-31F at Nowata, OK - New State Record

[Andrew Ryan]

Nowata, OK dropped to -31F this morning, setting a new state record. More information about on the mesonet ticker

 

[Jason Bolt]

Awesome! I knew it was cold last night, colder than predicted for my locale, but had no idea until I went outside this morning and had -15. Something else interesting, it's a ways out but looking at next Wednesday places like Coffeyville and Bartlesville could be in the low 70s. That could be a 100 degree temperature swing in one week!

 

[Jim Saueressig]

I am not sure how low we were but when my thermometer came back up it was climbing rapidly from -19f. Apparently it quits displaying at -20f.

 

[Chad Cowan]

That is an incredibly low temperature. I thought this was especially cool because exactly two years ago today I ended a chase day in Nowata at Cafe Bliss with temps in the upper 60's and knee-high floodwater in the streets. Today they have a foot of snow and it's -31F. Crazy.

 

[Patrick Marsh]

A couple of things to remember about this low temperature...

1. It is unofficial until certified by the state climatologist.

2. Because of the 1-2 feet of snow, the effective height of the temperature sensor was reduced from 4.5 feet to 2.5-3.5 feet. This may not seem like much, but under strong radiational cooling, the temperature decreases very rapidly the closer to the ground you get. I wonder how many degrees were shaved off the minimums because of this decrease of 1-2 feet in the effective height of the temperature sensor.

 

[B Ozanne]

When it comes to all-time state minimums they will certainly want to certify it.

Do you think a reduction in thermometer height due to snow would disqualify the data or would it just be adjusted?

 

[Patrick Marsh]

It won't disqualify the data, as this has happened before...and they won't adjust the data. There is no way to know precisely what the temperature would have been.

 

[Jeff Snyder]

It's worth mentioning, IMO, that the Oklahoma Mesonet has only been in operation since the early 1990s. As such, I wouldn't necessarily say that last night was the coldest this state has ever seen (well, since the late 1800s at least) since there's no way to know what the temperatures were at the location of the Nowata mesonet site before the early 1990s. In other words, Nowata may have seen -31 F temperatures before the Oklahoma Mesonet site was installed. Of course, this is almost always a caveat when we use sparsely-distributed observations -- there are bound to be maxima and minima that go unsampled/unmeasured. Then again, the BVO ASOS reported a temperature that surpassed the old record low anyway, though I don't know how long that site has been in place.

 

[Jeff Duda]

I don't get it. There's no mention of the -31 F reading at Nowata in the Mesonet ticker for 10 Feb. I only see it in the low temperature graphic. Is an Oklahoma Mesonet station not official?

 

[Robert Rohloff]

With two snow storms of 20 plus inches and temperatures at -20 if spring rolls like winter here in Oklahoma we better get the gear ready to rock.

 

[Jeff Snyder]

Jeff (Duda) -- I assume that Ticker page was written before the Nowata obs were brought "up to date". There were several Mesonet sites that had appreciable data gaps last night. I *think* these resulted from communications problems, and that those observations were reported at a later time. I noticed that the gaps that were evident on the meteograms last night on a few stations have been filled in, so I assume the data reporting was delayed. I guess we'll know more if there's a new Ticker tomorrow.

 

[Jonathan Whitehead]

Dont think Ive EVER seen winter white so far South on a temp map. This is horrifying


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[Chris Vagasky]

Jeff (Duda) -- I assume that Ticker page was written before the Nowata obs were brought "up to date". There were several Mesonet sites that had appreciable data gaps last night. I *think* these resulted from communications problems, and that those observations were reported at a later time. I noticed that the gaps that were evident on the meteograms last night on a few stations have been filled in, so I assume the data reporting was delayed. I guess we'll know more if there's a new Ticker tomorrow.

There were several power outages last night. Spoke to one of the Mesonet QA folks this morning, and they mentioned the power outage in Nowata that prevented the from getting the data until late.

http://www.mesonet.org/index.php/news/article/oklahoma_shatters_all_time_low_temperature_record Includes the Nowata temps.

 

[B Ozanne]

It's worth mentioning, IMO, that the Oklahoma Mesonet has only been in operation since the early 1990s. As such, I wouldn't necessarily say that last night was the coldest this state has ever seen (well, since the late 1800s at least) since there's no way to know what the temperatures were at the location of the Nowata mesonet site before the early 1990s. In other words, Nowata may have seen -31 F temperatures before the Oklahoma Mesonet site was installed. Of course, this is almost always a caveat when we use sparsely-distributed observations -- there are bound to be maxima and minima that go unsampled/unmeasured. Then again, the BVO ASOS reported a temperature that surpassed the old record low anyway, though I don't know how long that site has been in place.

But that is the case with every weather record. Obviously weather happened long before data was collected and it continues to happen everywhere there is not a weather station. I always thought it would be cool to "chase extremes." On a record day like yesterday go setup an observation site (following all the rules for site placements) in an ideal location that would most likely have the coldest temperatures.

 

[Andrew Ryan]

There were several power outages last night. Spoke to one of the Mesonet QA folks this morning, and they mentioned the power outage in Nowata that prevented the from getting the data until late.

http://www.mesonet.org/index.php/news/article/oklahoma_shatters_all_time_low_temperature_record Includes the Nowata temps.

I wasn't aware of any power outages. As far as I know, the record was known until later because the data was flagged as bad data since -31 is outside the reliable range of the thermistor. Most of the notable lows were flagged as bad data since they were all lowest temperatures recorded at that site.