Record low temperatures put chill in Hills

Rapid City Journal ^ | 16 Feb 07 | Heidi Bell Gease

[rellimpank]

RAPID CITY - Rapid City Regional Airport registered record low temperatures two consecutive nights this week, with lows of minus 20 Wednesday and minus 21 Thursday.

That may be cold, but it doesn't impress weather buffs much. After all, the airport's records don't go back far enough to include February 1936.

"That was a cold, cold, cold, cold, cold month. I think it's the coldest month in the U.S.," meteorologist Lee Czepyha of the National Weather Service said. "It's just a very impressive month, February of 1936."

Rapid City Regional Airport's records date back to 1942, but other sites in the area have records going back to the late 1800s. This week Regional broke the Feb. 14 record of minus 3 degrees, set in 1973, and the Feb. 15 record of minus 14 degrees, set in 1979

[rellimpank]

--interestingly enough, many of the high and low records in the area were set in 1936---Lead had its all-time low of -36F and the high of 100F--

[Question Liberal Authority]

We need some global warming!

[Always Right]

"That was a cold, cold, cold, cold, cold month. I think it's the coldest month in the U.S.," meteorologist Lee Czepyha of the National Weather Service said. "It's just a very impressive month, February of 1936."

Funny, for record highs they have no problem going back a few thousand years and declaring it the warmest year.

[Izzy Dunne]

Regional broke the Feb. 14 record of minus 3 degrees, set in 1973, and the Feb. 15 record of minus 14 degrees, set in 1979

In the last four billion years, two of the coldest Feb. 14ths AND two of the coldest Feb. 15ths have been in the last TWO DAYS!!!!!

Sounds like a trend, doesn't it?

[mainepatsfan]

Kent Brockman on the Simpson's once declared that Springfield had established a record high temperature breaking the old mark that was set 4 billion years ago.

[Red Badger]

There's COLD in them thar hills!............

[rellimpank]

--related piece---and it was -35F in Belle Fourche a few days ago--

---http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?BRD=1300&dept_id=156923&newsid=17845333&PAG=461&rfi=9

[Red Badger]

I bet it was a lot colder when the Mammoths and Saber toothed tigers were running around there........

[clearvision]

In regards to both record high and low in 1936, record highs and lows are usually associated with low humidity and low soil moisture...

I believe there was a major drought in 1936, but did not look up areas affected.

[rellimpank]

---yep---and as South Dakota voters for George McGovern know, it was caused by Herbert Hoover---

[ritewingwarrior]

Maybe the real reason we are having dramatic climate effects is because of rapid changes in the magnetic field.

http://www.nasa.gov/vision/earth/lookingatearth/29dec_magneticfield.html

FEATURE
Earth's Inconstant Magnetic Field
"Scientists have long known that the magnetic pole moves. James Ross located the pole for the first time in 1831 after an exhausting arctic journey during which his ship got stuck in the ice for four years. No one returned until the next century. In 1904, Roald Amundsen found the pole again and discovered that it had moved--at least 50 km since the days of Ross.

The pole kept going during the 20th century, north at an average speed of 10 km per year, lately accelerating "to 40 km per year," says Newitt. At this rate it will exit North America and reach Siberia in a few decades."