We’ve only got 12 years left to enjoy all this sub zero weather, err, climate, or, whatever. At least those 7,000 Keystone project pipe trades workers don’t have to worry about being cold, eh?
In Alexandria, La, the temp was about 10 degrees Fahrenheit. Most of the state is covered with ice and I don't dare go driving around. Ya'll should see a bunch of deep south southerners pretending they can drive on icy roads. Interstate 10 is iced over and morons keep going around entrance ramp barricades to get on 10. Lots of I 10 is elevated to go over places like the Atchafalaya Basin which is now a good place to have hockey games. My yard has glazed snow, slicker than owl feces and my poor old DK can't run without slipping and sliding. At least for once I can see her in the yard as otherwise she's so camouflaged she is almost invisible.
If you go way up north to the frozen lands of Shreveport and Monroe, it's worse. Tomorrow the prediction is 100% chance of freezing rain which will compound our problems. Poor Louisiana; we had seven tropical storms, including a storm worse than Katrina, tornadoes, the Wuhan Flu, and now ice storms.
Lots of Texas is without power because their windmills froze up. The irony of these environment saving windmills is they are de-icing them with drones carrying hoses. It appears to be similar to the way aircraft are de-iced. The spray is probably some alcohol based anti-freeze made by those wicked petroleum industries.
Fine here in Utah...in fact, in about an hour, I’ll be rippin through about 17” of fresh powder!!! :-) It actually feels a little bit like winter now. This winter, at least out west, has been pretty lame.
The ultimate clean enegery = frozen wind generators, at least they are not killing eagles and other birds of prey. Bad weather for brass monkies here in North LA bill
John, I will be in the shop testing the performance of gun lubricants at extremely low temperatures.
Lake Charles, where they grow gasoline and natural gas, is having rolling blackouts and no water pressure. They are operating on the maxim; "If it's yellow, let it mellow, if it's brown, flush it down."
I forgot, the most sought after bureaucrat job in LA is snow plow inspector in Cameron parish. We don't have enough salt for the roads because it's all been used up for crawfish boil seasoning.
It’s been -23 to -27 day in day out for the past 10 days. Today it’s breaking and up to 23. By weekend 36 - 40 and winter is over except for a few dumps of snow expected in March. The saving grace was the Covid lockdowns that kept us in house regardless
It’s about 5°F where I live, scheduled to go below zero this evening.
I saw that it was 33 below zero in Valentine Nebraska where I was hunting two weeks ago. I don’t think they are really set up for that.
It’s a good day to bake.
Clapper Zapper, having lived near the Sandhills for twenty years, I know that the folks in the Sandhills are, unfortunately, used to this and extremes the other direction. The worst part is that right now is calving season, so the ranchers have no option but to be out in these horrid conditions. A few prayers their direction would be welcomed.
Yes, calving during nasty weather is an extremely brutal, miserable and often heart breaking job which the vast majority of people don't think about and are totally unaware of.
It was -15 actual and -23 wind chill when I was having coffee at 6:30 this morning here in NW Arkansas.
Welcome to my world. Not unusual at all north of the cities, here, this time of year.
At the height of the “Polar Vortex”, what 2 winters past? 1:00PM, -47 degrees F. The nice thing about that kind of cold, is, there is no chance of snow, or, wind. The bad thing, is, it is 47 degrees below zero. Yes, that is ice on mine, and the dogs face. If she is ever cold, she doesn’t show it.
Having spent half my 62 years in Winnipeg, in Manitoba, where at least a dozen all time record lows were set this past weekend, temps in the -30 to -40 (sans wind chill exaggeration) range are all too familiar. I don't live there now.
Happy to go back for visits, not in January or February.
James, I don’t find the windchill index to be an exaggeration at all. I can take literally any temp outdoors, if the wind isn’t blowing. Last nights 3 mile walk with the dog was at about -13 degrees, but, the damn wind was steady out of the northwest at about 18-20 mph.
I think I was hypothermic, when I got home. Took me an hour and a half to warm up.
Tonight was perhaps 3 degrees, but, no wind. Got my coat off and cracked a beer. Hands weren’t even cold.
We used to get an occasional-40F or colder, and regularly 2-3 nights in the -30F range here in ND. But I can't remember any nights that cold for many years. Just read a study that showed three species of birds in SD tended to winter 200 miles farther north toward the end of the period 1974-2017. It used to be odd to see common crows during the Christmas Bird Counts here, but now they are are seen regularly. No shortage of plants invading from the south either. Canvasback would you believe corn, soybeans, and sunflowers are now produced over a hundred miles north of Winnipeg?
Constant rain here in GA. Well .......... 5 days out of 7 each week, lately. Temps running from lows in the 30s to the 40s, to highs from 40s to the 50s.
Hey, somebody's got to populate the South .............glad to oblige.
What the "h*** "is a Christmas Bird Count? For us it's how many doves are feeding in the peanut fields.
in the piney woods of ne texas...monday night was -4...to my understanding possibly breaking records back to late 19th century....certainly never seen anything below +4 in my lifetime (i'm 71).
the deal for us, like the louisiana guys, is the total lack of any infrastructure to address the conditions...little or no salt, no snow handling equipment, just an endless supply of fools who believe they can drive like always...regardless of the conditions.
ERCOT has dropped the ball - big time (Electric Reliability Council Of Texas)...numerous generators were off-line for scheduled rotating maintenance...numerous others could not access fuel stock piles...many fingers wiil be pointed...but i figure problem can be solved by simply removing the R from their acronym...
but, it's an ill wind that blows no good...we're supposed to stay below freezing for 7 - 8 days & nights....plumbers will have a field day.
Ted, that didn’t read the way I meant it. I’m in agreement with you. Very often a -15 sunny day is a lovely winter day. Gloves off, jacket unzipped, warmth of the sun easily felt. Wind takes that away. I just get tired of weather porn and exaggeration, which is common where I live now. People talk about windchills as though it was just the temp, in order to make their minus 5 sound worse. I’m always game for using the same measuring stick. One or the other and not conflating the two.
Yes, calving during nasty weather is an extremely brutal, miserable and often heart breaking job which the vast majority of people don't think about and are totally unaware of.
I've had some times pitching as I could with this type of thing. When I read stories of no place to hunt, I've noticed, it's a consistent theme of many ranchers to allow access to those willing to volunteer a little time.
My wife really likes the sound of windchill numbers, all I know is that no doubt I can feel it.
No snow or ice storms yet this year in GA I know about. Cold and rainy though if you guys will let us count 30's and 40's F as cold. Kind of embarrassing for a southern boy to post in a thread like this one...Geo
Wildlife will suffer a lot from this cold snap. I have come across several coveys of quail which froze to death on the roost in a little circle. Very sad sight.
When I was hunting off the Chesapeake Bay, when things froze solid I had three fresh water fed springs which stayed open in my marsh. During duck season they always held birds. In 1979 the Bay froze completely but my little springs stayed open. It was so cold every state in the lower 48 had snow which could be seen from orbit. It froze a mile and a half out into the ocean.
Season was closed so I put out several hundred pounds of corn. State game warden saw me doing it and though I was going to shoot ducks out of season. When he confronted me I explained that I was feeding the ducks because I had killed many a duck on this marsh and today was time to pay them back. Believe it or not he helped me take in the last couple hundred pounds of corn to one of the springs. Ronnie is retired now but I always remember him helping me keep a few ducks alive. In a week things opened up and the ducks dispersed but without that corn, at the right time, far fewer would have been left to disperse. I still put out a bit extra when the weather gets extreme.
KY Jon, further to your point. We had a bad cold snap along with heavy freezing rain just before Christmas 2013. You could and people did skate across fields.
Prior we had a ton of turkey in the area. After it was 4 years before I saw any and they still aren’t back to the way they were. I’m guess other populations took a similar hit.
Being in the geographical center of North America, we have the extreme in continental climate. Our all-time low is -60F and our high 121F. Weird thing is they both occurred in the same year (1936).