Saturday January 24th was a warm day with lots of sunshine and temperatures making it into the lower 60s. A strong backdoor cold front slid down during the late evening hours and sent temperatures into a nosedive - falling into the 30s before midnight on the 24th. Dewpoints fell into the teens which would become a major story just a few hours later...
Sunday morning, January 25th began cloudy with temperatures around freezing. Temperatures had warmed a few degrees when light rain began falling around noon. As the rain fell into this very dry airmass, evaporational cooling began which lowered the temperature several degrees below freezing. The rain changed to freezing rain and ice began accumulating on all elevated and exposed objects.
Other parts of the Carolinas had a much bigger storm. Areas from Raleigh to Greensboro and Hickory picked up several inches of snow before the changeover to ice occurred. These pictures from the Hickory, NC traffic cams show the story there. Approximately 3 inches of snow fell before the changeover to ice.
The following pictures document the ice storm in Wilmington at my house.
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