BUFFALO - The first snow of the season arrived off of Lake Erie Tuesday, coating towns south of the city but sparing Buffalo from breaking out the shovels.
“You start to get into November, you can expect it any time,” National Weather Service meteorologist Tom Paone said.
Up to six inches of snow was expected during the day Tuesday in the highest elevations of Chautauqua and Cattaraugus counties, well south of Buffalo, with a few more inches likely to fall through the night and into Wednesday. Authorities there reported several cars off slippery roads but no serious injuries.
In Buffalo, where the temperature stayed above freezing, pedestrians were pelted with wind-blown sleet that arrived throughout the day amid bursts of thunder and lightning but melted soon after bouncing to the ground.
Lake Erie, the source of the precipitation, was a relatively warm 56 degrees, Paone said, but it was too early to predict whether or when it might freeze over.
The region's notorious lake-effect snow forms when cold air moves across the lake's open waters, picking up warmth and moisture and creating narrow bands of severe weather.
A Christmas week storm in 2001 poured seven feet of snow over some areas of western New York.
“If we don't get any sustained air coming down from the Arctic this winter then it won't be a problem,” Paone said, “but it's way too early to even speculate.”
Buffalo receives about 95 inches of snow in a typical season and, despite a hard-to-shake reputation, is not even the snowiest city in New York.
That honor usually falls to Syracuse, which also gets pounded by lake-effect snows off another Great Lake - Lake Ontario.
The arrival of the first snow Tuesday in Buffalo was right on schedule - the first measurable snow generally arrives in the first week of November.
Even so, not everyone was ready for it. In the Chautauqua County village of Cassadaga, children at a bus stop threw snowballs at each other as their less-enthused parents looked on. Said Shannon Harroun, “I got up and I looked out the window and everything's all white and I thought, ‘oh no!'”
Up to six inches of snow was expected during the day Tuesday in the highest elevations of Chautauqua and Cattaraugus counties, well south of Buffalo, with a few more inches likely to fall through the night and into Wednesday. Authorities there reported several cars off slippery roads but no serious injuries.
In Buffalo, where the temperature stayed above freezing, pedestrians were pelted with wind-blown sleet that arrived throughout the day amid bursts of thunder and lightning but melted soon after bouncing to the ground.
Lake Erie, the source of the precipitation, was a relatively warm 56 degrees, Paone said, but it was too early to predict whether or when it might freeze over.
The region's notorious lake-effect snow forms when cold air moves across the lake's open waters, picking up warmth and moisture and creating narrow bands of severe weather.
A Christmas week storm in 2001 poured seven feet of snow over some areas of western New York.
“If we don't get any sustained air coming down from the Arctic this winter then it won't be a problem,” Paone said, “but it's way too early to even speculate.”
Buffalo receives about 95 inches of snow in a typical season and, despite a hard-to-shake reputation, is not even the snowiest city in New York.
That honor usually falls to Syracuse, which also gets pounded by lake-effect snows off another Great Lake - Lake Ontario.
The arrival of the first snow Tuesday in Buffalo was right on schedule - the first measurable snow generally arrives in the first week of November.
Even so, not everyone was ready for it. In the Chautauqua County village of Cassadaga, children at a bus stop threw snowballs at each other as their less-enthused parents looked on. Said Shannon Harroun, “I got up and I looked out the window and everything's all white and I thought, ‘oh no!'”
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