{"id":4459,"date":"2012-01-02T05:43:59","date_gmt":"2012-01-02T12:43:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thorntonweather.com\/blog\/?p=4459"},"modified":"2012-01-04T05:22:01","modified_gmt":"2012-01-04T12:22:01","slug":"december-2011-thornton-weather-recap-a-cold-and-snowy-close-to-the-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thorntonweather.com\/blog\/thornton-weather\/december-2011-thornton-weather-recap-a-cold-and-snowy-close-to-the-year\/","title":{"rendered":"December 2011 Thornton weather recap: A cold and snowy close to the year"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"December
December 2011 will go into the books as a cold and snowy month. (ThorntonWeather.com)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Thornton closed out 2011 with a month that while not necessarily historical, brought significant weather to the area.\u00a0 Snow was one of the bigger stories as we piled up a good bit of the white stuff and temperatures were below normal for the month.<\/p>\n

December 2011 came in like a lion as a cold front and associated upper level storm arrived during the first week of the month.\u00a0 Denver International Airport recorded 9.2 inches of snow during the period while here in Thornton we saw 10.7 inches.\u00a0 Temperatures were a bone chilling 17.2 degrees below normal during that time.<\/p>\n

The middle of the month saw the weather moderate and return to more seasonal conditions.\u00a0 Temperatures overall however remained slightly below average.<\/p>\n

With the third week of the month we saw another snowstorm arrive on the 21st and 22nd.\u00a0 Denver recorded 7.3 inches of snow.\u00a0 Thornton once again saw higher totals as we measured 9.1 inches.<\/p>\n

The constant snow cover kept temperatures down through the first few weeks of the month and for a time it looked like the month could make it into the books as one of the coldest on record.\u00a0 A late month warming trend however changed that situation.<\/p>\n

In the end, December 2011’s average temperature was 26.6 degrees.\u00a0 While this was 3.4 degrees below normal, it pushed the month out of ‘top 10 coldest’ contention.<\/p>\n

The snow during the month, while also not record setting, was significant.\u00a0 Denver wrapped up December with 16.5 inches – nearly double the 8.5 inch December average.\u00a0 For the season to date we stood at 29.5 inches giving us a good start toward the 53.5 inch seasonal average.<\/p>\n

In terms of precipitation, 0.78 inches was recorded in Denver which was 0.47 inch above normal.<\/p>\n

At DIA, temperatures ranged from a high of 58 degrees on the 18th down to a low of -5 degrees on the 6th.\u00a0 Thornton saw similar marks with a high of 59.7 degrees, also on the 18th, and a low of -6.5 degrees on the 6th.<\/p>\n

Mother Nature did close out the month and 2011 with a significant windstorm across northeastern Colorado.\u00a0 The New Year’s Eve event saw DIA record a 59mph wind gust and Thornton saw 45mph.\u00a0 Many other areas saw much higher speeds – click here for a summary of the event<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Click here to view the Thornton climatological summary for December 2011.<\/a>\u00a0 Below is the official Denver summary from the National Weather Service.<\/p>\n

CLIMATE REPORT\r\nNATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE BOULDER, CO\r\n335 PM MST TUE JAN 3 2012\r\n\r\n...THE DENVER CO CLIMATE SUMMARY FOR THE MONTH OF DECEMBER 2011... \r\n\r\nCLIMATE NORMAL PERIOD 1981 TO 2010\r\nCLIMATE RECORD PERIOD 1872 TO 2012\r\n\r\nWEATHER         OBSERVED          NORMAL  DEPART  LAST YEAR`S\r\n                 VALUE   DATE(S)  VALUE   FROM    VALUE  DATE(S)\r\n                                          NORMAL\r\n................................................................ \r\nTEMPERATURE (F)\r\nRECORD\r\n HIGH              79   12\/05\/1939\r\n LOW              -25   12\/22\/1990\r\n                        12\/24\/1876\r\nHIGHEST            58   12\/18        79     -21       70  12\/14\r\nLOWEST             -5   12\/06       -25      20        0  12\/31\r\nAVG. MAXIMUM     38.5              42.8    -4.3     48.9\r\nAVG. MINIMUM     14.8              17.1    -2.3     19.6\r\nMEAN             26.6              30.0    -3.4     34.3\r\nDAYS MAX >= 90      0               0.0     0.0        0\r\nDAYS MAX <= 32      7               5.8     1.2        2\r\nDAYS MIN <= 32     30              29.4     0.6       28\r\nDAYS MIN <= 0       2               2.0     0.0        1\r\n\r\nPRECIPITATION (INCHES)\r\nRECORD\r\n MAXIMUM         5.21   1913\r\n MINIMUM         0.00   1881\r\nTOTALS           0.78              0.31    0.47     0.22\r\nDAILY AVG.       0.03              0.01    0.02     0.01\r\nDAYS >= .01         6               4.1     1.9        2\r\nDAYS >= .10         3               1.1     1.9        2\r\nDAYS >= .50         0               0.1    -0.1        0\r\nDAYS >= 1.00        0               0.0     0.0        0\r\nGREATEST\r\n 24 HR. TOTAL    0.48   12\/21 TO 12\/22           12\/30 TO 12\/31\r\n\r\nSNOWFALL (INCHES)\r\nRECORDS\r\n TOTAL           57.4   1913\r\nTOTALS           16.5               8.5\r\n\r\nDEGREE_DAYS\r\nHEATING TOTAL    1182              1086      96      944\r\n SINCE 7\/1       2434              2463     -29     2072\r\nCOOLING TOTAL       0                 0       0        0\r\n SINCE 1\/1        964               769     195      870\r\n\r\nFREEZE DATES\r\nRECORD\r\n EARLIEST     09\/08\/1962\r\n LATEST       06\/08\/2007\r\nEARLIEST                        10\/07\r\nLATEST                          05\/05\r\n.................................................. \r\n\r\nWIND (MPH)\r\nAVERAGE WIND SPEED              9.4\r\nRESULTANT WIND SPEED\/DIRECTION   4\/224\r\nHIGHEST WIND SPEED\/DIRECTION    45\/270    DATE  12\/31\r\nHIGHEST GUST SPEED\/DIRECTION    59\/270    DATE  12\/31\r\n\r\nSKY COVER\r\nPOSSIBLE SUNSHINE (PERCENT)   MM\r\nAVERAGE SKY COVER           0.40\r\nNUMBER OF DAYS FAIR           15\r\nNUMBER OF DAYS PC             12\r\nNUMBER OF DAYS CLOUDY          4\r\n\r\nAVERAGE RH (PERCENT)     62\r\n\r\nWEATHER CONDITIONS. NUMBER OF DAYS WITH\r\nTHUNDERSTORM              0     MIXED PRECIP               0\r\nHEAVY RAIN                0     RAIN                       0\r\nLIGHT RAIN                0     FREEZING RAIN              1\r\nLT FREEZING RAIN          0     HAIL                       0\r\nHEAVY SNOW                1     SNOW                       5\r\nLIGHT SNOW                6     SLEET                      0\r\nFOG                      11     FOG W\/VIS <= 1\/4 MILE      3\r\nHAZE                      4\r\n\r\n-  INDICATES NEGATIVE NUMBERS.\r\nR  INDICATES RECORD WAS SET OR TIED.\r\nMM INDICATES DATA IS MISSING.\r\nT  INDICATES TRACE AMOUNT.<\/pre>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Thornton closed out 2011 with a month that while not necessarily historical, brought significant weather to the area.\u00a0 Snow was one of the bigger stories as we piled up a good bit of the white stuff and temperatures were below normal for the month. December 2011 came in like a lion as a cold front … Continue reading December 2011 Thornton weather recap: A cold and snowy close to the year<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[156],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thorntonweather.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4459"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thorntonweather.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thorntonweather.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thorntonweather.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thorntonweather.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4459"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.thorntonweather.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4459\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4462,"href":"https:\/\/www.thorntonweather.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4459\/revisions\/4462"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thorntonweather.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4459"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thorntonweather.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4459"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thorntonweather.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4459"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}