A tremendous snowstorm was ongoing along the east coast during this period with a large nearly meridonal longwave upper level trough in place across the upper midwest. A clipper type low pressure system rapidly dove southeast out of Alberta Canada early on the 25th spreading a band of light snow across Northern Indiana.
Deaths and injuries are direct and indirect together, as the offices filed them. Damage is property and crops in the dollars of the year, not adjusted for inflation, and only where an office estimated it.
The episode as NWS IWX wrote it up.
...Synoptic and mesoscale conditions on the 25th/26th...A tremendous snowstorm was ongoing along the east coast during this period with a large nearly meridonal longwave upper level trough in place across the upper midwest. A clipper type low pressure system rapidly dove southeast out of Alberta Canada early on the 25th spreading a band of light snow across Northern Indiana. Quick on its heels was a 1040 millibar arctic high. This combined with intensifing cold advection and induced thermal troughing along the lake and initial boundary layer wind trajectory of 360 degrees... led once again to a very intense shore parallel snowband to develop along the Lake Michigan shoreline during the late afternoon of the 25th reaching as far south as Lafayette Indiana. This band remained in roughly the same position for 12 hours before shifting westward into Lake and Porter counties the morning of the 26th. Many locations from western Berrien county into Laporte county reported from 14 to 20 inches of snow with the heaviest snowfall occurring in Michigan City and Laporte.
1 heavy snow. Local standard time, as filed.
Storm total snow amounts ranged from 2 inches in Niles to 16 inches in Baroda and Michiana and points west and southwest as the most intense snow bands hugged the Lake Michigan shoreline before shifting westward the morning of the 26th.
After NWS Directive 10-1605, the rules offices file Storm Data by.
Every storm in Michigan in 2000Every state in 2000This day in weather historyWarnings in Michigan, January 2000
NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database, compiled from the National Weather Service’s monthly Storm Data. Complete through 2026-06; NCEI adds each month about 75 days after it ends and revises past years a few times a year. Rebuilt 2026-10-01. Each event’s entry at NCEI: 5127028.