Temperature Facts
On January 22 1943, the temperature at Spearfish, South Dakota (USA) rose from minus 20°C (minus 4°F) at 7.30am to 7°C (45°F) at 7.32 am (a 27°C rise in just 2 minutes!).
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Temperatures dipped below freezing in the north central U.S. Five cities in North Dakota and Nebraska reported record low temperatures for the date, including Bismarck ND with a reading of 17 degrees above zero. Low pressure brought snow and sleet to parts of Upper Michigan.
The temperature at Minneapolis, MN, reached 90 degrees, their latest such
reading of record.
Freezing temperatures were reported in the Great Lakes Region and the Ohio Valley. Houghton Lake MI reported a record low of 21 degrees.
The temperature at Sentinel AZ soared to 116 degrees to establish an October record for the nation.
Freezing temperatures were reported in the Northern and Central Appalachians, and the Upper Ohio Valley. The morning low of 27 degrees at Concord NH tied their record for the date. Temperatures soared into the 90s in South Dakota. Pierre SD reported an afternoon high of 98 degrees.
The temperature soared to 104 degrees at San Diego, CA. Southern California was in the midst of a late October heat wave that year. Los Angeles had ten consecutive days with afternoon highs reaching 100 degrees.
The temperature at Honolulu, Hawaii, reached 94 degrees to establish an all-time record at that location.
The temperature at Wichita Falls TX soared to 108 degrees to establish a record for September.
The temperature at Deeth NV soared from a morning low of 12 degrees to a high of 87 degrees, a record daily warm-up for the state.
Twenty-three cities in the south central U.S. reported record low temperatures for the date, including Topeka KS with a reading of 33 degrees, and Binghamton NY with a low of 25 degrees. Showers and thunderstorms in the southeastern U.S. drenched Atlanta GA with 4.87 inches of rain, their sixth highest total of record for any given ay.
In Australia, Marble Bar (WA) recorded maximum temperatures equaling or exceeding 37.8°C (100°F) on 161 consecutive days (between 30 October 1923 and 7 April 1924)
In New York in 1988 the temperature stayed above 32°C for 32 days and the murder rate soared by 75%.
The greatest recorded temperature range in Australia is 57.2°C, measured in White Cliffs (NSW) where the maximum has risen to over 50°C and the minimum has fallen to minus 7°C.
The worlds greatest temperature range at a single location is 105°C, from minus 68°C to 37°C recorded at Verkhoyansk, Siberia.
The temperature at West Yellowstone MT plunged to six degrees below zero, while the temperature at San Francisco CA soared to 94 degrees.
San Diego CA reached an all-time record high of 111 degrees. Los Angeles hit 109 degrees.
The Australian record is 53.1°C (127.6°F) recorded at Cloncurry (QLD) on 16 January 1889.
The highest temperature recorded in the world is 58.0°C (136.4°F) at Al,Azizyah in Libya on 13 September 1922.
Only Perisher Valley and Kiandra have ever fallen below minus 20°C.
The Australian record low is minus 23.0°C recorded at Charlotte Pass (NSW) on 29 June 1994.
The lowest temperature recorded in the world is minus 89.6°C at the Vostok Scientific Station in Antarctica on 21 July 1983.
Rainfall Facts
Exmouth in Western Australia received some 322mm of rain in the first week of June 2002. 305mm of this total falling in just 24 hours on June 4.
A rainbow was visible for 6 hours (from 9am to 6pm) at Wetherby, Yorkshire (UK) on 14 March 1994. This is rare as most rainbows last for only a few minutes.
The total amount of precipitation to fall to earth in one year is 5,000 million million tones.
The amount of water held in the atmosphere at any time is sufficient to produce about 2.5cm (1 inch) of rain over the surface of the earth.
The most rain to fall in a single 24 hour period is 1,850mm (74 inches) at Cilaos (on the Indian Ocean island of Reunion) between 15 and 16 March 1952.
The Driest place in Australia is Mulka Bore, west of Lake Eyre (SA), with an average annual rainfall of 100mm (4 inches).
The driest place on earth is Wadi Halfa in Sudan, with an annual average rainfall of less than 2.5 mm (less than one-tenth of an inch).
In NSW, the wettest town is Dorrigo with an average of 2,004mm per year.
On average, the wettest town in Australia is Tully (N QLD) with an annual average rainfall of 4,204mm.
In Australia, Bellenden Kerr (NE QLD) received 11,251mm in 1979. With a massive 960mm of this total falling in just 24 hours on January 3/4.
The wettest place in the world (based on the yearly average total) is Mawsynram, India, which receives an average of 11,870mm (474.8 inches) of rain each year.
Low pressure off the Northern Pacific Coast brought rain and gale force winds to the coast of Washington State. Fair weather prevailed across most of the rest of the nation.
The famous "Pumpkin Flood" occurred on the Delaware and Susquehanna Rivers. Harrisburg PA reported a river stage of twenty-two feet. The heavy rains culminated a wet season.
A west coast hurricane moved onshore south of Los Angeles bringing unprecedented rains along the southern coast of California.
The most consistently wet place in Australia is Waratah, (TAS) with an average of 314 'rainy days' per year.
The longest dry spell of record in the U.S. commenced as Bagdad CA went 767 days without rain.
The summit is 1,569m (5,148ft) above sea level and receives over 350 days of rain each year.
The wettest place in the world is Mt Wai-'ale-'ale in Hawaii ........
Wind Facts
The windiest place in the world is Port Martin, Antarctica, which has an average wind speed over a year of 64 km/h (40 mph). It experiences gale force 8 winds for over a hundred days a year!
The most violent tornado in recorded history struck on 18 March 1925, killing 689 people, injuring 1980 others, destroying 4 towns, severely damaging 6 others and leaving 11,000 homeless across Missouri, Indiana and Illinois.
The fastest winds on earth are inside a tornado funnel. Winds here have been recorded at 480 km/h (300 mph).
The Australian wind record goes to Mardie in Western Australia, when winds gusted to 259 km/h (162 mph) during Cyclone "Trixie" on 19 February 1975.
This movement of air is what makes the wind blow.
A cold front brought strong and gusty winds to the Great Basin and the Southern Plateau Region, with wind gusts to 44 mph reported at Kingman AZ.
The hurricane which hit Miami FL on the 18th, pounded Pensacola FL with wind gusts to 152 mph. Winds raged in excess of 100 mph for four hours, and above 75 mph for 20 hours.
Wet air is lighter than dry air.
Then cool air moves in and replaces the rising warm air.
Thunderstorms produced high winds in eastern Colorado, with gusts to 63 mph reported at La Junta.
Warm air, which weighs less than cool air, rises.
The strongest wind gust recorded on the surface of the earth is 371km/h (231 mph) at Mount Washington, New Hampshire (USA) on 12 April 1934.
Clouds Facts
Clouds can reflect so much ultraviolet light from the sunlight they dramatically increase the ultraviolet reaching the ground.
Sunbathing on sunny days with clouds in the sky can be dangerous.
The biggest clouds are cumulonimbus, climbing up to 9.7 kilometers (6 miles) high and holding up to half a million tons of water.
Cloud droplets are extremely small. They are about ten thousandth of an inch across, a thousand times smaller than a raindrop.
Snow and Ice Facts
The largest piece of ice to fall to earth was an ice block 6 meters (20 ft) across that fell in Scotland on 13 August 1849.
The largest hailstone recorded fell on 14 April 1986 in Bangladesh weighing 1kg (2.25lbs). The hailstorm reportedly killed 92 people.
The largest snowflakes in the world fell across Fort Keogh in Montana (USA) on 28 January 1887.
Mt Kilimanjaro in Tanzania is the only permanent snowcap within sight of the equator.
Permanent snow and ice cover about 12% (21 million square km's) of the Earth's land surface. 80% of the world's fresh water is locked up as ice or snow.
A single snowstorm can drop 40 million tons of snow, carrying the energy equivalent to 120 atom bombs.
There is NOT a law of nature that prohibits 2 snowflakes from being identical.
Denver CO received 9.6 inches of snow. October of that year proved to be the coldest and snowiest of record for Denver, with a total snowfall for the month of 31.2 inches.
Light snow falls in Canberra during most years, but it rarely accumulates to more than a few centimeters.
In Australia, snowfalls are common above 1,500m in the Alps during the winter, but there are no permanent snowfields anywhere on the continent.
Denver CO was buried under 21.3 inches of snow, 19.4 inches of which fell in 24 hours. The heavy wet snow snapped trees and wires causing seven million dollars damage.
Parts of Michigan and Wisconsin experienced their first freeze of the autumn. Snow and sleet were reported in the Sheffield and Sutton areas of northeastern Vermont at midday.
The most snow produced in a single snowstorm is 4.8 meters (15.75ft) at Mt Shasta Ski Bowl, California (USA) between 13 and 19 February 1959.
Sunshine Facts
Lightning is 5 times hotter then the surface of the sun.
Residents of the northeastern U.S. observed a blue sun and a blue moon, caused by forest fires in British Columbia.
Melbourne (VIC) has the dubious honour of being Australia's least sunny capital with an average of 5.7 hours of sunshine each day.
In Australia, Darwin (NT) is the sunniest capital with an average of 8.5 hours a day.
Yuma in Arizona (USA) is the sunniest place in the world.
Dust Facts
In May 1962, strong westerly winds resulted in such a thick dust haze in Sydney, that Bankstown Airport had to close for almost 4 hours.
In Australia's capital cities dust storms are somewhat of a rarity, but have, nonetheless, been responsible for causing significant inconvenience to city life.
In Australia, the most severe dust storms usually occur across the dry interior of the continent during the summer months.
Strom Facts
A storm blanketed Worcester, MA, with 7.5 inches of snow, a record snowfall total for so early in the season for that location.
A tropical wave, later to become Tropical Storm Isabel, struck Puerto Rico.
As much as 24 inches of rain fell in 24 hours, and the severe flooding and numerous landslides resulting from the rain claimed about 180 lives.
A second early season snowstorm produced eleven inches at Wilkes Barre PA and 26 inches at Auburn NY. All the mountains in the northeastern U.S. were whitened with snow.
Thunderstorms developing ahead of a cold front produced large hail in southeastern Wyoming during the afternoon, with tennis ball size hail reported at Cheyenne. Strong winds ushering the cold air into the north central U.S. gusted to 59 mph at Lander WY.
A record early season snowstorm struck the Central High Plains Region. The storm left up to nineteen inches of snow along the Colorado Front Range, and as much as a foot of snow in the High Plains Region.
Thunderstorms produced high winds and locally heavy rain in the southwestern U.S. One thunderstorm in west Texas produced wind gusts to 86 mph at Dell City completely destroying an airport hangar.
Tropical Storm Emily, which formed in the Carribean the previous afternoon, caused considerable damage to the banana industry of Saint Vincent in the Windward Islands.
A storm produced 28 inches of snow at Colorado Springs CO.
Showers and thunderstorms produced locally heavy rains in central Wyoming, and snow in some of the higher elevations. Casper WY reported 1.75 inches of rain in 24 hours, and a thunderstorm north of the Wild Horse Reservoir produced 1.90 inches of rain in just forty minutes.
Afternoon and evening thunderstorms produced severe weather in Oklahoma and west Texas. In Oklahoma, a thunderstorm at Seiling produced three inches of rain in one hour, golf ball size hail, and wind gusts to 60 mph which collapsed a tent at the state fair injuring nine persons.
Thunderstorms can generate gusts of wind that can develop additional thunderstorms 100 miles away.
The Empire State Building has been struck by lightning a dozen time in a single storm.
A government study showed that one small thunderstorm held more than 33 million gallons of water.
Supercells are the most dangerous types of thunder storms.
An exceedingly great storm struck eastern New England causing extensive coastal damage from Massachusetts to Maine, and the highest tide in 47 years.
The second in a series of unusual October storms hit southern California causing widespread thunderstorms. Santa Maria was drenched with 1.13 inches of rain in two hours.
A great storm struck New England. The storm reportedly was predicted twelve months in advance by a British officer named Saxby. Heavy rains and high floods plagued all of New England, with strong winds and high tides over New Hampshire and Maine. Canton CT was deluged with 12.35 inches of rain.
Tornado Facts
Hurricane Beulah moved into South Texas, and torrential rains from the hurricane turned the rich agricultural areas of South Texas into a large lake. Beulah also spawned a record 115 tornadoes.
A tornado traveled 275 miles across Lake Ontario, New York and Lake Champlain.
One South Dakota tornado was observed hovering in a field for 45 minutes.
In 1967, Hurricane Beulah unleased 115 tornadoes over Texas.
The tornado is the most violent of all earth's storms.
The average lifespan of a tornado is less than 15 minutes.
Hurricane Hilda struck Louisiana spawning many tornadoes, and claimed twenty-two lives
The first killer tornado of record in October in Connecticut destroyed sixteen vintage aircraft at the Bradley Air Museum in Windsor Locks. The tornado damaged more than one hundred homes causing 200 million dollars damage.
Three persons were killed, and 500 others were injured.
Three tornadoes spawned by the remnants of Hurricane Gracie killed 12 persons at Ivy VA.
A tornado 440 yards in width traveled twenty miles from near Hollow OK to western Cherokee County KS. Although a strong tornado, it was very slow moving, and gave a tremendous warning roar, and as a result no one was killed.
A heavy chicken house, sixteen by sixteen feet in area, was picked up by a tornado and wedged between two trees. The hens were found the next day sitting on their eggs in the chicken house, with no windows broken, as though nothing had happened.
An outbreak of tornadoes from Oklahoma to Indiana caused 81 deaths and 25 million dollars damage. A tornado (possibly two tornadoes) cut an eight-mile long path across Saint Louis MO, to Granite City IL, killing 79 persons. The damage path at times was a mile and a quarter in width.