Research
Snow, freeze and ice dams: why northern gutters fail differently
South Bend averages 126.4 nights a year at or below freezing and 51.9 days with at least an inch of snow on the ground, against 35.7 freezing nights and 1.2 snow-cover days at Atlanta's airport, NOAA's 1991-2020 normals show.
By Top Rated Gutters · Published
Gutters in South Bend and Cincinnati fail in ways Georgia gutters rarely do: snow load, ice in the trough and ice dams at the eaves. We pulled NOAA's official figures for snow, snow cover and freezing temperatures for the five areas we serve to show how different the winters are.
Key numbers
126.4 nights
Nights a year at or below 32°F in South Bend, 3.5 times Atlanta's 35.7.
Source: NOAA NCEI 1991-2020 normals, South Bend and Atlanta airports
51.9 days
Days a year with at least an inch of snow on the ground in South Bend; 21.6 in Cincinnati.
Source: NOAA NCEI 1991-2020 normals
64.5 inches
Snow a year in South Bend, against 23.3 in Cincinnati and 2.2 at Atlanta's airport.
Source: NOAA NCEI 1991-2020 normals
81.7 days
Days a year in South Bend that freeze at night and thaw by day; 77.5 in Cincinnati and 65.4 in Cumming.
Source: NOAA NCEI 1991-2020 normals; our calculation
Freezing nights a year
The table behind the chart
Yearly averages, NOAA 1991-2020 normals. "Cross freezing" days are our calculation: freezing nights minus days that stay at or below 32°F all day, so they are days that freeze at night and thaw by afternoon.
| Area (weather station) | Snow a year, inches | Days with 1 in. or more of new snow | Days with 1 in. or more on the ground | Freezing nights | Days that stay frozen | Days that cross freezing |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cumming, GACumming 2N (NOAA cooperative station) | 0.6 | 0.2 | 0.1 | 67.2 | 1.8 | 65.4 |
| Atlanta, GAAtlanta Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport | 2.2 | 0.8 | 1.2 | 35.7 | 1.2 | 34.5 |
| Macon, GAMacon Middle Georgia Regional Airport | not published | not published | not published | 43.8 | 0.1 | 43.7 |
| Cincinnati, OHCincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport (CVG), Hebron, KY | 23.3 | 7.0 | 21.6 | 99.8 | 22.3 | 77.5 |
| South Bend, INSouth Bend International Airport | 64.5 | 20.3 | 51.9 | 126.4 | 44.7 | 81.7 |
Download the table (CSV). For what winter means for gutter work in each area, see our fall and winter services page.
What this means for your gutters
- Ice dams need snow on the roof and heat from the attic. South Bend keeps snow on the ground 51.9 days a year and Cincinnati 21.6; at the Georgia stations that report it, 1.2 days or fewer. Ice dams form when attic heat melts that snow and the water refreezes at the cold eave. Gutters and guards neither cause nor cure them; the fix is air sealing, insulation and ventilation in the attic.
- Freeze and thaw is hard on hangers and seams. About 82 days a year in South Bend and 78 in Cincinnati swing across freezing. Water left in a clogged or sagging gutter freezes and expands each time, which is why a clean, properly pitched gutter going into winter matters more up north.
- North Georgia freezes more than Atlanta's airport suggests. The cooperative station in Cumming records 67.2 freezing nights a year, against 35.7 at the airport, but almost no snow. Freezing nights there mean frost and the occasional ice in a clogged gutter, not months of snow load.
- Guards are a debris decision, not an ice decision. Whether guards make sense depends on the trees over your roof. In snow country, ask how any guard handles snow and ice sitting on it; no guard stops an ice dam.
Method
All figures are NOAA's official 1991-2020 annual normals for each station, from the National Centers for Environmental Information. Snowfall is new snow measured each day; snow cover is snow depth on the ground.
Freezing nights are days whose low is 32°F or colder. Days that stay frozen are days whose high is 32°F or colder. We subtract the second from the first to count days that cross freezing; at the four airport stations a recount from NOAA's daily records for 1991-2020 matches these to within a fraction of a day.
Macon's station has no published snow normals, so those cells say so rather than showing zero. Central Georgia snow is rare; Atlanta's airport averages 2.2 inches a year.
Sources
- NOAA NCEI, U.S. Climate Normals 1991-2020 (annual/seasonal station files). Period: 1991-2020.
Limits
- Station figures describe the spot where they were measured. Snow and cold vary with elevation and distance from a city.
- The Cincinnati station is CVG airport in Hebron, Kentucky. Northwest Georgia and Marietta use the Atlanta airport station; as the Cumming figures show, nights can be colder away from the airport.
- Cumming's temperature normals rest on 14 years of data and are graded representative by NOAA; its snow figures and Atlanta's are graded provisional, because gaps could not be filled. The South Bend and Cincinnati figures are graded standard.
- Averages hide hard winters; any one season can differ a lot from the normal.
- This is weather data, not an inspection. It can't tell you whether your attic is losing heat.
Cite this study
Top Rated Gutters (2026). Snow, freeze and ice dams: why northern gutters fail differently. Published 12 Nov 2026. https://topratedgutters.com/research/freeze-days-ice-dams-by-city/
The table is free to download as a CSV file and free to reuse with credit to Top Rated Gutters and a link to this page (CC BY 4.0). The underlying public data stay under their publishers’ own terms.
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