Snow Day Predictor for Columbia, SC

Columbia is a mid-size city of about 142,416 people that sits well south, where snow is a rarer visitor, near 34.0°N in South Carolina. A winter here typically brings often less than 2 inches a year. A rare winter storm can shut things down with very little accumulation. Because the town falls in the Deep South / Gulf climate region, our model's closure threshold for Columbia is set to close very readily — even a forecast of an inch, or a glaze of ice, can tip the odds.

The percentage at the top of this page isn't a static guess — it's rebuilt each night from Columbia's own Open-Meteo forecast. The model reads seven signals from the overnight-into-morning window: total snowfall, whether any of it is timed for the 2–6 a.m. commute, freezing rain or sleet, the coldest air temperature, the wind chill, the peak wind, and how much snow is already on the ground. Snow and ice are so unusual that even a forecast of a coating can close schools for a day or more. Hard freezes and icy roads cause more delays here than snowfall does.

Because a 2-hour delay clears a lower bar than an outright cancellation, you'll often see delay odds for Columbia even when the closure odds stay modest — that gap is the model flagging a borderline morning. The estimate shifts as the forecast firms up overnight, so it's worth re-checking Columbia's odds the evening before school. Treat it as a well-informed second opinion for planning, never as an official South Carolina closing announcement.