January 11-17, 2008
Midwest Weekly Highlights - January 11-17, 2008
Cold but Quiet
The second week of January was marked by several cold front passages that brought cold blasts of air across the northwestern portion of the region. Despite all of the cold air, temperatures from January 11-17 were well above normal for most of Wisconsin, Michigan and portions of Illinois, Indiana and Ohio. The average daily temperatures ranged from 12°F above normal along the Wisconsin Michigan border, to chilly conditions along the western edge of the region where the average temperatures ranged from 2°F below in western Iowa to at or barely below the normal for this time of year in Minnesota and Missouri (Figure 1).
Precipitation was limited to a band stretching from northwest Missouri through central Iowa and into the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. These areas received anywhere from 100% to over 400% of the normal precipitation for the period. Areas of Illinois, southern Missouri, Minnesota, Indiana and western Ohio were relatively dry; receiving only 5% to 50% of their normal (Figure 2). There was only a slight improvement reflected in the January 15th U.S. Drought Monitor (Figure 3). This is due inpart to the persistent precipitation and storm activity last week. Almost a foot of snow fell in portions of northern Wisconsin and along the Upper Peninsula as a few weather systems moved across the area (Figure 4).
A Week with Little Excitement
A clipper system delivered a decent amount of snow across the upper portions of the region on Saturday the 12th of January. Normally clippers are swift moving systems but this one moved a lot slower and managed to stall over the area through Tuesday the 14th. As winds wrapped around the back side of the system, they had a large fetch of lake water to go over - allowing lake effect snowfall over the western great lakes (Figure 5). On Wednesday the 16th and into Thursday the 17th a cold front worked its way across the region (Figure 6). This frontal passage brought several inches of snow across northwestern Missouri, central Iowa and later on into Wisconsin (Figure 7). Temperatures plunged behind the front as a large area of high pressure settled in and brought cold Canadian air with it.
Daily Records January 11 - 17
It was a quiet week when compared the records that were set during the opening week of the new year. Only a handful of high minimum temperatures were set in Michigan and Ohio as warm air was ushered into the area before the passage of a cold front.
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