Summer in January? Record high shattered
Published 10:15 am Friday, January 6, 2012
Jim Schulstad watches his daughter Kristen's drive as the pair were golfing Thursday at Meadow Greens Golf Course. Temperatures reached unseasonly into the 50s allowing many to get out and enjoy the spring-like weather. "I didn't expect to do this on my Christmas break," Kristen, a student in her fourth year at the College of St. Benedicts, said. -- Eric Johnson/photodesk@austindailyherald.com
Austin is shattering record-high temperatures.
“You’re going to smash it,” Jeff Boyne, National Weather Service meteorologist in La Crosse Wis., said about breaking today’s high temperature.
Kristen Schulstad, a four-year student at the College of St. Benedicts home for Christmas break, putts at Meadow Greens under a mostly sunny sky and temperatures in the 50s Thursday afternoon. Schulstad, who was golfing with her dad Jim Schulstad, said, "I didn't expect to do this on my Christmas break."
NWS forecasts 47 degrees in Austin today, which would be 8 degrees warmer than the record of 39 degrees set in 1961.
Thursday, however, was a doozy. The temperature reached 55 degrees — 11 degrees warmer than the previous record set in Austin. That was just 7 degrees shy of the all-time January record set on Jan. 25, 1944. And there may be a few more unusually warm days to come this month.
“It happens every once in awhile, with no snow.” Boyne said about unusually warm streaks in January.
With no snow cover and a jet stream that has been lingering in Canada, warm weather may continue into the beginning of next week. After that, NWS officials expect some cold air to move into the area.
Boyne mentioned last year at the same time, the jet stream was hundreds of miles farther south, which brought winter conditions all the way into Arkansas.
But even if things cool down at the end of January and through February, Boyne isn’t sure just how much.
“This may be one of those years that we just don’t have a very cold winter,” he said.
Austin may be headed for one of the warmest January’s on record, as well. The warmest January recorded was in 1989, with an average temperature of 27.9 degrees.
Puddles spread out across East Side Lake, surrounding a lone angler Thursday afternoon. Temperatures reached unseasonly into the 50s allowing many to get out and enjoy the spring-like weather.
