Monmouth County snow
Each year we wonder just how bad our winter is going to be here at the Jersey Shore, and after nine months of 2020, it's hard to be optimistic about this upcoming winter.

For me, the thing I like least about the winter is worrying about snow and roadway conditions. Yes, we root for snow for the kids, but outside that, I don't really mind if the snow misses us altogether.

You may think it's a little early to be worried about snow, right? I mean, it's the first week of October. Not so fast. I did a little research on the earliest accumulating snow ever recorded in Monmouth County and the date will certainly surprise you.

Anyone who remembers the aftermath of Sandy knows that October snow has definitely happened relatively recently, but that was the end of the month. So how early in October has Monmouth County seen snow?

We checked with our friends at NOAA and the Center For Weather & Climate, and they dug deep to find the answer for us. They looked all the way back to 1893 in the official records, and they came up with the answer for us.

It turns out in the past 127 years, there has not been an accumulating snow recorded at the Freehold weather station in the first two weeks of October. The earliest accumulating snow recorded in Monmouth County happened on October 20, 1940, and on that day, the Freehold area got an inch of snow.

So the data, and history, show that the first half of October has been clear of accumulating snow, but late October is not that far away, and let's all remember that it's 2020, and that means anything can happen!