Tag Archives: temperatures

Deadly cold envelops Northern Hemisphere from U.S. to China

Severe cold weather has enveloped the northern half of the globe from the United States to Britain to China. Across the continents, many places are reporting record setting temperatures and lives have been lost due to the Arctic chill.

The eastern half of the United States saw cold, Arctic air pulled down from the north plunging temperatures below freezing in normally mild places as far south as Florida. The widespread cold gripped most of the nation east of the Rocky Mountains to the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic Seaboard.

Across the Midwest, temperatures plunged to well below freezing as parts of Iowa recorded temperatures as low as -15 degrees. Jeff Johnson, National Weather Service meteorologist, told the Des Moines Register, “”We’re a solid 30 degrees below normal.” Minneapolis, Minnesota and Chicago, Illinois were seeing wind chills below 0 degrees Tuesday morning.

In Miami, residents accustomed to short sleeve shirts and shorts bundled up as temperatures dropped to freezing. Further north in the state, Orlando saw a low temperature of 21 degrees.

The National Weather Service issued hard freeze warnings across parts of Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia and Florida as the cold threatened the agriculture industry in those states. Freeze watches in Tennessee highlighted the severe cold and came on the heels of reports that four people have died in that state from the cold.

There's more to this story on Examiner.com!The United States is not alone as the cold has turned deadly across the globe.  Get all the details and see some amazing photos at the Natural Disasters Examiner.

December 2009 goes into the books as seventh coldest on record

For the second time in the past three months, Denver has experienced monthly average temperatures in the ‘top 10 coldest’ category. In October, the Mile High City saw its second coldest October on record since record keeping began in 1882. Now Denver has just wrapped up its seventh coldest December in history.

Denver’s average December 2009 temperature was 24.1 degrees – a chilly 6.2 degrees below the normal average of 30.3 degrees. That puts the month into the books as the seventh coldest December on record (image right).  Thornton was just a touch colder having recorded an average temperature of 23.8 degrees.

Temperatures during the month ranged from a high temperature of 59 degrees on the 1st down to a low of -17 on the 9th. Overall, the majority of days during the month saw below normal temperatures.

In terms of snowfall, the month did finish above average but not in record setting territory. The National Weather Service recorded 11.1 inches of snowfall at the official monitoring station at Denver International Airport. This was 2.4 inches above the average of 8.7 inches for December.  In Thornton, we received a bit more snow than DIA.  15.3 inches was recorded at ThorntonWeather.com of which the single biggest even was the pre-Christmas storm which dumped 7.5 inches.

 The snow we did receive however was rather dry and as such we finished the month below normal for precipitation. DIA recorded 0.45 inch of precipitation which is 0.18 inch below normal.  Here again, because of the additional snowfall, Thornton fared a bit better with 0.5 inch of precipitation. 

CLIMATE REPORT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE BOULDER, CO                                 
510 PM MST SAT JAN 2 2010

................................... 

...THE DENVER CO CLIMATE SUMMARY FOR THE MONTH OF DECEMBER 2009...

CLIMATE NORMAL PERIOD 1971 TO 2000
CLIMATE RECORD PERIOD 1872 TO 2009

WEATHER         OBSERVED          NORMAL  DEPART  LAST YEAR'S         
                 VALUE   DATE(S)  VALUE   FROM    VALUE  DATE(S)      
                                          NORMAL                      
................................................................
TEMPERATURE (F)
RECORD
 HIGH              79   12/05/1939                                    
 LOW              -25   12/22/1990                                    
                        12/24/1876                                    
HIGHEST            59   12/21        79     -20       69  12/02       
                        12/01                                         
LOWEST            -17   12/09       -25       8      -19  12/15       
AVG. MAXIMUM     36.4              44.1    -7.7     41.0              
AVG. MINIMUM     11.9              16.4    -4.5     12.3              
MEAN             24.1              30.3    -6.2     26.6              
DAYS MAX >= 90      0               0.0     0.0        0              
DAYS MAX <= 32     15               5.3     9.7       10              
DAYS MIN <= 32     31              29.2     1.8       30              
DAYS MIN <= 0       6               2.8     3.2        6              

PRECIPITATION (INCHES)
RECORD
 MAXIMUM         5.21   1913                                          
 MINIMUM         0.00   1881                                          
TOTALS           0.45              0.63   -0.18     0.24              
DAILY AVG.       0.01              0.02   -0.01     0.01              
DAYS >= .01         7               5.3     1.7        6              
DAYS >= .10         2                MM      MM        0              
DAYS >= .50         0                MM      MM        0              
DAYS >= 1.00        0                MM      MM        0              
GREATEST
 24 HR. TOTAL    0.20   12/22 TO 12/23        0.10  12/13 TO 12/14       

SNOWFALL (INCHES)
RECORDS
 TOTAL           57.4   1913  SNOWIEST DENVER MONTH SINCE 1881
TOTALS           11.1                8.7              7.1             

DEGREE_DAYS
HEATING TOTAL    1260              1078     182     1179              
 SINCE 7/1       2739              2486     253     2367              
COOLING TOTAL       0                 0       0        0              
 SINCE 1/1        533               696    -163      825              

FREEZE DATES
RECORD
 EARLIEST     09/08/1962                                              
 LATEST       06/08/2007                                              
EARLIEST                        10/07                                 
LATEST                          05/05                                 
.................................................................

WIND (MPH)
AVERAGE WIND SPEED              8.8
RESULTANT WIND SPEED/DIRECTION   3/217
HIGHEST WIND SPEED/DIRECTION    43/220    DATE  12/13
HIGHEST GUST SPEED/DIRECTION    49/220    DATE  12/13

SKY COVER
POSSIBLE SUNSHINE (PERCENT)   MM *SUNSHINE DATA N/A EFFECTIVE 10/1

NUMBER OF DAYS FAIR            4
NUMBER OF DAYS PC             21
NUMBER OF DAYS CLOUDY          6

AVERAGE RH (PERCENT)     61

WEATHER CONDITIONS. NUMBER OF DAYS WITH 
THUNDERSTORM              0     MIXED PRECIP               0
HEAVY RAIN                0     RAIN                       0
LIGHT RAIN                0     FREEZING RAIN              0
LT FREEZING RAIN          0     HAIL                       0
HEAVY SNOW                0     SNOW                       2
LIGHT SNOW               10     SLEET                      0
FOG                      11     FOG W/VIS <= 1/4 MILE      1
HAZE                      7                                           
                                                                    
-  INDICATES NEGATIVE NUMBERS.                                      
R  INDICATES RECORD WAS SET OR TIED.                                
MM INDICATES DATA IS MISSING.                                       
T  INDICATES TRACE AMOUNT.   

Denver sets new high temperature record for November 5th

Denver broke the record high temperature for the date today.
Denver broke the record high temperature for the date today.

Everyone in the Mile High City has been enjoying an extraordinarily beautiful November day today. As we mentioned in our morning forecast on Examiner.com, temperatures were expected to reach record-setting highs and that has been the case.

At 1:49pm the official temperature as taken at Denver International Airport reached 77 degrees. This broke the record high for the date last of 76 degrees set in 1945 and before that in 1916.

Here in Thornton we actually were a good bit warmer than the offical high.  ThorntonWeather.com reached a high of 79.9 degrees at 12:12pm.

As always, we have to ask the question: Is this really a record or not? Some say Denver’s climate records have forever been altered and as such any weather record should have an asterisk attached to it. Why? Get the details on that story here.

Global warming? Not this year in the U.S.

Global warming?  Not this year in the U.S.  Thus far most of the United States is experiencing cooler temperatures in 2008.
Global warming? Not this year in the U.S. Thus far most of the United States is experiencing cooler temperatures in 2008.

According to the National Climatic Data Center (NCDC), much of the United States is experiencing below normal temperatures thus far in 2008.  In all, through the end of October, over 80% of the continental United States is experiencing normal or below normal temperatures.

This news comes on the heels of some other interesting “cool weather” recently.  The Swiss lowlands received the most snow for October since 1931 and areas of Florida broke 150 year record temperature lows.  Perhaps in a somewhat ironic event, London experienced its first October snow since 1922 on the same day the House of Commons was debating Global Warming.  🙂

Certainly we cannot draw any real conclusions about manmade climate change or global warming from these isolated incidents but they do have to make you wonder.