New York, 2025

Lake-Effect Snow in New York, February 13 to 14, 2025

February 13 to 14, 2025 · NWS BUF · 2 events in 2 counties and zones

Similar to earlier in the week, another band of lake effect snow set up off of Lake Ontario, focusing on areas east to southeast of the lake. Again, behind a passing area of low pressure, cooling temperatures aloft at 850 hPa along with a trough over the region and optimal flow over Lake Ontario resulted in heavy snowfall for areas that received heavy snow earlier in the week.

Where it happened

Every event with a place to put it; 2 filed by county or forecast zone are drawn at its center, in a lighter ring. Tap one for its entry below.

  • Tornadoes
  • Tropical storms and surge
  • Floods
  • Wind
  • Hail
  • Winter weather
  • Heat and drought
  • Cold
  • Fire, smoke and dust
  • Marine and coastal
  • Other

Open the live radar over this ground

The toll

Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
None recorded
Crop damage
None recorded
Events
2

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 BUF wrote it up.

Similar to earlier in the week, another band of lake effect snow set up off of Lake Ontario, focusing on areas east to southeast of the lake. Again, behind a passing area of low pressure, cooling temperatures aloft at 850 hPa along with a trough over the region and optimal flow over Lake Ontario resulted in heavy snowfall for areas that received heavy snow earlier in the week. After this lake effect event was over, some areas received nearly 60 inches of snow for the week between the two events. Heavy snowfall for the week, combined with subsequent snow and rainfall caused roof damage to some structures in Oswego County, including numerous structures where entire roofs collapsed due to the weight of the snow and water equivalent.

Snowfall amounts from this event includes: 35.8 inches in Palermo and 31.0 inches in Cleveland.

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 Buffalo, NY wrote its last area forecast discussion before the first event at Feb 12, 5:36 PM EST, 22 hours 24 minutes earlier.

Area forecast discussion, Feb 12, 5:36 PM EST, 22 hours 24 minutes before
<!doctype html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
  <meta charset="utf-8">
  <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1">
  <title>Service Notice</title>
  <link rel="stylesheet" href="index.css">
</head>
<body>
  <main class="wrap">
    <section class="card" role="status" aria-live="polite">
      <div class="status" id="status">Temporary Notice</div>
      <h1 id="headline">This service is currently unavailable.</h1>
      <p id="message1">
        The site you requested is temporarily down for maintenance or an unexpected outage.
      </p>
      <p id="message2">
        Please try again in a few minutes.
      </p>
      <p class="small" id="detail">
        If you are an administrator, restore upstream service and remove the redirect/fallback rule when normal operations resume.
      </p>
    </section>
  </main>
  <script src="index.js"></script>
</body>
</html>

The radar

The national radar mosaic for the moment the first event began.

Open the radar archive at this moment

Event by event

2 lake-effect snow. Local standard time, as filed.

Lake-Effect Snow, Northern Cayuga

When
February 13, 4:00 PM EST to February 14, 6:00 PM EST
Where
Northern Cayuga forecast zone
Reported by
Public
Coordinates
43.010, -76.574 (the zone’s center; the record gives no point)

Lake-Effect Snow, Oswego

When
February 13, 6:00 PM EST to February 14, 9:00 PM EST
Where
Oswego forecast zone
Reported by
Trained Spotter
Coordinates
43.464, -76.209 (the zone’s center; the record gives no point)

What these are

Lake-Effect Snow
Heavy snow in bands downwind of a large lake as cold air crosses warmer water.

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

The same day elsewhere

More

Every storm in New York in 2025Every state in 2025This day in weather historyWarnings in New York, February 2025

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: 1237335, 1237336.