• 1969: Across central and eastern South Dakota, February 1969 contained a variety of winter weather causing many difficulties. Glazing due to heavy fog and drizzle periodically formed on utility lines causing numerous broken power lines. Periodically, strong winds caused widespread blowing and drifting snow resulting in many closed roads. Snowplows would open the roads and often drifting snow would close the roads again. Frequent uses of pusher type snowplows piled banks of snow 20 to 30 feet along the roads and it became impractical to open roads with this type of snowplow. Several rotary snowplows were flown in from military airbases outside of the state to open some of the roads in the eastern part of the state. Numerous school closings occurred during the month due to snow blocked roads.
• 1989: Four to eight inches of snow fell across western and northern South Dakota. Winds of 25 mph and subzero temperature produced wind chills in the 50 to 80 below zero range. Several schools were closed across the area due to the dangerous wind chills. The storm continued into the 2nd.
• 1996: Bitterly cold Arctic air combined with north winds of 5 to 20 mph to produce record low temperatures and extreme wind chills across northeast South Dakota and west central Minnesota. Wind chills ranged from 50 below to 70 below with actual temperatures ranging from 20 below to 40 below on the morning of the first. Aberdeen had a record low of 36 below that morning. Then, as the north winds increased to 15 to 25 mph, the wind chills fell to 60 below to 80 below by late afternoon and during the night. Wind speeds decreased by the late morning of the second, allowing wind chills to rise to the 40 below to 60 below range. By 4 pm cst, the winds had decreased enough to keep wind chills in the 20 below to 40 below range.
• 1951: One of the worst ice storms ever to hit the United States deposited a glaze up to four inches thick from Texas to Pennsylvania. The storm caused 25 deaths, 500 serious injuries, and $100 million damage. Tennessee was hardest hit by the storm. Communications and utilities were interrupted for up to ten days.
• 1953: An intense low pressure system swept across the North Sea. Wind speeds at Aberdeen, Scotland exceeded 125 mph. A storm surge of 13 feet breached dams in the Netherlands, flooding 4 million acres, or one-sixth of the country.
• 1972: A blizzard in Iran ended a four year drought, but a full week of cold and snow caused the deaths of approximately 4,000 people.
• 2011: An immense blizzard dropped as much as two feet of snow from Tulsa through Springfield MO, St Louis, central Illinois, northern Illinois, southeastern Wisconsin, to Lower Michigan. The northern suburbs of Chicago received 21 inches, and the Chicago lakefront recorded 70 mph winds!
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