2023 Weather Highlights in New York
JANUARY
1 - Temperatures were nearly as mild as a year ago (high/low of 55°/49°) but this year differed as the day featured sunny skies.
6 - This was the ninth day in a row with a mean temperature 10 degrees or more above average, the longest such streak since another one of nine days in December 2015 (there was a 10-day streak in October 1990). The average high/low during this streak was 56°/46°, sixteen degrees above average. And although this was the last day of the streak, tomorrow would still be well above average (+7 degrees).
14 - For the first time this year the temperature fell to 32°. Only 2005 started with a longer streak, with its first reading of 32° or colder happening on 1/15. This was also the 18th day in a row with above average temperatures.
16 - This morning's low of 28° would be the coldest reading of the month - the mildest coldest reading of any January on record, breaking the previous record of 25° in January 1937. (January 2023 would become the mildest January on record.)
29 - The winter of 1973's record for latest date of the first measurable snowfall was broken today - and it would continue to be broken into February. (The average winter in Central Park has 14.2" of snowfall by the end of January.)
FEBRUARY
1 - At long last Central Park had its first measurable snow of the winter as 0.4" accumulated in the pre-dawn hours. This is the longest NYC had to wait for this event (the previous record was 1/29 during the winter of 1973). Not only was today the end of the City's record snowless streak, it was also the end of its record 35-day streak with above average mean temperatures. Today was 2 degrees colder than average (high/low of 38°/26°). And, finally, this morning's low was the coldest reading since the day after Christmas.
4 - This morning's frigid low of +3° was Central Park's coldest reading in four years (+2° on 1/31/19) and the coldest reading in February in seven years (-1° on 2/14/16). And from 3-7 AM howling winds gusting between 25-35 mph produced wind chills between -10° and -15°. Today's reading was in sharp contrast to January's coldest of 28° (the mildest coldest reading in January on record). Finally, although today's reading was the coldest of the winter, the coldest day of the winter (based on average temperature) remained 12/24, with a high/low of 15°/7° (today's high reached 27° shortly before midnight).
Today's low was the ninth time since 2000 that a reading of 3° or colder occurred (and the fourth time it's happened in February).
14 - Through today, just 0.05" of precipitation fell in Central Park this month, making this the second driest first half of February on record. Only February 1980 had a smaller amount.
16 - The day after a high of 67° today was even milder as the high reached 70°, one degree shy of tying the record for the date. This was the mildest reading in February since 2018, when the warmest reading of any February, 78°, occurred on 2/21. And it was the earliest date for a year's first reading of 70+ since 2007 (when it occurred on 1/6). Showers in the afternoon produced a rather meager 0.07" of rain, but it was more than what fell in the first 15 days of the month (0.05").
Finally, this was the ninth day in a row in which the temperature remained above freezing, a period that was 14 degrees above average (average high/low of 56°/44°).
20 - Although the warmest high temperature on Presidents' Day is 64° in 2008, President's Day 2023 has the distinction of having the mildest mean temperature, with a high/low of 61°/47° (2008's low was 40°), 17 degrees above average.
23 - A new winter record (meteorological winter) was established as Central Park had its 59th frost-free day, surpassing the 58 days experienced during the winters of 2012 and 1998. Average number is 35 days.
27 - The second measurable snowfall of the winter (the first was on 2/1) began this evening and brought 1.8" of snow (half of it fell today, the other half in the overnight hours). Three to six inches fell in outlying suburbs, where temperatures were colder.
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