MINNEAPOLIS — When it comes to Halloween in Minnesota, you can expect to hear the sounds of ghosts and goblins. But you can also expect to hear the familiar sound of lifelong Minnesotans (Gen X or older) collectively reminding the never-forgotten rest of Minnesota of that one time it snowed a lot on Halloween.

While WCCO meteorologist Joseph Dames says This year's Halloween forecast calls for snowflakesit will be nothing compared to the white wave that swept the area 33 years ago.

The Halloween Blizzard of 1991 is a story that is mentioned year after year as a badge of honor for those who lived through it. Galeful winds and plunging temperatures made it challenging to go from house to house trick-or-treating or going anywhere on Halloween night.

But Halloween night was just the beginning.

On the spooky night itself, Minneapolis-St. Paul received a little over twenty inches of snow. And the next day? Another 18.5 inches. The next day another centimeter fell. And on November 3rd, another few tenths of an inch, bringing with it a whopping 28.4 inches of snow, the largest single storm ever recorded.

But about a decade earlier there was an even bigger event. Two consecutive snowstorms hit the Twin Cities just days apart in January 1982. These two waves resulted in 37.4 inches, which is significantly more than even the famous Halloween blizzard of 1991.

Former WCCO team member remembers

Former WCCO meteorologist Paul Huttner remembers the 24-hour updated information on a stormy morning on November 1st.

“It came quickly and was a shock,” remembers Huttner. “We're saying there will be more than 20 inches of snow! That’s not really going to happen, is it?”

As the Twin Cities woke up, the snow was increasing, falling five inches an hour at times. The wet, heavy snowfall caused roofs to collapse and left firefighters stranded. Police swapped their squads for snowmobiles to move around the streets while others used skis to travel down the street.

“As a meteorologist, you always want to work on the big storm,” Huttner said. “When I saw it that morning I knew it was huge. I had no idea that this would be the largest snowstorm in Twin Cities history as I sit here 30 years later.”

This blizzard left snow on the ground in the mountains. It melted away about a week later, but over Thanksgiving we gained another 14 inches. And that snow stayed until early March.

contributed to this report.