--- title: Snow Falls On Desert Southwest Saguaros | WeatherBug | WeatherBug description: The weather was flipped Wednesday throughout much of the U.S. West, with snow falling on cactuses. canonical: https://www.weatherbug.com/news/Snow-Falls-On-Desert-Southwest-Saguaros og:title: Snow Falls On Desert Southwest Saguaros | WeatherBug | WeatherBug og:description: The weather was flipped Wednesday throughout much of the U.S. West, with snow falling on cactuses. og:url: https://www.weatherbug.com/news/Snow-Falls-On-Desert-Southwest-Saguaros og:site_name: WeatherBug og:locale: en_US og:image: https://cms-assets-con.cdn.weatherbug.net/assets/contentitems/55/5549210e-ec2d-44f5-8eae-ac545c2b44f0/52e0ce98-d40a-4283-82d1-d0fe816ebf4b/d5359af9-8278-4c08-a55a-58969dfe1da0.jpg og:image:width: 800 og:image:height: 600 og:image:alt: "It's the first time we've seen snow the desert," says Mayra Vasquez who brought Valeria Luzania, 11, and MarcoDario Luzania, 8, to Saguaro National Park East on January 02, 2019. The kids built a snowman and the trio took a selfie with their creation. (Mamta Popat /Arizona Daily Star via AP) og:type: article article:published_time: 2019-01-03T14:29:18Z article:modified_time: 2019-01-03T14:29:18Z article:author: By The Associated Press article:tag: arizona article:tag: news twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Snow Falls On Desert Southwest Saguaros | WeatherBug twitter:description: The weather was flipped Wednesday throughout much of the U.S. West, with snow falling on cactuses. twitter:image: https://cms-assets-con.cdn.weatherbug.net/assets/contentitems/55/5549210e-ec2d-44f5-8eae-ac545c2b44f0/52e0ce98-d40a-4283-82d1-d0fe816ebf4b/d5359af9-8278-4c08-a55a-58969dfe1da0.jpg --- [](/weather-forecast/now) [Back to forecast](/weather-forecast/now) # Snow Falls On Desert Southwest Saguaros January 3, 2019 at 09:29 AM EST By The Associated Press  PHOENIX (AP) — The weather was flipped Wednesday throughout much of the U.S. West, with snow falling on cactuses in the Arizona desert and Anchorage seeing balmy weather — at least by Alaska standards. In Phoenix, the overnight low was 30 degrees for the first time in five years and more cold temperatures were expected Thursday. The Tucson area saw as much as 6 inches of snow. "It was pretty magical," said Jessica Howard, a resident of the Tucson suburb of Vail who took her 8- and 5-year-old children to play in the snow. "My social media feeds are like 100 percent snow pictures right now." Snow dusted cactuses and mountains in southern Arizona and covered the Grand Canyon in the north. Elsewhere, the National Weather Service issued a freeze warning in the Nevada county where Las Vegas is located. Snow fell and stuck Tuesday on a desert highway over a mountain just 20 minutes outside Sin City. Albuquerque, New Mexico, saw heavy snowfall and icy roads that caused many government agencies and schools to close. The cold weather and snow is "quite uncommon" for the area, said Glenn Lader, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Tucson. Nogales, an Arizona city on the Mexico border, had about 6 inches of snow, he said. Even Southern California got a bit of the action, with rain expected as part of already cold, windy weather. Meanwhile, some parts of Alaska rang in the new year with relatively balmy weather for the region that helped melt snow in Anchorage. A change in the jet stream brought warmer air from the south, taking the temperature to 42 degrees on New Year's Day. It was a nice respite from a winter mix that left 32.6 inches of snow on the ground in Anchorage in December, with most of it falling during the last half of the month. Colder weather was in the forecast, with high temperatures dropping to the teens or even single digits. This story has been corrected to say the temperature hit a high of 42 degrees on New Year's Day in Anchorage. Copyright 2019 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. _Image_: "It's the first time we've seen snow the desert," says Mayra Vasquez who brought Valeria Luzania, 11, and MarcoDario Luzania, 8, to Saguaro National Park East on January 02, 2019\. The kids built a snowman and the trio took a selfie with their creation. (Mamta Popat /Arizona Daily Star via AP) We use technologies, such as cookies, to analyze your use (i.e., pages visited), to customize content, for our internal analytics purposes and for security and other purposes. By continuing to use this website, you agree to this usage. Please review our [privacy policy](/legal/privacy) for more details as well as for information on how to contact us to object to these activities. [Ad Choices](/legal/privacy#digitaladvertisingandyourchoices) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://www.weatherbug.com/news/Snow-Falls-On-Desert-Southwest-Saguaros"},"headline":"Snow Falls On Desert Southwest Saguaros","description":"The weather was flipped Wednesday throughout much of the U.S. West, with snow falling on cactuses.","image":["https://cms-assets-con.cdn.weatherbug.net/assets/contentitems/55/5549210e-ec2d-44f5-8eae-ac545c2b44f0/52e0ce98-d40a-4283-82d1-d0fe816ebf4b/d5359af9-8278-4c08-a55a-58969dfe1da0.jpg"],"datePublished":"2019-01-03T14:29:18Z","dateModified":"2019-01-03T14:29:18Z","dateCreated":"2019-01-03T14:29:18Z","articleSection":"Weather News","keywords":"arizona,news","articleBody":"PHOENIX (AP) — The weather was flipped Wednesday throughout much of the U.S. West, with snow falling on cactuses in the Arizona desert and Anchorage seeing balmy weather — at least by Alaska standards.
\r\n
\r\nIn Phoenix, the overnight low was 30 degrees for the first time in five years and more cold temperatures were expected Thursday. The Tucson area saw as much as 6 inches of snow.
\r\n
\r\n\"It was pretty magical,\" said Jessica Howard, a resident of the Tucson suburb of Vail who took her 8- and 5-year-old children to play in the snow. \"My social media feeds are like 100 percent snow pictures right now.\"
\r\n
\r\nSnow dusted cactuses and mountains in southern Arizona and covered the Grand Canyon in the north.
\r\n
\r\nElsewhere, the National Weather Service issued a freeze warning in the Nevada county where Las Vegas is located. Snow fell and stuck Tuesday on a desert highway over a mountain just 20 minutes outside Sin City.
\r\n
\r\nAlbuquerque, New Mexico, saw heavy snowfall and icy roads that caused many government agencies and schools to close.
\r\n
\r\nThe cold weather and snow is \"quite uncommon\" for the area, said Glenn Lader, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Tucson. Nogales, an Arizona city on the Mexico border, had about 6 inches of snow, he said.
\r\n
\r\nEven Southern California got a bit of the action, with rain expected as part of already cold, windy weather.
\r\n
\r\nMeanwhile, some parts of Alaska rang in the new year with relatively balmy weather for the region that helped melt snow in Anchorage. A change in the jet stream brought warmer air from the south, taking the temperature to 42 degrees on New Year's Day.
\r\n
\r\nIt was a nice respite from a winter mix that left 32.6 inches of snow on the ground in Anchorage in December, with most of it falling during the last half of the month.
\r\n
\r\nColder weather was in the forecast, with high temperatures dropping to the teens or even single digits.
\r\n
\r\nThis story has been corrected to say the temperature hit a high of 42 degrees on New Year's Day in Anchorage.
\r\n
\r\nCopyright 2019 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. 
\r\n
\r\nImage: \"It's the first time we've seen snow the desert,\" says Mayra Vasquez who brought Valeria Luzania, 11, and MarcoDario Luzania, 8, to Saguaro National Park East on January 02, 2019. The kids built a snowman and the trio took a selfie with their creation. (Mamta Popat /Arizona Daily Star via AP)","author":{"@type":"Person","name":"By The Associated Press","url":"https://www.weatherbug.com"},"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"WeatherBug","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://www.weatherbug.com/images/sharing/f1ff28ba-6f06-4745-a782-011a20397e16.png"}}} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"WebSite","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://www.weatherbug.com/news/Snow-Falls-On-Desert-Southwest-Saguaros","relatedLink":"https://www.weatherbug.com/news/Snow-Falls-On-Desert-Southwest-Saguaros"},"name":"WeatherBug","url":"https://www.weatherbug.com/news/Snow-Falls-On-Desert-Southwest-Saguaros","headline":"Snow Falls On Desert Southwest Saguaros","description":"The weather was flipped Wednesday throughout much of the U.S. West, with snow falling on cactuses.","dateModified":"2019-01-03T14:29:18Z","publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"WeatherBug","url":"https://www.weatherbug.com","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/WeatherBug","https://instagram.com/WeatherBug","https://www.linkedin.com/company/weatherbug","https://www.pinterest.com/weatherbug","https://twitter.com/WeatherBug","https://www.youtube.com/user/WeatherBugVideo"],"logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://www.weatherbug.com/images/logos/weatherbug_logo_620x447.png"}},"author":{"@type":"Organization","name":"WeatherBug","url":"https://www.weatherbug.com","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/WeatherBug","https://instagram.com/WeatherBug","https://www.linkedin.com/company/weatherbug","https://www.pinterest.com/weatherbug","https://twitter.com/WeatherBug","https://www.youtube.com/user/WeatherBugVideo"],"logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://www.weatherbug.com/images/logos/weatherbug_logo_620x447.png"}}} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"Organization","name":"WeatherBug","logo":"https://www.weatherbug.com/images/logos/weatherbug_logo_620x447.png","url":"https://www.weatherbug.com","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/WeatherBug","https://instagram.com/WeatherBug","https://www.linkedin.com/company/weatherbug","https://www.pinterest.com/weatherbug","https://twitter.com/WeatherBug","https://www.youtube.com/user/WeatherBugVideo"]} ```