Has it ever gone from frost to 100 on the same day?

[Scott Patterson]

Does anyone ever know if it has happened anywhere in the US?

Yesterday we were dang close, but I'm wondering if it has actually ever happened at any one location.

Anyway, yesterday I had 33 at the house, which is about as close to freezing as you can get. In our mostly shaded backyard it was right at 100. Since our high/low digital thermometer gets afternoon sun and reads high, I had to use a dial one, so the 100 is probably accurate.

At the nearest official weather station, the low was 38 and the high was 97 yesterday. See the temperature history here:

http://www.weather.gov/data/obhistory/KCAG.html

Notice it went from 38 to 90 in six hours alone, even at the official weather station. Outside the town, it usually gets a bit cooler at night and often slightly warmer in the day.

Of course, it's the official weather stations that count, but does anyone know if any of the official weather stations has ever gone from 32 to 100 in a single day? I'm curious if it has happened.

[Aquawind]

Woah that would be a radical flip.. I doubt it has happened..The air would have to be sooo dry condensation wouldn't happen..lol j/k Being outside that day would be a challenge.. Parka ---> GString

[Aslkahuna]

Dugway Utah recorded their coldest August temperature of record and their highest on the same day in the same year but the low was not quite freezing with high at 108F. During the late Summer and early Fall in the Intermountain West, it's possible to have lows well below freezing (low to mid 20's) and highs well into the 90's because the air is so dry.

Steve

[Aquawind]

Ohh Geesh.. That kind of dry or change is not even imaginable here.

[Category 5]

I've seen 50 degree swings before in Florida but thats insane.

[vbhoutex]

Many years ago I was in Flaggstaff, AZ at about 5 am and the temp was 34ºF(Early to mid JUne). The high that day had been 104º!!!! That's the high desert for you.

[Ptarmigan]

Maybe it has happened, but went unrecorded. It happens in dry and mountainous areas. I have been through 30 degree changes. Crazy all I can say.

[TampaSteve]

Greatest Temperature Range in the World
Range: -90.4 degrees to 98 degrees Fahrenheit
Net Temperature Change: +188 degrees Fahrenheit
Location: Verkhoyansk, Russia
Date: April 26, 1998

Greatest Temperature Range in the United States
Range: 44 degrees to -56 degrees Fahrenheit
Net Temperature Change: -100 degrees
Location: Browning, M.T.
Date: Jan 23-24, 1916

[O Town]

Greatest Temperature Range in the World
Range: -90.4 degrees to 98 degrees Fahrenheit
Net Temperature Change: +188 degrees Fahrenheit
Location: Verkhoyansk, Russia
Date: April 26, 1998

[Aquawind]

Can someone explain what exactly transpired for that to happen? I can guess but maybe someone has the facts? That is some crazy stuff..

[vbhoutex]

Verkhoyansk is noted chiefly for its exceptionally low winter temperatures, with a January average of −50 °C (−58 °F). It lies in the coldest area of the Northern Hemisphere (a.k.a. Stalin's Death Ring), and together with Oymyakon is one of the places considered the northern Pole of Cold. The lowest temperature recorded there in 1892, was −69.8 °C (−93.6 °F). Temperatures in Verkhoyansk have spanned 107 °C (192 °F): from −68 °C (−90.4 °F) to 39 °C (102 °F). January 2006 saw temperatures coming close to the all-time record, when it reached a low of −66.7 °C (−88.1 °F).

In this area, temperature inversions often form in winter, with the temperature warmer with higher altitude, rather than vice-versa.

[Aslkahuna]

I suspect that Siberia one is bogus since -90F is as far out a reading in April as is 98F. A temperature of -90F requires a lot of snow cover and even if you break an inversion, where are you going to get 37C air to surface at that latitude in early Spring? The greatest daily swing in the US was set in NV from a low of 22F to a high of 92F in one day. The MT one did not occur in a single calendar day but was due to a cold front coming through and then the cold air settling in.

Steve

[Aquawind]

Yeah I read the same stuff David posted and just had to think how is it possible. It would seem like more than just inversion and something like a downslope chinook type wind after a well timed high pressure centered overhead a low basin that the cool air settled in basically. 188F in 24hours sounds beyond just air physics and a freaky geographic enhancement of some sort..or bogus.

[TampaSteve]

Yeah I read the same stuff David posted and just had to think how is it possible. It would seem like more than just inversion and something like a downslope chinook type wind after a well timed high pressure centered overhead a low basin that the cool air settled in basically. 188F in 24hours sounds beyond just air physics and a freaky geographic enhancement of some sort..or bogus.

Hey, I read it on the Internet, so it must be true!

[Aslkahuna]

Even with downslope, you would still need air temperatures aloft that are rather beyond what would normally occur aloft in deep Siberia only one month after the equinox. At nay rate, what the question was about concerned a non frontal non dynamic diurnal variation which would rule out the Montana case because that was frontal. The only other possibility for Siberia would be a deep intense Low tracking to the north with warm sector air scouring out the shallow cold air (nice trick if it can be pulled off which often it can not) but again where are you going to get air capable of temperatures of 37C in a region where I don't think anyone for thousands of miles around has ever seen that kind of temperature in April.

Steve

[Aquawind]

No probs TampaSteve..been there before..

Thanks for the input Sierra Vista Steve..

[Scott Patterson]

I suspect that Siberia one is bogus since -90F is as far out a reading in April as is 98F.

Actually the Siberia one is correct, but the message was confusing since it made is sound like it was on the same day. -90 is actually the all time record low in winter and 98 is the all time record high in summer. It is the biggest span of any in the world.

Medicine Lake Montana holds the record for the USA with a record low of -58 and a record high of 117, a range of 175, not that far behind. Maybell, just west of here has a span of 163 (-61 to 102). See below:

http://www.wrcc.dri.edu/cgi-bin/cliMAIN.pl?comayb (click on Temperature under "General Climate Summary Tables" for more details).

Still the 33 to 100 is the closest I've seen it get to freezing and 100 on the same day and was curious if it had happened and where. 50 to 60 degree temperature swings in a day are very common here. For the last month or so it has happened almost on a daily basis. One reason is that it has been so dry. No measurable rain or snow has fallen since our little snowstorm on June 7, over a month ago.

Most of the time when it hits in the 90's around here, it is in the 30's or low 40's at night. Usually only when it's cloudy are nights as warm as the 50's, and then the days don't get as warm, brnging the average nights warmer and the average days cooler than they would otherwise be when it's dry. Back in 2004, we had a night at 61, but that's really rare and the only time I've ever seen it above 60 at night around here. Sometimes in October, we have lows in the teens and highs in the 80's on the same day, but I've never seen any place freeze and hit 100 on the same day.

[Aslkahuna]

As I said above, Dugway was close but no enchilada.

Steve

[Scott Patterson]

Dugway Utah recorded their coldest August temperature of record and their highest on the same day in the same year but the low was not quite freezing with high at 108F

You don't happen to have a source for that do you? Would be much appreciated.

I wanted to look at the data, but teh above stat doesn't match the weather records I can find:

http://www.wrcc.dri.edu/cgi-bin/cliMAIN.pl?utdugw

I don't know why, but I can't link directly, so use the above link and go all the way down on the bottom of the left column and click "Daily Summary Stats (~55 KB)".

The only time it hit 108 in August was on 8-11-72, but the record low for that date is only 45.

I wonder if it is actually a station near Dugway?

Thanks!

[PTPatrick]

For what it is worth...Denver had its latest Spring Freeze in history with a low of 31 on the morning of June 8th...By the 11th we were in the 90's. I could believe that some of the drier places in the northern Arizona/Utah/New Mexico...could easily have a morning low of 32 with a high of 100....just a matter of whether the instrument was in the right spot.

I can say I have seen some crazy temp swings though with thunderstorms here this summer...like one day it wen from 93 to 52 in one thunderstorm. In about an hour. And one day from 90s to 70 with a dry microburst in a matter of minues.