On this day in 1893, Agassiz recorded a high/low of -14.4c/-25.0c!
Three days later, on Feb 3rd, a blizzard enveloped the South Coast. Agassiz would record a high/low of -15.0c/-20.6c while also receiving an astonishing 45.7cm of snow!


As has been referenced numerous times..i question the record keeping from wayyyy back. Prolly had someone reading the F scale and listing temps in CTypeing3 wrote: ↑Sat Jan 31, 2026 1:59 pm![]()
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On this day in 1893, Agassiz recorded a high/low of -14.4c/-25.0c!
Three days later, on Feb 3rd, a blizzard enveloped the South Coast. Agassiz would record a high/low of -15.0c/-20.6c while also receiving an astonishing 45.7cm of snow!
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Luckily, we have access to visual and written accounts on what occurred back then!
Those living in Vancouver during its early years could still remember the storms of February 1893, which coated the city with more than a metre of snow for weeks.
In 1893, for example, a wave of unrelenting storms coated Vancouver and much of coastal British Columbia in deep snow between late January and late February. In early February, the Daily World reported that drifts were “several feet deep” in Vancouver’s Mount Pleasant neighbourhood.
In his 1893 report, for example, Frank Devlin explained how that year’s “unusually severe” winter had “destroyed nearly all the potatoes which the Indians had stored away.” Devlin may have needed to distribute extra relief rations to mainland coastal First Nations that winter. Such was the case in Vancouver Island’s Cowichan Valley, where deep, prolonged snow-cover prevented the Cowichan peoples from obtaining fish or game.
The Board of Works in particular was wholly unprepared for extremely snowy weather. The Board did very little during the infamous snows of February 1893. To be fair, officials may not have believed that metre-deep snowfalls were possible on the coast, but the Board’s inaction is still surprising. On 6 February, a motion by Alderman William Towler to hire shovellers or to re-distribute city employees from other departments to clean the streets and sidewalks gained no traction among his colleagues, other than the tacit understanding that “some such action should be taken.” Apparently, this action was to compel residents to clean their sidewalks. Compliance with the by-law was a problem that February. After pleading with residents to heed the by-law, the Board instructed the police to enforce it against negligent homeowners.
During the first week of February, the roof of ABC Company’s Canoe Pass cannery and a large warehouse at Ladner’s Landing collapsed under the weight of the snow. The Fraser River was reported open from Port Guichon to its mouth. It was frozen over all the rest of the way to Hope. Efforts made on February 7 and 8 to cut a passage across the river for the ferry steamer but work progressed very slowly.
The weather turned mild again and a big thaw was in progress. If the thaw would come too swiftly, it was feared that much damage would be done roads and bridges through the district. The bridge built by the government the previous year over Hatzic Slough was destroyed by the ice. When the tide rose after ice had formed, it lifted the piles right out of the ground. In New Westminster till February 9, some 25 in. (62.5 cm) of snow had fallen.
1893, Feb. 4 Valdez Island. [now called Quadra Island]
Very severe weather has been experienced here for the last 9 or 10 days. On Sunday and Monday morning last the thermometer registered one below zero [−18°C]. Everything that could freeze is frozen tight, all the little bays in the harbors (and some of the harbors too) are ice bound. Today snow is falling, it is intensely cold, and the snow is as fine as flour. Thursday morning, Feb. 2nd, the thermometer registered 2 above zero, about a foot of snow is lying with signs of more coming, verily this is the coldest snap ever had here for many years, so say the oldest inhabitants (the Indians).
The Big Snow of 1893
By one newspaper account the big snow of 1893 began on January 27 and kept up almost steadily dropping 45 inches before it stopped on the February 8, 1893. On February 3, a reading of 5 degrees below zero was claimed at Woodland Park on Phinney Ridge, while down the hill on Green Lake the ice was six inches thick.
In his book Seattle, long-time Post-Intelligencer contributor Nard Jones notes of the 1893 snow and cold that "it frightened a good many Seattleites nearly to death; they thought the end of the world was on its way and not in accordance with the Bible."
On February 3, 1893, heavy snow and extreme cold grips Western Washington. In Seattle, the temperature at Woodland Park stands at five degrees below zero and the ice on Green Lake is six inches thick.
A three-foot snow stopped all the streetcars in Seattle for several days and piles of snow from rooftops reached 12 feet in depth. On Front Street at the Sullivan Block a sign stuck in the deep snow read, "The Evergreen State -- Please Keep off the Grass" (Press-Times).


Johnny might have some insight? Hey may remember that one?

Typeing3 wrote: ↑Sat Jan 31, 2026 1:59 pm![]()
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On this day in 1893, Agassiz recorded a high/low of -14.4c/-25.0c!
Three days later, on Feb 3rd, a blizzard enveloped the South Coast. Agassiz would record a high/low of -15.0c/-20.6c while also receiving an astonishing 45.7cm of snow!
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It feels like it will never freeze again Grandaddyyp2233 just like the Knuckles will never win again.Granddaddyp2233 wrote: ↑Sun Feb 01, 2026 9:26 am I really hope we don’t go completely mild then freeze as it will break dormancy for my trees and a freeze will damage the buds

The threat is real.. I hope the flora survives!!Granddaddyp2233 wrote: ↑Sun Feb 01, 2026 9:26 am I really hope we don’t go completely mild then freeze as it will break dormancy for my trees and a freeze will damage the buds

This I am okay withHarrisonSasquatchWx wrote: ↑Sun Feb 01, 2026 9:38 am It feels like it will never freeze again Grandaddyyp2233 just like the Knuckles will never win again.![]()


