Second Coldest Month on Record

By Russell Russ

This February will be remembered by millions of people for a long time. Cities from Pennsylvania to Maine to upstate New York have reported that this February was their coldest month on record. These records only go back a hundred years or so, but still it was impressively cold. It was certainly a cold month in Norfolk as well, but only our second coldest in over 83 years, and it didn’t beat our third coldest by much. But although it wasn’t record breaking, here in Norfolk anything in the top 10 means it was really cold. It was also a month with above average snowfall, although eastern Massachusetts, Rhode Island and eastern Connecticut hit the jackpot with record amounts of snowfall.

February’s low temperature of minus 12 degrees was observed on February 16, and the high of 35 degrees on February 22. During a few of the colder days, some locations reported temperatures of minus 15 to minus 18. With an average mean temperature of 10.9 degrees, it was 11.1 degrees colder than normal for Norfolk. Hartford’s record-setting monthly mean temperature was 16.1 degrees. According to our records, Norfolk’s top five coldest months since January 1932 were February 1934 with 9.0, February 2015 with 10.9, February 1979 with 11.0, December 1989 with 11.5 and January 1982 with 11.7 degrees.

February is typically when we get most of our lowest daily temperature readings of the year. There were nine days this month with below zero temperatures and only two days with temperatures above freezing. We got close on several occasions, but only the minus 10 on February 24 set a daily record, beating the minus 5 set on that date back in 1985.

The total precipitation recorded for the month was 2.55 inches, 1.06 inches below normal. All the precipitation that fell this month was in the form of snow. The monthly snowfall total of 32.4 inches was 12.1 inches above normal. It was our 14th snowiest February on record. Last February’s total of 35.7 inches was ranked eighth. Our snowiest February was in 1969 when we measured 52.4 inches.

The snowfall total for both January and February of 56.5 inches was 15.2 inches above normal, but was 5 inches less than last year. The snowfall total for this winter season, October through February, was 77.2 inches. This was 11.2 inches above normal and just 1.8 inches less than last winter. We haven’t recorded as much snow as Boston this winter, but we still have March and April to catch up. On March 15 Boston topped 108 inches of snowfall to break their winter season record. For comparison, Norfolk’s average winter snowfall is 90.5 inches, and our snowiest winter was in 1955–56 when we recorded a total of 177.4 inches.

Just three years ago in 2012 we recorded our second warmest and our third least snowy February. What a difference a few years makes.

Weather observations are recorded by the Great Mountain Forest Corporation at Norfolk’s National Weather Service Cooperative Weather Observer Station, Norfolk 2SW.