Do you need a snowblower in Des Moines, WA?
What clears snow in Des Moines
A shovel is enough
A normal winter drops about 0.8 tons of snow on this driveway in Des Moines, 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 Des Moines is light enough for one.
What a Des Moines winter brings
- Snow a year
- 6 in
- Storms of 5 in or more
- 0.3 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 5.0 times as much. Most of it melts within a few days, so in Des Moines waiting a day is often a real option.
On a two car driveway that is about 0.8 tons of snow to move in a season, and a 10 inch storm weighs 2,600 pounds.
When the snow comes in Des Moines
- Nov0.2
- Dec1.7
- Jan1.8
- Feb2.2
- Mar0.4
Snow worth clearing runs from December to February, heaviest in February. Buy the shovel before the first fall, when stores still have them.
Des Moines and its neighbours
Des Moines is number 23 of 91 Washington towns here for snowfall; Spokane gets the most at 45 inches.
| Town | Miles | Snow | Two car, paved |
|---|---|---|---|
| SeaTac, WA | 4 | 6 in | A shovel is enough |
| Kent, WA | 5 | 6 in | A shovel is enough |
| Federal Way, WA | 5 | 6 in | A shovel is enough |
| Burien, WA | 6 | 6 in | A shovel is enough |
| Tukwila, WA | 6 | 6 in | A shovel is enough |
| Auburn, WA | 8 | 6 in | A shovel is enough |
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 Seattle Tacoma International Airport, 3.9 miles from Des Moines. 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.