An historic winter storm deposited tremendous amounts of snow over all of southern New England, mainly from the mid-afternoon on Friday, February 8 and lasting into the daylight hours of Saturday, February 9. What made this an amazing storm was the widespread coverage of heavy snowfall. Most locations received 2 to 2.5 feet of snow! A stationary band of even heavier snowfall persisted from southwest NH through central MA and on to the southwest across central and western CT. In those areas, reports averaged closer to 2.5 to 3 feet! Isolated thunderstorms were common across the entire region during the height of the storm.
A low pressure system advancing from the Great Lakes region combined forces with a very moist low pressure system moving northeast from the Gulf Coast states. Explosive deepening took place Friday evening, February 8, as a low center moved from the North Carolina coast to south of Nantucket. Strong high pressure to the north of New England helped ensure that cold air remained in place over the area. Snowfall gained intensity during the afternoon, but during the night, 2 to 3 inch per hour amounts were common throughout the region. The band of heaviest snowfall, with 3 to 5 inches per hour for several hours, extended from southwest NH to central and western CT. Snow ended in the morning in western and central MA, southwest NH, most of CT and RI, and in the early afternoon across eastern MA.
The Connecticut Department of Agriculture reported that more than 140 agricultural structures were damaged or destroyed throughout the state because of the weight of the snow. Many of these were hoop houses, but a few greenhouses and barns were destroyed as well.