cyclone77

After making it to -11 we've begun to drop off. Back to -13. Point has been lowered a degree to -31.

Just gonna go with 1-3" for here/QC.

The wind chill at MLI fell 2 degrees short of the old record of -54. Was hoping they'd beat that, and then beat the low max record. If they fail to achieve a new all-time record tonight this will end up being pretty disappointing overall. Would still be a very impressive arctic outbreak, but definitely wouldn't be as noteworthy as it could have. For tonight I'm most excited to see how Sterling/Rochelle/Dekalb/Aurora do.

Looks like -41 for the Rochelle area on the 18z HRRR. Coldest spot is actually a little east of Belvidere where it has -42.

They always seem to be one of the warmer spots when the wind has a westerly component. Especially west-southwest. They may really bottom out tonight though if all goes well.

Temps are overachieving suprisingly. MLI up to a relatively balmy -9, so no new record low max there. Up to -12 here.

-25 here, and also at DVN and Sterling. Lowest wind chill here so far was -53. The way the house keeps popping I feel like I'm on a submarine approaching hull crush depth lol.

Oh yeah, the blowers for forced air heat definitely eat up electricity. Even gas boilers utilize a decent mount of electricity as they need to power the water pump(s) that drive the hot water through the system.

Nah, they're mostly gas powered. Either forced air or gas boilers. The only person I know who has an electrical furnace is my nephew, and he pays a ridiculous amount for his heating bill, and the unit is fairly new.

Right on. Have a few space heaters going in the basement along the west wall to ensure the pipes that run along that side stay unfrozen. Probably overkill, but I definitely want to error on the side of caution with this lol.

Yeah a midnight RAOB from DVN would have been pretty nice to see. Down another degree to -17. Really wouldn't be surprised to make a run at -30 tonight. Tomorrow night is going to be utterly fascinating to watch as each ob comes in. Daytime temps tomorrow shouldn't matter too much IMO, as the areas that go calm can plummet 5-10 degrees within an hour. Last Friday night MLI was waaaay behind other ob sites as the lingering weak north wind was advecting slightly warmer air in from the IL side of the QC. Once it went dead calm they plummeted and ended up with a new record. The biggest impact on tomorrow night's temp potential in the favored drainage sites will be whether they can go completely calm for a decent period of time, and also remain cloud free. Gonna have to keep an eye on that upstream cloud deck pouring in off that incoming clipper.

This really is putting that 2014 Jan outbreak to shame. The way the temps just keep steadily falling with such wind blowing is pretty amazing. Temp is now down to -16, and the winds are gusting over 30mph. Normally for it to get this cold it has to be near calm. This may be the most impressive weather event I've ever seen. Still another 7-8hrs of temp decline to go.

Charles City Iowa down to -60 wind chill. On the old chart it would be -81. MLI bumped down to -13, so it appears the low max is in play as long as they don't warm more than expected in the afternoon.

MLI is languishing as well, as they're only at -9. Think -12 is the record low max. -14 here and dropping steadily.

Boone Iowa leading the charge with a wind chill of -99.

Mason City is -23 with winds gusting to 40mph. Just brutal! Wind chill already -57 there.

Screw that, I'd call in sick lol. I'll be working tomorrow as well, but only have to make it from the parking lot to the building. Just worried about the drive in with all the blowing snow out here in the country. It was manageable today so it should be okay.

Luckily Sterling and it looks like Aurora have been upgraded to ASOS since then. One or both look to have a shot at exceeding -36. My guess would be Sterling based on the timing of the ridge. They hit -28 pretty easily Sat morning with ideal radiational cooling.

I'm definitely saving that one.

Wow that is extremely impressive if that happens. As impressive as the Jan '14 arctic outbreak was, this one looks to put that one to shame.

Yeah it did one-up the 12z. Also colder at 18z on Wed, with -22 to -24 similar to what the 03z RAP showed for northern IL/east IA. Verbatim the new Euro has Waterloo hitting -39, Cedar Rapids -38, and DVN -37.

Sure is lol. In the heart of summer we have some of the more tropical conditions that you'll find on the planet. It's simply amazing that we can transform into a vicious arctic wasteland like this. The other areas around the planet that get the extreme tropical conditions don't even come close to seeing the kind of cold/dry arctic air masses like what we see. Made this image comparison earlier.

Just to balance out the extreme cold talk. Here's a heat index forecast from this past June. Amazing the contrast in weather conditions we can see during the course of a year. 117 heat index forecast to -60 wind chill potential.

A lot of us grew up with the old wind chill chart, when it was sort of common to achieve -40 or lower wind chills during a harsh arctic outbreak. I can remember in the '94 arctic outbreak they were forecasting -60 to -80 wind chills for northern IA. On the modern scale (post 2001) seeing wind chills down near -60 show up on the models this far south is pretty astounding. I found the old chart, and it looks like the wind chill potential using the old scale would be between -65 and -80 for the western sub.

03z RAP shows midday temps on Wednesday between -22 and -24 for northern IL/eastern IA. This one's gonna be one for the ages boys.