Dear Tom,
Where would you have to go in the United States to be absolutely sure of a white Christmas?
— Kenneth Gutman
Dear Kenneth,
“Absolutely sure” is a powerful term, and with that in mind, Canadian geographer Dr. George Kimble has written, with some hyperbole, “The regrettable truth of the matter is that over fully three-quarters of the United States of America the odds on your waking up to a white Christmas are so long as to be incapable of calculation.”
Historically, Chicagoans can expect at least 1 inch of snow on the ground on 4 out of 10 Christmases. Elsewhere in the lower 48 states, a 100 percent certainty of snow-covered ground on Dec. 25 exists only in our western mountains, on a few of the Appalachian peaks in New England, and in the Lake Superior snow belt of northern Wisconsin and Upper Michigan.
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Write to: ASK TOM WHY, 2501 Bradley Pl., Chicago, IL 60618 or: asktomwhy@wgntv.com
Weather Report is prepared by the WGN-TV Weather Center, where Tom Skilling is chief meteorologist. His forecasts can be seen Monday through Friday on WGN News at 11:30 a.m., 5:30 p.m. and 9 p.m.
WGN-TV meteorologists Steve Kahn, Richard Koeneman and Paul Dailey plus weather producer Bill Snyder contribute to this page.
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