CRAZY Cold 30 Years Ago!

30 years ago, December of 1983, it was COLD! Really Cold! It was so cold that the Arkansas River froze over! ABC affiliate, KATV has video of the Arkansas River from that month and it was posted on their blog. Here is the clip:

I went back into the record books and grabbed the December of 1983 climate log from Jonesboro. In 1983, Terry Wood kept that log and you can see his signature near the bottom of the page. You can click the image to enlarge, but let me point out some points. First, on December 18th, we had a high of 34. That night, the temperature fell to 8 degrees! We did not go above freezing for the rest of the month! Take a look:

Other interesting things to notice:

• We had 3 nights below ZERO.
• The HIGH temperature on Christmas Eve in 1983 was a whopping 6 degrees.
• The coldest morning was Christmas morning at 5 degrees BELOW ZERO.

In case you wondered, we went well above freezing to start 1984 with highs in the 50s on January 1, 1984.

In comparison, we were much warmer this December! We were close to some record highs and close to some record lows, but overall... it was average. In summary, December of 2013 was a roller coaster:

Stay warm!

Ryan