The snow may not have measured 20 inches as it did in one record-breaking period in October 1984, but the weather last month will still make the books.
"Potpourri" comes close to describing the array of weather patterns and conditions Mother Nature sent Utahns' way, as snow fell, the sun shone and dozens of records were either smashed or matched in a month that Bill Alder called "half summer, half winter, with only a wee bit of fall.""Several daily maximum temperatures were either broken or tied," the meteorologist-in-charge at the National Weather Service in Salt Lake City said Friday. "With all the extremes in the month - the record heat at first and the coldness at the end - temperatures averaged just 0.7 degrees above normal.
"We went from the swamp coolers to the furnace."
Indeed, a 63-degree temperature shift in 20 days - 88 degrees on Oct. 1, 25 degrees on Oct. 21 - pretty much summed up the month's weather and an old Utah weather adage: If you don't like what you see, wait a minute; it will soon change.
And it did.
Snowfall from two major storms was more than twice the annual norm, with 5.1 inches of the white stuff measured at the airport - 243 percent of normal. Alder said the 2.5 inches of snow that fell Oct. 20 tied for the seventh earliest "measurable" snowfall since data began to be recorded at the airport in 1928.
On Oct. 24 and 25, the second storm clobbered the Wasatch Front, producing widespread power outages along the eastern portions of Davis, Weber and Salt Lake counties. As many as 40,000 Utah Power and US WEST customers were affected with the blackouts and phone problems.
For skiers itching to hit the slopes, the snow was good news. More than 40 inches fell at Silver Lake at Brighton in October, while 62 inches found their way to Alta. Park City got the jump on everyone, opening Oct. 26, the second earliest date in the resort's history.
But it wasn't just snow that helped to produce impressive precipitation numbers for the first month of the 1996-97 water year, which runs from October through the following year's September. Rain fell like it was April.
Some of the larger precipitation percentages of normal were: Kanab, 198 percent; Bryce Canyon, 187 percent; Blanding, 154 percent; and Monticello, 156 percent.
Three weeks earlier, however, ski resorts were probably wondering whether it would get cold, let alone whether snow would ever fly. From Oct. 5-13, Alder said, an unseasonably warm period set or tied dozens of daily high temperature records.
In Coalville, the thermometer topped at 81 degrees; Milford reached 87; Green River hit 88; and St. George crushed a 52-year-old record when it hit 98 degrees Oct. 7.
On Oct. 10, "the grandfather of all hot days in October," Alder said, 22 records were tied or broken. A day later the heat wave continued, and another dozen records fell or were matched.
Then, quicker than one can say "two days later," a cold front moved in, and thunderstorms erupted with a moderate shower of marble-sized hail at Enoch, Iron County, and in a few other locations, Alder said. Microburst winds were associated with the thunderstorms, with gusts near 42 mph in Magna and 48 mph in Pleasant Grove.
Then the snow fell, just in time for the deer hunt.
On Halloween, another storm brewed and dumped a handful of inches in central and southern Utah, keeping temperatures cold for a lot of kids in search of candy. The trick-filled weather also kept mischievous activity to a minimum across the state - thankfully, said several law enforcement officials Friday morning.
But all in all, "We will look back years from now and say, `It was just about a normal month,' " Alder joked.
*****
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
Weird weather
Top 20 snowfall amounts from the Oct. 24 winter storm (in inches)
Alta 36
Snowbird 33
Elk Meadows 30
Brian Head 20
Bountiful Bench 14
South Ogden 11
Holladay 10
SLC Avenues 9
Layton 8