Just when we thought the snow boots and winter coats were safe to put away, we not only saw a late season snow, but it was one for the record books.

What You Need To Know

  • Latest and greatest snowfall for Toledo and Cincinnati on April 20 and 21

  • We saw heavy amounts because of fast snowfall rates and it happened at night/early morning

  • We've had snow in May, but not at this amount

  • Our spring sun angle made it a melt fest on Wednesday afternoon

Toledo picked up historic snowfall in the afternoon and evening on April 20. Five inches of snow was recorded before midnight. 

It not only shattered the record snowfall for April 20, but it is now the latest and most snowfall Toledo has seen on record.

The old record for "greatest and latest" snowfall was 3.5 inches on April 24, 2005.

There are May snowfall events across the state, but not for this high of an amount. 

Cincinnati joined Toledo with this distinction on April 21. Cincinnati picked up 2.7 inches of snow, which is almost the most and latest snowfall on record.

A two-inch snow event in Cleveland on or after April 21 has only happened three times: May 6, 1974 (2.0"), April 23-25, 2005 (12.4") and now April 21, 2021 with (4.5").

Oh spring, where art thou?

Ohioans know spring is fickle, but how strange is it to get this much snow this late?

It is rare. Most of the daily snowfall records were from 1901.

Our average last snowfall of the season is March 25 in Cincinnati, March 30 for Columbus and April 9 for Cleveland.

The latest snowfall on record happened in Cleveland last year on May 11. It was only 0.2 inch.

So why did we get so much?

Two factors came into play with this history-making snowfall.

One, it happened mainly overnight when our temperatures were the coldest. This storm also produced exceptionally fast snowfall rates. At times, we saw 1-2 inches of snowfall per hour.

The good thing about the snow is that it melted quickly. Spring snow does not last long with our sun angle this time of year.

Did I also mention the high on Tuesday afternoon in Toledo will be close to 80 degrees?

If you know Ohio weather, you know I'm not kidding.