It has been a remarkable winter in Texas. At the beginning of February, a new record was set at the Dallas Fort Worth Airport when 11.2″ fell in just one day! That was a the greatest amount of snow to ever fall in one calendar day in Dallas. Well, once again the wintery weather will be making its way into Texas. The month to date snowfall in Dallas is 12.5″. Normally by this date in February we only have is only 1.2″! For Dallas, this upcoming storm will be nothing like the big storm from the begining of February but heavier snow is expected for west central Texas, where cities like Midland and Odessa could be getting up to 6″ of snow. Latest model runs showing 3 to 4 inches possible to the west of Waco. Even the Austin area could pick up around a half inch. With this surplus of rain and snow across the state, the major drought that portions of the state were suffering from is quickly fading away. Any snow that accumulates thoughout the afternoon will melt quickly throughout the day tomorrow since the highs will be rising into the mid to upper 40 for the northern part of the state. Here is a picture of the scene in Lubbock, Texas this morning:
The wintery weather is also returning to the Pacific Northwest. For several days, a ridge of high pressure has brought sunny skies and warmer afternoons to the Northwest, including the Vancouver area. For the olympic spectators, this has been ideal conditions for taking in all of the sights and sounds of the Olympics. For the folks in charge of maintaining the snow levels on the mountains, this as been a tricky situation and has required natural snow and man made snow. Well this ridge is breaking down and flow is changing so the second half of the Olympic games will have very different feel compared to the first half. A moist Pacific flow will be moving over the region and that will be bringing in more snow, which is good news for the Mountain snow situation. For the rest of the Northwest, it means more clouds and more wet weather for not only the rest of the day today and tomorrow but also through the end of the week.
Pittsbugh, PA is on the brink of breaking an all-time record. The most snow that Pittsburgh has ever recorded in one month is 40.2″. That is January of 1978. So far this year in the month of February, Pittsburgh has recieved a total 40.0″. A system that is moving in to the Mid Atlantic region is posed to potentially bring more than 0.2″ of snow to Pittsburgh, which would mean the long standing record record is broken. This system has been able to tap into gulf moisture and has already brought a couple of inches of snow to Chicago this morning and heavy snow continues to fall this afternoon in the southern portions of Michigan. Graphic below shows model estimated snow totals in west Pennsylvania.
Meanwhile, another system moving into Texas for the middle of the week isn’t expected to break any records but it will break a long standing streak of no snow. The last time measureable snow fell in San Angelo, TX was at the beginning of December. A system that is currently bring snow and rain to the southwest will be moving into central Texas and San Angelo could be recieving up to 7″ of fresh snow. Graphic below shows model estimates for snow totals in west Central Texas.
These cities bring new meaning to the word “cold.” It amazes me what human beings can endure on a day to day basis… I couldn’t imagine living in any of these locations! I’ll just have to remind myself of this next time I complain about being cold. Here we go! Take a peak at the top five coldest (inhabited) places on earth!
Oymyakon, Russia
Oymyakon is a place of extremes. The difference in temperature between winter and summer is absolutely astounding. This little 800 person village boasts the greatest temperature difference in the world with a whopping 196.6°F change from winter to summer. That’s just about 48° over the average temperature difference in Oymyakon. It’s known as the coldest inhabited place in the northern hemisphere. Supposedly, birds have frozen to death in mid flight due to the ferocious cold. The coldest temperature this place has ever seen? -96.2°F in Jauary of 1926. Wow! Would you believe that the village’s school only closes if the temperature drops to below -52°?
Verkhoyansk, Russia
Verhoyansk is geographically similar to Oymyakon. Both villages are located in an area known as “Stalin’s Death Ring” (pleasant, isn’t it?). Under Stalin’s rule, prisoners were ordered to build the Kolyma Highway and it is said that one prisoner has died for every meter of the road (which is 2000 km long). The temperatures out of this place are just as impressive as Oymyakon’s. In fact, Verhoyanks holds the record for the coldest VERIFIED temperature in the northern hemisphere. On that lovely winter day in 1892, the mercury dropped to -93.6°F. Yikes…
Yakutsk, Russia
Russia’s at it again. Unlike the previous two villages, this is an actual city (population: 210,000) and it is officially the coldest city in the world. Average winter temperatures hover around -40°F. The slightest breeze can make it feel like -70°F. The coldest temperature ever recorded here was -84°. Would you believe that this city pretty much forces their citizens to keep their yards clean? If you don’t, you will be publicly humiliated. Glad I’m not there…
Yakutsk, Russia
Enough of Russia, let’s go to Canada. Aside from the beautiful images of Vancouver that have been
plastered all over TV lately, what comes to mind when you think of Canada? Some people might think of sled dogs, frozen tundras and tiny, icy villages. Places like Snag, Canada fit right into that description. The coldest temperature on record occured back in 1947 (when the population was at about 10) when the nearest airport reported -81.4°F. The alcohol in the thermometer dropped below the lowest readable point and more notches had to be manually added in order to get an accurate reading. Brr. Hopefully, that wasn’t the only kind of alcohol they had lying around…
Vostok, Antarctica
Vostok Research Outpost, Antarctica
This is one of the most remote research outposts in the world and it’s located 1300 km from the South Pole. This place exhibits some crazy winter temperatures. How does -128.6°F sound? That was the world record set on July 21, 1983. On average, the temperature sits around -85°F. You don’t want to know what the warmest temperature ever recorded was…….. Ok. Yes, you do. 10°F!
Well, that was fun. Can’t wait for Spring…
Susie Martin
WeatherNation Meteorologist
As the week concludes, many places around the country will be experiencing a shift in their weather pattern. And for many places it won’t be a change for the better. Starting off with the Southwest: After a week of above normal temperatures and an abundance of sunshine, a weather system moving out of the Pacific will be not only bring more clouds, rain, and higher elevation snow, but also much cooler temperatures. In fact, the highs tomorrow in Phoenix and Southern California will be about 10 to 12 degrees cooler tomorrow than they will be today.
The southwest isn’t the only place where folks have been enjoying sunny skies this week. An area of high pressure planted over the Midwest brought a streak of days packed with sunshine this week. A system moving out of the Rockies will be bringing an end to that pattern as well, just in time for the weekend. This system has already brought a messy, slushy mix to Kansas City. Here is a look at the scene in Kansas City this morning:
The pacific Northwest has been enjoying the effects of high pressure for the past several days. That has brought clearer conditions to the Olympic games but temperatures are a little warmer than ideal. We may actually see highs in the 50s today in the metro area of Vancouver today. This pattern will continue through the weekend.
Hope you have a great weekend (even if you are in on those places where the weather will be taking a turn for the worse)!
Hello and happy Thursday everyone, hope all is well. We’re still talking about a fairly quiet weather patter across the nation. There are only a couple of areas of interest weather-wise, though, tomorrow it appears things will start to get a little more interesting over the central Rockies. Here’s the forecast map through tomorrow:
Watches and Warnings
As of this morning Pittsburgh, PA was only 0.2″ away from tying their snowiest month on record – they’ll likely hit that mark later today. Here’s what downtown Pittsburgh looks like, note there isn’t much room for parking or any more snow:
Drought Update
The image below shows the current drought status across the country and what a dramatic improvement from a year ago across the southern regions. Last year at this time, most of Texas was considered in a severe drought with a good percentage of the state under exceptional drought conditions. If you’d like to see a drought condition animation over the last 12 weeks, see here:
Image of the Day
Now, this is cool! I found this on the NASA Twitter Page today. Space Shuttle Endeavor (docked with the International Space Station) had a phone call with President Obama and the White House and mentioned to them that the Grand Canyon is beautiful from space… then the astronauts sent this picture:
Alright, well… that’s it for today. Hope you have a wonderful rest of your Thursday. Don’t forget to stop back often for more interesting weather facts and tidbits.
Meteorologist Todd Nelson – WeatherNation LLC
