Cold outbreaks across eastern Colorado happen every couple of years. The last true Arctic air outbreak was President's Day weekend 2021. Let's dive into what to expect and how this setup compares to events in southern Colorado's weather history.
First, let's recap what's going to happen. From Friday evening through approximately mid-day Wednesday, temperatures will be below freezing. This is about 115 hours or a little less than 5 days. Low temperatures Sunday through Tuesday will be negative. There's a chance temperatures Tuesday flirt with the freezing mark during the middle of the day - we'll see. We're also tracking a two rounds of snow.
The setup in any Arctic cold event involves air from the North Pole surging directly south into the U.S. with the air staying pretty much the same as it travels. It doesn't pick up any moisture or get extra heat from the sun to make it warmer or wetter. We'd call that "modified arctic air".
One thing I've been asked several times, and I'm sure you're wondering, is how historically significant this cold is. It's not. The top 10 longest below-freezing stretches in Colorado Springs are between 12 and 14 days. A five-day event isn't even in the top 50 longest stretches!
The story is the same in Pueblo. Your top 5 longest under-freezing stretches range from 11 days to two weeks. But back in 2021, our last Arctic outbreak, you stayed under freezing for 10 days. You also spent 8 days below freezing in February 2014, so a 5-day cold stretch is nothing new for you.
Let's talk about record lows. In both the Springs and Pueblo, the coldest temperature on record was on February first, 1951. Neither city has a top 10 coldest low near what we expect early next week.
To be clear though, this cold is still dangerous. On Sunday, it will feel around zero degrees during the daytime…
And Monday morning will have wind chills from negative ten to negative twenty degrees.
The worst cold will be Tuesday morning when you'll walk outside to wind chills under negative twenty.
In summary, we see this type of event every few years, but this is still dangerously cold. Make sure you're covering all exposed skin if going outside from Saturday to Wednesday!
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