensacola, strong northerly winds would drive the temperature down overnight. The power went out about 11 p.m. as 50 mph winds and heavy snow, complete with lightning and thunder produced true blizzard conditions.

By the next morning, we were buried in over a foot of snow. The region shut down for three days. At Birmingham, the mercury plunged to 2F by Sunday morning.

What is your Superstorm memory? Post them below. Send digital photos to bill.murray@theweatherco.com.

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