beavis1729

That’s incredible…definitely a legendary winter of yore.

Wow…I imagine your snowpack lasted forever that season, even if much of the rest of that winter was dry (?). One of the all-time cold winters up there, right?

It dropped to -45F in Hettinger ND, under perfect radiational cooling conditions. This is incredible, considering that it's relatively late in the season. Probably around 50 degrees below normal (?). Weather observations for the past three days for Hettinger, Hettinger Municipal Airport Imperial (Metric) Date Time (mst) Wind (mph) Vis. (mi.) Weather Sky Cond. Temperature (ºF) Relative Humidity Wind Chill (°F) Heat Index (°F) Pressure Precipitation (in) Air Dwpt 6 hour altimeter (in) sea level (mb) 1 hr 3 hr 6 hr Max. Min. 19 07:53 Calm 10.00 Fair CLR -38.2 0 0% 30.63 1049.3 19 06:53 Calm 10.00 Fair CLR -41.8 0 0% 30.63 1049.2 19 05:53 Calm 10.00 Fair CLR -43.6 0 0% 30.63 1049.3 19 04:53 Calm 10.00 Fair CLR -41.8 0 -36 -45 0% 30.65 1049.5 19 03:53 Calm 10.00 Fair CLR -43.6 0 0% 30.66 1049.8 19 02:53 Calm 10.00 Fair CLR -38.2 0 0% 30.67 1049.5 19 01:53 Calm 10.00 Fair CLR -41.8 0 0% 30.68 1050.3 19 00:53 Calm 10.00 Fair CLR -38.2 0 0% 30.68 1050.2 18 23:53 Calm 10.00 Fair CLR -40 0 0% 30.68 1050.4

An intense arctic airmass is in place across ND and eastern MT. This would be very impressive in mid-winter, but even more so on Feb 17-19. Coldest since early Feb 1996? Here's the NWS forecast for Crosby, ND in the far NW corner of the state. Temps were in the minus 20s at midnight, so the daily max may end up around -20. That is incredibly rare. Washington's Birthday Sunny and cold, with a steady temperature around -20. Wind chill values as low as -40. North wind 3 to 8 mph. Tonight Partly cloudy, with a low around -45. North wind around 5 mph becoming calm in the evening. Tuesday Sunny and cold, with a high near -14. Wind chill values as low as -45. Calm wind becoming north around 5 mph. Tuesday Night Mostly clear, with a low around -43. Wind chill values as low as -60. Light and variable wind becoming northwest around 5 mph in the evening. Wednesday Sunny and cold, with a high near -5. Southwest wind 5 to 7 mph becoming southeast in the afternoon. Wednesday Night Clear, with a low around -26. South wind 6 to 10 mph.

With complete respect, I don’t think this is accurate. Most guidance was hinting at around 0.4” of QPF 36 hours ago with ratios around 15:1, generally leading to 5-8” of snow. Some were showing even more, but I agree with not giving them much weight. Now it’s looking like 0.25” of QPF with 12:1 ratios, around 3” of snow. That’s a huge difference. It’s frustrating that a million things need to come together to get a proper snowfall around here. What happened to clippers?

I think Mason City only has 2.7” on the season, which is arguably even more shocking than the SW Iowa stat since Mason City is near the MN border.

Ha ha...I wish this were true.

I don't understand why you keep arguing about this - we're on the same side. Can't you admit that our climo is horrible, if you're a person (like yourself) who likes snow...and especially snow cover? Just because it has been relatively better in recent decades, doesn't mean it's good. Why is this so difficult for people to grasp? Every winter in Miami gets an F; it's the same concept. In my mind, the last 10 winters have been horrible, because there have been way too many thaws. Doesn't mean that snowfall itself has been horrible, but as everyone knows that's only one aspect to winter. 2013-14 and 2014-15 were the last good winters, and all I keep hearing about is how great they were and that we should never ever complain again...and how we should just be content with the current winter that hasn't had more than a 1" depth all season. Those good winters were 10 years ago...are we going to keep falling back on the nostalgia of them forever and ever?

I have to believe that the observations back then weren't very reliable. How could Detroit only have one 6"+ storm over a 10-year period? If that's actually correct, all it does is illustrate (yet again) how horrible our winter climo is. It shouldn't make any of us think "oh, we've been lucky in recent decades"; it's just not a reasonable reaction/response. If a student scores 20% on an exam after getting a 0% on a previous one, the 20% score is still an F.

Jan 2025 wasn't really that cold in Chicago, with a monthly average of 22F. The shame is that it could have been a Top 20 cold month if there was snow cover here and upstream. That's the bigger story. If you look at 1951-1980 normals, Jan 2025 was actually a +1F departure...even as it was -3F vs. 1991-2020 normals. That says more about the obnoxious warming (exacerbated by UHI) over the past 40 years than anything else.

The craziest warm/cold temp swing over a short period in Chicago was probably in the 1984-85 winter. It was 69F on 12/28/84, then -27F (all-time record low) 3 weeks later on 1/20/85.

For sure…and it has been just as bad in the Midwest. Here are a couple examples of places that have essentially experienced a snowless winter so far. Data since November 20th, which I consider to be the beginning of winter: - Mason City IA: 1.14” precip (most fell on one mild day in December), 2.7” snow - Omaha, NE: 0.85” precip (most fell on one mild day in December), 1.0” snow It would be nice if we could ever experience a proper winter. The last one was 2014-15. I know it has been similar in much of SNE. It just gets to be ridiculous at some point.

It's bad enough this winter in MSP...but I just saw that Mason City IA has 2.7" of snow for the entire season, and Omaha NE has 1.0". There aren't really enough words in the English language to describe how bad this is. Even worse, it applies to a wide swath of geography across the lower 48...basically coast-to-coast north of 40N outside of the lake belts.

Yeah...and the Midwest & northern Plains. Shockingly low snowfall (and even worse on the SDD front) in so many areas so far this season. Anchorage has only had 4.1" of snow since Nov 17th, with an approx +12F departure over that period.

25F with SN+ at Pensacola NAS, right on the Gulf, in the middle of the afternoon: Location Time (cst) Sky/Weather Temp. (ºF) Dewpt. (ºF) Humidity (%) Wind (mph) Pressure (in) Click on location name for the weather during the past two days at that site. Pensacola - Pensacola International Airport 14:53 Snow 24 19 81 N 14 G 23 30.41 Birmingham, Birmingham International Airport 14:53 Overcast 25 3 39 N 9 30.52 Crestview, Sikes Airport 14:53 Snow Freezing Fog 24 22 91 N 8 G 22 30.45 Destin, Destin-Ft. Walton Beach Airport 14:53 Light Snow 30 25 82 N 16 G 25 30.42 Evergreen, Middleton Field 14:53 Snow Freezing Fog 23 20 88 N 7 30.44 Keesler Air Force Base / Biloxi 14:55 Light Snow Fog/Mist 25 21 85 N 12 30.46 Milton - Whiting Field Naval Air Station North 14:56 Snow Freezing Fog 23 22 96 N 5 30.42 Mobile, Mobile Downtown Airport 14:53 Snow 25 19 78 N 14 30.49 Montgomery, Dannelly Field 14:53 Overcast 25 20 81 N 8 30.49 Panama City - Northwest Florida Beaches International Airport 14:53 Overcast 32 23 69 NW 16 30.37 Pensacola Naval Air Station 13:55 Heavy Snow 25 23 92 N 10 G 24 30.42

Yes, it does. The WC at ORD that morning was -57F on the new scale (-27F temp with 20 mph winds). It was in the -70s on the old scale.

What's even more impressive about this airmass (although I'd prefer to say "maddeningly annoying and frustrating") is that there's bare ground for an entire 200+ mile radius around MBY, and we still hit -10 this morning. There's no snow cover upstream anywhere south of 45N, and even where there's snow cover north of that it's not very deep/widespread. Usually when you get cold with no snow cover, the snow field is at least very close...which limits the temp moderation somewhat. In this current situation, we didn't really have that. This would have absolutely challenged January 2019 in many areas, imo. A good illustration is Orr, MN where it was -18/-36 yesterday with only 9" of snow on the ground. On Jan 30-31 2019, it was -22/-35 and -18/-42 with 14" of snow on the ground. So, while the temps were slightly milder yesterday vs. Jan 2019, there was a bit less snow cover.

Just to show what this airmass was capable of…it looks like Ely MN will post a -17/-36 today, for a daily average of -26.5. This may be a Top 10 all-time coldest day on record there. The max of -17 is even more impressive. While the -36 min would be great to experience, I imagine Ely hits -40 every 3-5 years (?) on average. I was in Grand Marais MN over the 4th of July this year. A beautiful area, and a nice cool breeze during the summer.

I suppose…but you’re making it seem like this type of pattern happens occasionally, and that it’s ok. Another example of our standards being beaten into oblivion after 8 years of bad winters. It shouldn’t be that way. It’s fine to have a 2-3 week period of cold and dry at some point in the winter, but that’s why you need to build a snowpack earlier in the winter. Then at least it would look like winter (and maximize the cold) if a cold and dry period occurs. We shouldn’t be normalizing bare ground in most of WI, MN, ND, SD, and IL in mid-January.

Congratulations - enjoy!

There are no words to describe how frustrating this is. It could have been a Top 10 arctic outbreak for our area, if there were snow cover here and upstream. The dump of arctic air will be in full swing Sunday night with a lobe of roughly -27 to -30 C 850 mb air waiting in the wings just to our north and west, and this will traverse northern Illinois fully on Monday night. From a climatology perspective, this is just about as cold as we`ve seen (at 850 mb) in the nearby upper air database (Quad Cities and Lincoln, IL). Out of curiosity, went back and took a look at the arctic outbreak from this time last year (January 14 - 17), which featured low temperatures in the -5 to -15 degree range and wind chills solidly down towards -30 F (and even lower than that on short time periods). 850 mb temperatures last year were actually notably warmer, generally around -20 C. They key difference was a widespread and dense snowpack which we obviously don`t have this time around, which just goes to show the power of snowpacks in altering these arctic airmasses.

Right, I hear you...but that assumes you have a snowpack to begin with. Considering it's mid-January, way too much of the Midwest doesn't (southern half of MN and southern 3/4 of WI, for starters).

Completely agree with your sentiment in spirit, but unfortunately here in barren Lake County IL there's only a dusting of snow cover in the shaded areas of neighborhoods, and essentially bare ground in all exposed areas. At least MBY (literally) has a thin cover. The southern 3/4 of WI is bare ground - just hard to comprehend. We should not be normalizing this. All of the nickels have been hitting the city and south. Up here, it has only been the occasional penny. My standards aren't as high as many think. Just 2" of snow cover would be nice, with cold temps - nothing more needed.

Fine to be optimistic, but I don't think you realize how horrible the winter has been west of MI. Much of the northern plains, MN, WI, and N/NW IL (especially far northern IL) has had very little snow cover outside of intermittent dustings...and when the dustings do occur, they sublimate in sunny areas. IMBY, I haven't had more than 1" of snow cover all season, and this will probably hold through the end of January. So while the upcoming pattern after 1/25 may look a bit better relatively speaking, who cares until it actually happens. And, even if it does, it's (yet again) too late to save the winter. This is the 2nd winter in a row where there hasn't been enough snow in northern WI for winter activities, where we've had to cancel plans. It's getting ridiculous. Bad enough for MBY, but at 46N in mid-January, 2 years in a row?? Cold and dry for a 2-3 week period would be ok if there were meaningful snow cover going into it, which is why it's so important to build a base in December...but we can't seem to do that lately either. This had the potential to be a Top 10 cold January if the entire source region and MBY had decent snow cover.

I’ll bite. Unfortunately for you and us in the Midwest, the angle of the cold may be too far east again…even if centered a bit further west than the recent cold. Hopefully you guys can get in on some upslope as the cold presses down, but otherwise the baroclinic zone may again be too far south for any meaningful precipitation north of 40N. Dry and very cold would be wonderful if there were snow cover, but it feels wasted with bare ground. Still a ways out, so plenty of time for changes.