Name: Heavy Snow in Montana, December 11, 2016
Start: 2016-12-11T22:00
End: 2016-12-11T22:00
Location: Montana

The toll

Deaths: 0
Injuries: 0
Property damage: None recorded
Crop damage: None recorded
Events: 1

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.

What happened

The episode as NWS TFX wrote it up.

An arctic front swept southward across North-Central MT during the afternoon of Sunday, December 11th. Broad lift and sufficient moisture along and behind this front allowed widespread snow to impact much of North-Central MT, including the Rocky Mountain Front, Sunday into Monday, December 12th.

What forecasters said that day

The local office's own words before the first event, as it sent them, from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service text.

NWS Great Falls, MT wrote its last area forecast discussion before the first event at Dec 11, 9:07 PM MST, 53 minutes earlier.

Area forecast discussion, Dec 11, 9:07 PM MST, 53 minutes before

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Event by event

1 heavy snow. Local standard time, as filed.

Heavy Snow, North Rocky Mountain Front

When: December 11, 10:00 PM MST
Where: North Rocky Mountain Front forecast zone
Reported by: SNOTEL

Five inches for storm-total snowfall at Pike Creek SNOTEL (11 miles SSW of East Glacier Park).

What these are

Heavy Snow: Snowfall reaching the local warning threshold without the other hazards of a winter storm.

After NWS Directive 10-1605, the rules offices file Storm Data by.

The same day elsewhere

More

Every storm in Montana in 2016 Every state in 2016 This day in weather history Warnings in Montana, December 2016

Sources

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: 662898.