thundersnow
n.— «The storm did come with a novelty act as residents were treated to a rare meteorological phenomenon called thundersnow, which is caused from the upward motion of a cold front when temperatures are near freezing. And that thunder folks heard on Friday morning was nearby, for the snowfall acts as an acoustic suppressor of the thunder. » —“Snow surprise” by Bob Fenske Forest City Summit (Iowa) Nov. 14, 2006. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
It was a dark and stormy night. So begins the long and increasingly convoluted prose of Edwards Bulwer-Lytton’s best-known novel. Today the annual Bulwer-Lytton Contest asks contestants for fanciful first sentences that are similarly...
Ophelia in Johnson City, Tennessee, wonders about the exclamation her great-grandmother often used when something surprised her: Cat bristle! That may be her own version of a minced oath, although it fits with the idea of how a cat’s tail might look...