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Historic big chill just about to end for central Indiana
If it seems pretty difficult to recall a colder start to a new year than this has been, it darn well ought to be.
Because according to the National Weather Service, the first week of 2018 has been the coldest start to a new year on record in Indiana (or at least for the 146 years the NWS has been keeping track).
How cold was it (insert your best Ed McMahon voice here)?
Well, the average temperature for the first six days was 3.3 degrees, which is 25 degrees below normal.
And with another subzero occurrence Friday night into Saturday morning, it marks seven straight days of below-zero temperatures, or the most since 1990.
Saturday’s high temperature isn’t expected out of the teens, which makes it the 13th straight day of below-freezing temperatures. The last day the temperature was at the freezing mark or above was Christmas Eve when the high reached 32 degrees.
That means we have endured something like 320 consecutive hours of below-freezing temperatures during this big chill.
The National Weather Service says that is the longest such streak since Feb. 17, 2010.
The record for such frozen futility is 35 frigid days set in February 1977.
Overall, the official outlook for January from the Climate Prediction Center has indicated a much greater chance of below normal temperatures across central Indiana. At Indianapolis, the average temperature for the month is 28.1 degrees.
A greater chance of near to slightly above-average precipitation exists as well. The average precipitation for January at Indianapolis is 2.66 inches, with 8.6 inches of snowfall.
Oddly, all the cold weather comes on the heels of a December that began as one of the warmest on record and ended with quite a cold snap.
December began warm as highs rose into the 50s and 60s through the first few days of the month. Highs peaked in the mid 60s across central Indiana on Dec. 4, a solid 20 to 25 degrees above normal.
Temperatures warmed again beginning on Dec. 16 and would remain above normal for much of the following week, with highs most commonly in the low 50s. The arrival of a strong cold front late on Dec. 22 and early on Dec. 23 ushered in a shift to much colder air that would culminate with one of the coldest finishes to a year in recent memory.
Temperatures fell below 30 degrees on Christmas Eve, then fell below 20 degrees on Christmas Day as a progressively deeper Arctic airmass expanded across central Indiana. The last six days of the month saw much of the area not climb above 20 degrees as highs remained in the teens and lows were in the single digits or below zero.
New Year’s Eve was one of the coldest on record with highs only in the single digits and teens, and lows near or below zero. Indianapolis tied its coldest high on record for New Year’s Eve, matching the 11 degrees reached on the final day of the year in 1976.
The result of the very cold temperatures over the last week of the month led to average temperatures for December running generally 1 to 3 degrees below normal. At Indianapolis, the average temperature of 30.2 degrees ended up just a tenth of a degree colder than December 2016, and the coldest December since 2013.