National Weather Service United States Department of Commerce

Severe Thunderstorm Threat From the Central Plains to the Northeast; Extreme HeatRisk for the East Coast

Strong to severe thunderstorms are possible from the central Plains to the Northeast through this evening. Widespread damaging winds are the primary threat but hail and a tornado or two is also possible. Extremely dangerous heat continues across the Eastern U.S. Warm overnight low temperatures will provide little to no relief. Read More >

The first three weeks of the month were fairly uneventful with generally seasonable temperatures and little in the way of storminess. We did see an uptick in precipitation which significantly reduced drought levels in the region. The wettest system was a cold front that came through on the 14th that dropped one to two inches of rain across southern Indiana and north central Kentucky.

By far the most significant event was the amazing cold front that barged through the area during the evening of the 22nd. The front caused temperatures to crash 50 degrees in 12 hours, from the 40s on the afternoon of the 22nd to subzero readings the following morning. Light rain ahead of the front quickly changed to light snow behind it with 1 to 3 inches falling in many locations. A band of 4-5" developed from Salem, Indiana to Frankfort, Kentucky. The snow and plunging temperatures were accompanied by wind gusts to 40 mph and wind chills down to 30 degrees below zero...some of the coldest wind chills seen in 25 years. Daytime readings on the 23rd did not get out of the single digits.

The Arctic blast was followed by a quick warm-up, and by the 29th and 30th we were well back into the 60s. 

  Average Temperature Departure from Normal Precipitation Departure from Normal Snow Departure from Normal
Bowling Green 40.5° 3.28" -1.07" 2.5" +1.7"
Frankfort 37.3° -0.8° 3.18" -0.59"    
Lexington 38.7° +0.9° 3.46" -0.74" 1.9" 0"
Louisville Ali 39.4° -0.2° 3.28" -0.85" 3.2" +1.0"
Louisville Bowman 37.4° -1.4° 3.25" -0.63"    

 

14th: Rainfall of 1.45" at Frankfort
23rd: Cold max temperature of 6° at Bowling Green, cold max temperature of 7° at Louisville

 

White Christmas

We had a white, and cold, Christmas this year! Photo courtesy Ryan Sharp