Last month’s cold weather left Gainesville residents turning up their heaters and scrambling to buy gloves and scarves. But this January wasn’t the coldest one the city has seen.
Although at the start of the year Gainesville had its coldest two-week period in climate history, the average monthly temperature did not exceed previous records, according to an e-mail from National Weather Service Meteorologist Jason Hess.
According to Hess, the city’s average temperature in January, 49 degrees Fahrenheit, was 5.3 degrees below normal and tied as the third coldest January since 1903. The coldest January in Gainesville was in 1940, when the average was 46 degrees. The city’s all-time low was 10 degrees on Jan. 21, 1985.
Hess said there were 15 days last month when temperatures reached 32 degrees or lower. The lowest temperature, 17 degrees on Jan. 11, was the city’s fifth coldest day recorded.
According to Hess, the National Weather Service expects temperatures in Gainesville to be lower than average in February, March and April.
“While we are not expecting that kind of cold snap in February, subfreezing temperatures will remain possible,” he said.
NWS predicts freezing weather in Gainesville to end within a matter of weeks.
