A LIST OF DEEP FREEZES AT GLENS FALLS, NY

DEEP FREEZES FOR GLENS FALLS, NY

A deep freeze is defined as a period of 10 consecutive days or longer where the temperature does  not get above 32°. This deep freeze climatology used the Northeast regional Climate Center database. The station is the Warren County Airport (now called the Floyd Bennett Memorial Airport). The period of record (POR) for the airport goes back to late 1944. Records are missing for some month in 1944 and 1947.
   
The most recent deep freeze from Dec 25th, 2017 through January 8, 2018 was a 15 day freeze. The last time a freeze of 15 days occurred was Dec 08-22, 1981.

40 Days Jan 3-Feb 11, 1985 34 Days Dec 16, 1969-Jan 16, 1970 29 Days Jan 14-Feb 11, 1948 28 Days Dec 22, 1976-Jan19, 1977 27 Days January 27-Feb 22, 1978 Jan 25- Feb 20, 2007 Jan 26-Feb 21, 2015 24 Days Jan 8-31, 1982 23 Days Dec 8-30, 1989 Dec 19, 2000 – Jan 10, 2001 Jan 6 – 28, 2001  22 Days Jan 30-Feb 20, 1979 21 Days Jan 2-22, 1945 20 Days Feb 2-21, 1958 Feb 7-26, 1968 Dec 30, 1968-Jan 17, 1967 Jan 21-Feb 9, 1977 Jan 24-Feb 12, 1980	14 Days Dec 11-24, 1945 Jan 10-24, 1978 Jan 17-30, 1987 13 Days Jan 24 – Feb 5, 1955 Jan 2-14, 1974 Jan 1-13, 1976 Jan 19-31, 2008 12 Days Dec 7-18, 1958 Jan 22-Feb 2, 1963 Nov 30-Dec 10, 1964 Dec 7-18, 1958 Jan 22-Feb 2, 1963 Nov 30-Dec 10, 1964 Dec 20, 1970 – Jan 2, 1971 Feb 1-12, 1974 Jan 15-26, 1976 Dec 23, 1983 – Jan 3, 1984 Dec 12-23, 1985 Feb 9-20, 1987 Feb 18- Mar 1, 1993 Jan 1-12, 1996 Jan 29-Feb 9, 2010 Jan 6-17, 2015	11 Days Jan 14-24, 1946 Jan 26-Feb 5, 1951 Jan 4-14, 1954 Dec 22, 1966 – Jan 1, 1967 Feb 7-17, 1967 Feb 26-Mar 8, 1978 Jan 3-13, 1979 Feb 22-Mar 4, 1982 Jan 02-12, 1988 10 Days Feb 18-27, 1946 Jan 24-Feb2, 1957 Feb 7-16, 1962 Jan 28-Feb 6, 1965 Jan 18-27, 1970 Jan 27-Feb 5, 1971 Dec 26, 1977 – Jan 4, 1978 Jan 13-22,1983 Feb 2-11, 1989 Jan 3-12, 1994 Jan 14-23, 1994 Dec 16-25, 2009 Jan 21-30, 2014 Feb 04-13, 2014 Feb 25-Mar 6, 2014
19 Days Dec 31, 1980-Jan 18, 1981 18 Days Jan 19 – Feb 5, 1945 Dec 27, 1967 – Jan 13, 1968 Jan 30-Feb 16, 1994 17 Days Jan 24- Feb 9, 1961 16 Days Jan 25-Feb 9, 1961 Dec 14-29, 1980 Jan 8-23, 1984 Jan 30/31-Feb 16, 1994 Dec 7-22, 1995 15 Days Dec 08-22, 1981 Dec 25, 2017- Jan 8, 2018

The Cryogenic Climate of Glens Falls New York

The airport is actually situated in Queensbury and is now called the Floyd Bennett Memorial Airport. The location of the airport can best be described as being in a rural location and in a "hollow". The elevation is 328 feet. The surrounding terrain is somewhat higher than the actual airport runway. The rural location and surrounding farmland allows for radiational cooling to occur at night. In addition the surrounding higher terrain allows for drainage of cool air down to the airport. And we also have an extensive snowpack across the region now. Yet another element that aids in "radiational" cooling.

For the longest I have wanted to organize a climatology database for this location using data from the Northeast Regional Climate Center (NRCC). Things that I wanted to do were show what were the warmest or coldest, wettest of a particular holiday or what was the longest heat wave for the site and so on. I started working on heat and heat waves for this location but be became sidetracked. Considering the cold wave we're going through now, it may not be a bad idea to continue this heat project but instead I decided to work on some of the colder aspects of the Glens Falls airport.

The Cold Facts 

Weather records for the airport go back to 1944. There are some periods of missing data for the months of January through April in 1944 and for the periods of April through October 1945 and February and March 1947.

On eleven separate occasions the airport has recorded a temperature of -30°F or lower. The lowest temperature recorded at the airport was -35° F on January 27, 1994. 1994 was a very cold winter here. The previous all-time record low of -34° F was set 11 days earlier. And on February 10 of that  year the thermometer dipped to -30° F.  In comparison Albany, NY's lowest temperature of record is -28° set on 19 January 1971. Albany has recorded a temperature of -20° or colder on 29 separate dates, while Glens Falls has recorded temperatures of -20° or lower a total of 129 times through January 2018!

   NUMBER OF OCCURRENCES OF A TEMPERATURE OF ≤ -30° F AT GLENS FALLS, NY

January 27, 1994   -35° (ALL-TIME Record low temp for location)

January 16, 1994   -34°

January 08, 1968   -33°

January 11, 1968   -33°

January 12, 1968   -33°

January 19, 1976   -32°

January 23, 1976   -32°

January 04, 1981   -31°

February 10, 1994 -30°

January 06, 1996   -30°

January 24, 2011   -30°

Our Current Cold Snap/"Deep Freeze"

Through January 7, 2017 the area has been enduring a 14 days stretch  with temperatures not surpassing 32° A "Deep Freeze" is defined as 10 or more consecutive days where the temperatures does not pass 32°. The last time Glens Falls had a deep freeze of 10 days was Feb 26 through Mar 6, 2014. The last time we had a 14 day deep freeze was Jan 17-30, 1987 and the last 15 day deep freeze was Dec 8-22, 1981. 

As excessive as this string of sub-freezing weather is (with many of the days and moreso nights accompanied by very low at times record temperatures) it can be worse. On 5 occasions there were 20 day stretches of sub-32° weather, there were each one occurrence of 21, 22, 24, 28, 29 and 34 day durations of deep freezes. 3 times each had 23 and 27 day ones.  Any guess what the longest stretch of days with a temperature < 32° for Glens Falls is?

40 DAYS! This happened in 1985 when from Jan 3 through February 11th the thermometer never rose past the freezing mark. Now that's a "Deep Freeze" for sure! In comparison the longest "Deep Freeze" for Albany, NY was 36 days in January-February 1945 (5 Jan through 9 February).

Reference:

Northeast Regional Climate Center NOWDATA for Glens Falls Airport. Access to the NOWDATA site through the following link : NRCC Regional Climate Data