We’ve shattered cold records today in Burlington, and the rest of the state is seeing similarly extreme cold. Mike McClure is a senior meteorologist with the National Weather Service in the Quad Cities.’
“The record low for today’s date, the 27th of February in Burlington, was -7. We shattered that record this morning. We got to -15,” McClure told KBUR.
Some part of the state got even colder, with Waterloo and Cedar Rapids seeing temps as low as -20 below. Such temperature, when combined with windchill, can make it feel several degrees colder.
But how in the world did it get so cold?
“The combination between the recent snow, lighter winds, and cold, artic, high pressure converged. And of course, the skies were clear yesterday so any heat that we did have, which was meager, went into the skies and radiated out,” said McClure.
The good news is, the extreme cold is getting an eviction notice. It’ll be replaced with a slightly less extreme cold over the weekend.
“We do actually see somewhat of an improvment here over the next five to seven days,” said McClure, “Our flow pattern is going to change…that will usher in warmer air, but with the snow on the ground, that will [stifle] any warming that we would see.”
As of Friday, there are only 21 days until we can officially usher in Spring, hopefully putting and keeping this winter’s cold where it belongs: in the record books.
