This Winter vs. Last in the Northeast: No Warmth
I talked last month about how consistent the cold air has been in the Northeast U.S. this winter - and suggested that was why it has been perceived as such a brutal season. Here are some additional stats for this winter vs. last in State College, Pennsylvania, home of AccuWeather HQ [Google Map], from Penn State weather records.
No matter how you measure it, this winter has been much colder. But the most impressive numbers are the lack of warm high temperatures. For example, this winter has held 68% more days below freezing, and 77% less "warm" days (above 40). And this winter, we've yet to top 50 degrees, something that happened 4 times last winter (although interestingly, last February never got above 45, something this season broke yesterday). This season, we haven't been above 50 since November 30th!
I think that lack of warm days makes it seem even colder than the average shows, although a difference of 3.4 degrees on average is a big difference. Even more interesting is this data for the last 10 years from Pete in New Hope, PA, for Doylestown (near Philly):
These numbers say that this winter so far has blown away all others for the lowest average temperature to-date, and probably will when it's all said and done at the end of February, depending on how warm the rest of the month ends up. That's 7 consecutive 10-day periods below normal this season, or as Pete points out "over the first 70 days of winter since December 1, there have been 58 days below normal, 3 days at normal, and just 9 days above." That's only 13% of days above normal, even worse than the State College stats shown above.
Interesting note: Although the cold was consistent, like I have pointed out, it was not extreme -- only last year held a less extreme 10-day period.
Given that weather is usually a story of extremes, this is remarkable. Certainly in the latter half of the decade, things seemed to have "calmed down" which goes against what some people are saying about extremes becoming worse lately due to climate change. Of course, a decade does not make climate change, and this is only one station. I wish I had more time to research this on a regional or global basis.
Meanwhile, here are the Northeast departure from normal maps for last winter and this winter -- nearly every station is much colder this winter.
