The Severe Weather Team 9 meteorologists collaborated with the National Weather Service in Pittsburgh to determine a list ranking the top 5 weather events to affect the Ohio Valley in 2012.

The list considers the weather event itself with the impacts felt locally.

The number 3 event is a story that affected the entire area. Remember breaking out the shorts early last March? When you did, you were getting dressed for history.

We hadn't even seen our last spat with snow for the year when thermometers started rising into the 80s. From mid - late March, the Ohio Valley saw a wintertime warm stretch unlike any in over a decade.

"If we end up taking a look at Pittsburgh, it ended up being the warmest month on record. The records in Pittsburgh go back about 150 years,” said Tom Green of the National Weather Service in Pittsburgh.

The average March temperature for Pittsburgh was 51.5 degrees, some 10 degrees above normal. Wheeling topped that with 52 degrees. That's about 12 degrees above normal.

"We ended up having three days where in Wheeling itself, we ended up setting daily record highs," said Green.

The reason for all of this was a ridge of high pressure set up to our south and east. Not only did that ridge promote sinking air and inhibit cloud formation, but the clockwise flow around that high meant the Ohio Valley had southwesterly winds for a long period of time, pulling in much warmer air from that region.

"This was only the third time in those 150 years that the average temperature in April was cooler than it was in March," said Green.

One environmental consequence did arise from the early warmth, as leaves and flowers popped early. Trees had started to bud weeks earlier than usual, and several days after the warmth, not out of the ordinary, the area saw its final freeze of the year.

"This ends up putting stress on the trees and that's one reason that the colors might not have ended up being as good this fall because you had a very warm March, you had a cooler April," said Green.

In all, from March 13-24, four local records fell.

Amazingly, the area stayed above 70 degrees for all 12 days.