Weather experts have confirmed what most residents have probably suspected: Snow has been a no-show and temperatures have been milder than normal this winter.
Instead of the typical 18.1 inches of snow that should have fallen on the region by this time, only 1.8 inches actually came down, Howard Silverman, meteorologist at the National Weather Service's Baltimore-Washington forecast office, said Tuesday.
February was also decidedly less brutal than usual. The weather office at Aberdeen Proving Ground showed only half an inch of snow for the month, compared with 4.5 inches last year.
The area has also been five to six degrees warmer this February than normal, Silverman said.
Aberdeen Proving Ground showed an average high of 49.5 degrees in February and an average low of 29.8 degrees.
"Obviously that's significantly below normal," he said. "I can tell you the whole mid-Atlantic has had a warm winter period...We have had a jet stream that is moving along the U.S.-Canadian border instead of driving down."
"All the arctic air really has been bottled up in Canada," he said.
Weekend winds
From Friday night into early evening Saturday, Harford and Cecil counties were buffeted by swirling, gusting winds, a reminder, perhaps, that the month that comes in like a lion was just days away. Thursday is March 1, which in years other than leap years would have been today (Wednesday).
Aside from scattered power outages, however, no major incidents or property damage associated with the high winds were reported Saturday in Harford County.
On the other side of the Susquehanna River, there were power problems earlier in the day in Port Deposit.
Approximately 3,600 Delmarva Power customers in the Port Deposit area lost power around 9:30 a.m. Saturday, according to Bridget Shelton, a spokesperson for the company.
Power was restored within an hour, by 10:30 a.m., according to Shelton, who said the outage was wind-related.
Other than that, Shelton said, Delmarva was not experiencing any additional problems in the area, including in northern Harford County where the company has 6,000 customers.
Shortly before 3 p.m., Baltimore Gas & Electric spokesperson Linda Foy said the company had experienced about 4,400 outages systemwide, 200 of which were in Harford county.
Most of the Harford outages were restored by mid-afternoon. As of 7 p.m., the BGE website showed 18 customers without power in Harford and 213 restored during the day. The company has 99,982 customers in the county.