Do you need a snowblower in Altus, OK?
Your answer for Altus
A shovel is enough
A normal winter drops about 0.5 tons of snow on this driveway in Altus, spread over a few light falls. That is shovel work.
Get a wide plastic shovel with a bent handle before the first fall, and if you have a bad back, consider a cordless single-stage instead: the snow in Altus is light enough for one.
A normal Altus winter
- Snow a year
- 4 in
- Storms of 5 in or more
- 0.0 a winter
- Storms of 10 in or more
- almost never
- Days with snow on the ground
- 4
Light, below most snowy cities. A typical snowy US city gets about 10.0 times as much. Most of it melts within a few days, so in Altus waiting a day is often a real option.
On a two car driveway that is about 0.5 tons of snow to move in a season, and a 10 inch storm weighs 2,600 pounds.
When the snow comes in Altus
- Nov0.5
- Dec1.3
- Jan1.3
- Feb0.5
- Mar0.5
Snow worth clearing runs from December to January, heaviest in December. Buy the shovel before the first fall, when stores still have them.
Towns near Altus
Altus is number 29 of 45 Oklahoma towns here for snowfall; Woodward gets the most at 15 inches.
| Town | Miles | Snow | Two car, paved |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lawton, OK | 51 | 2 in | No snowblower |
| Elk City, OK | 51 | 9 in | A shovel is enough |
| Burkburnett, TX | 58 | 3 in | A shovel is enough |
| Wichita Falls, TX | 68 | 3 in | A shovel is enough |
| Weatherford, OK | 70 | 6 in | A shovel is enough |
| Duncan, OK | 78 | 3 in | No snowblower |
Where these numbers come from
Read next: What a winter of snow weighs and Why storm depth matters more than snowfall.
NOAA 1991 to 2020 climate normals from Altus Irig Rsch Station, 4.8 miles from Altus. A normal winter, not this winter's forecast. Snow is weighed at 6.24 pounds a cubic foot, fresh and fairly dry; wet spring snow can weigh three times that.