Great Lakes Ice Coverage Hit A Record Low

Living in Michigan you know, we can never predict the weather. There will be days where we're supposed to get a foot of snow and only end up with a light dusting. Hey, I'm not really complaining. I like snow, but dig driving in it.

So far we've had a pretty mild winter. It looks like after this mini cold spell, things are going to start warming up in February. We're expected to get more rain then snow.

With January and December being warmer than normal, the entire Great Lakes ice coverage has hit a record low. Only 7.7 percent of the Great Lakes are covered making this the fifth lowest amount of total ice. James Kessler, a physical scientist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Great Lakes Environmental Research Lab says,

“Ice coverage is definitely below normal. [During] the highest ice years, like 1979, almost all the lakes were 90 percent or higher. But in 2002, all the lakes were around 10 percent … [Lake] Huron got to 25 percent."

What year had the warmest winter that you remember?

I remember back in 2015-2016, I was living up in Port Huron and it was in the 60's mid February. It was so warm, I went for a run on the Blue Water River Walk in shorts. That year ranked number two for the warmest winter in the Flint Bishop and Saginaw area and number six in Detroit.

The coldest and snowiest winter I remember was 2013-2014 when we were hit with that polar vortex. It felt like I was shoveling snow for 40 days and 40 nights. It ranked top 10 on Michigan's top 20 Coldest/Warmest Winters in Southeast Lower Michigan.