This U.S. City Has Seen Some of the Worst Weather This Year and Continues to Shatter Records

Brian Donegan
Published: July 28,2017
As if the snowiest winter on record wasn't enough for Binghamton, New York, the city in south-central New York is also making a run at the wettest year on record.
As of Wednesday, 37.08 inches of precipitation had been recorded at Binghamton Regional Airport, the official observing site for the city that's home to some 47,000 people. This total includes rainfall and the liquid equivalent of melted snow.
In 2016, Binghamton had only measured 16.91 inches of precipitation by July 26 and 36.11 inches by the end of the year. An average year in the city features 39.3 inches of precipitation.
(MORE: 5 Best and Worst U.S. Cities in Winter 2016-17)

Precipitation totals by month this year in Binghamton, New York, through July 26. This includes rainfall and the liquid equivalent of melted snow.

At the current pace, Binghamton will exceed its wettest year on record, 2011, when the airport picked up 68.05 inches of precipitation. A large amount of that rainfall came from the remnants of Hurricane Irene and Tropical Storm Lee, which brought devastating floods to the region from late August into early September.
August and September 2011 featured 8.9 inches and 16.58 inches of rain in Binghamton, respectively, for a total of 25.48 inches over the two-month period.
Numerous heavy rain events in New York's southern tier have led to this excessively wet year, which has consisted of multiple flash flood events. Most recently, a rain event on Monday washed away several feet of the embankment under a bridge along Route 17 in the town of Nichols, some 30 miles west of Binghamton, WETM-TV reported.
(MORE: 6 Reasons Why the Interior Northeast, Well Removed from the Coast, Should Care About Hurricane Season)
Binghamton Regional Airport recorded 2 inches of rain on Monday, a record for the date, and 0.84 inches of that fell in just three hours from 2 to 5 p.m. EDT.
Lesley Pelotte, mayor of Nichols, said the bridge may be shut down until Labor Day, so drivers in the area will be forced to take a detour for the remainder of summer, WETM also reported. Route 17 is the only major east-to-west highway through the southern tier of New York.
June only featured nine days without precipitation in Binghamton, with the longest dry stretch being three days, June 1-3. May was even gloomier, with only seven dry days recorded; the longest dry stretch was also three days, May 9-11.
Prior to this rainy setup throughout the spring and summer, winter 2016-17 was the snowiest on record for Binghamton. In fact, it broke an all-time snowstorm record twice in the same winter season.
(MORE: One U.S. City Has Seen Its Two Biggest Snowstorms on Record in Less Than 4 Months)
Just before Thanksgiving, Winter Storm Argos buried Binghamton with 27.6 inches of snow in about 72 hours, topping the city's previous record snowstorm of 24.4 inches from Feb. 18-20, 1972.
Less than four months later, Winter Storm Stella clobbered the record from Argos, wringing out 35.3 inches of snow in Binghamton. In just 22 hours, 31.3 inches fell, also breaking the city's 24-hour snowfall record of 23 inches set in February 1961.
(MORE: Binghamton Officials Fired for Poor Snow Removal During Winter Storm Stella)

Winter 2016-17 snowfall totals by month in Binghamton, New York. Winter Storm Argos was responsible for all the snow in November, and Winter Storm Stella contributed to the majority of March's total.

Those snowstorms helped set a new seasonal snowfall record with 135.2 inches in Binghamton, where it was snowier than Syracuse, America's snowiest major city. The snow from Argos and Stella combined nearly accounted for half the season's total.
The previous record-snowiest season in Binghamton was 131.3 inches from 1993-94, which this past winter topped by nearly 4 inches.
Deservedly, Binghamton ended up winning New York's "Golden Snowball Award" – a friendly contest between Binghamton, Syracuse, Rochester, Buffalo and Albany each winter to see which city picks up the most snow – for the first time since 1982-83. Syracuse was a close second place with 134.9 inches.
(MORE: For First Time in 34 Years, Binghamton Finished Season as Snowiest City in New York)
This was a sharp contrast to the winter of 2015-16, when a meager 32 inches piled up in Binghamton, which ranked as the least-snowy season on record.

Cars and a street buried by snow from Winter Storm Stella in Binghamton, New York, March 15, 2017.
(Wally Dion/Instagram)

The latest three-month precipitation outlook from NOAA's Climate Prediction Center shows Binghamton and all of the eastern states receiving near-average precipitation from August through October.
Brian Donegan is a digital meteorologist at weather.com. Follow him on Facebook and Twitter.
MORE: Winter Storm Stella

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