System Radar View February 29th 2012 Image from SPC

A Significant weather system which packed a punch in nearly every start in the Upper Midwest effected much of the region today. The biggest effect in our area was significant ice accumulations causing isolated power outages. Power outages were reported in Eastern Wabasha County around Reads Landing and parts of the city of Rochester. Ice accumulations on trees also lead to widespread area wide minor to significant tree damage, especially for evergreen trees. Heavy, drought easing rains in excess of 1 inch were seen most of the area bringing creeks and river are back up. The last thing to note is the area also got the first official thunderstorms of the season occurred late last night as convective from the storms in Nebraska earlier in the evening moved northeast all the way across Iowa and into Southern Minnesota. Above the radar image showing 2 vigorous bands of precip. One falling as rain in Southern Minnesota to heavy snow in Northern Wisconsin, the other a wave of heavy rain Thunderstorms in Iowa, which eventually made their way Northeast and gave us our 1st thunderstorms of the season! The low can be seen in South Dakota.

 Front Yard View February 29th 2012.

Here in Rochester going to college Tuesday Morning we had light snow already starting around 1:30 the intensity of the snow picked up but none of it accumulated. Around a half hour later that it changed to freezing rain which became moderate at times. The problem was the temperature was hovering right around 32.F which thankfully kept the roads wet, but thick ice started to developed on trees and power lines which caused problems related with this described below. Eventually around 12AM once the center of low pressure moved into Minnesota warmer air was nudged northward which warmed temperature has warmed to 33.F which ended the icing problem, We had a brief break between precip bands before thunderstorms in a band of moderate to heavy precip moved in around 2:00AM. This produced the 1st thunderstorm of the season at my location, and many other across the area! The rain was so heavy for a time that local news reported that slow storm drains were causing some minor flooding on Broadway Ave. In total this system dropped 1.62″ of rain here in Rochester and trace amounts of snow/sleet. This is the highest amount of rain since August, and actually the highest amount since I moved down here!

 Significant Tree damage from ice accumulations

Tree Damage in St Marys Park February 29th 2012

 Ice accumulations and falling tree limbs and problems associated with this was the biggest problem with this storm has in our area, Moderate to even heavy freezing rain at times coupled with breezy southeast winds caused tree limbs to sag and snap. The branches on our neighbors tree were hanging so low and one point it was almost touching there roof, around the time of this we were having power flickers. The bulk of the damage was done to evergreen trees, especially the White Pines. Driving around Wednesday It seemed that every pine grove had at least some branches down, some lost a large amount of branches.

Large branches down St Marys Park February 29th 2012

In this photo two large branches can be seen one in the foreground and one in the background. These old cedar trees at the park took a hard hit with this ice there were multiple big branches down across the park, the biggest one was at least 10 inches in diameter, and would not be able to be removed without first cutting it up.

Large branch down near RCTC February 29th 2012

This is a large branch that I saw down in a long row of White Pines in the area of my school, this branch was around 10 inches in diameter as well.

White Pine Damage February 29th 2012

This was the worse damage that I came across. This tree lost many large branches and much of its top. Most of the branches up and down the tree on the winded southeast side of the tree were broken.

Storm Total Rainfall

The areas received very beneficial rains, The highest area rainfall was more then 2 inches in Reg Wing! Everyone got over at least a half inch, which will help with our drought conditions.

Other regions effected.

 Photo of the heavy snow near my hometown Turtle Lake,WI February 29th


This was a very dynamic storm becuase while we were getting heavy rain, some areas were getting very heavy snow with major snowfall amounts. Even 115 miles made a huge difference, my hometown area had heavy snowfall amounts around 9 inches with strong winds. My dad and family  said the snow was extremely wet in nature. Even further north very dangerous blizzard conditions with power outages were reported with this storm around Duluth, which reported around 7 inches of snow with winds up to 60MPH! people who are interested in hearing more about the weather in this area should see Tim’s Weather Blog