Sheridan residents woke up to a new temperature record on Wednesday: minus 27 degrees, breaking the previous record for Feb. 19 set in 1929.
“I knew it was cold, but not that cold,” Hanns Mercer, Public Works Director for the city of Sheridan, told Cowboy State Daily. “I was walking outside this morning, and it reminded me of a video I made last year where I threw the boiling water into the air. Maybe I should do a remake today.”
Other places in Wyoming that aren't breaking record-low temperatures got unbelievable amounts of snow. The Snowy Range and Sierra Madres have received over 80 inches since Valentine’s Day, with more on the horizon.
This might have been the worst week for winter weather across Wyoming, and there’s more to come.
“This may be the worst of the cold, but we’re not even close to being done with nasty winter weather,” said Cowboy State Daily meteorologist Don Day. “We’ve got a lot more to get through.”
Double Blankets
The National Weather Service (NWS) Office in Rapid City, South Dakota, confirmed that Gillette and Newcastle experienced record-low temperatures on Feb. 19.
“Gillette-Campbell County Airport recorded a temperature of minus 29 this morning,” said meteorologist Aaron Woodward with NWS Rapid City. “That breaks the record of minus 14 set in 1928 and came close to Gillette’s all-time cold record of minus 40 back in 1936
Newcastle’s morning temperature was minus 23, also breaking a record of minus 14 in 1929. The all-time cold record for Newcastle was minus 37 in 1930.
“It’s definitely very cold out there,” Woodward said.
That wasn’t news for Samantha Gross, manager of the Rockin’ Rafter O Ranch, 15 miles south of Gillette. When Gross stepped outside Wednesday morning, the temperature gauge in her vehicle showed a temperature of minus 31.
“That was at 8:30 this morning,” she said. “It’s been that cold for the last four or five hours today.”
Gross is responsible for keeping the ranch's 24 horses warm and fed. Most of them are acclimated to Wyoming’s winter climate, but two horses from Oklahoma are wearing extra layers this week.
“I’m sure this is a shock for them, so they’ve got double blankets on,” she said. “I hope it warms up soon, for their sake and everybody’s sake.”
Cold Soaking
Sheridan real estate agent John Baggett was delivering Meals on Wheels on Wednesday. He didn’t need to be told it was that cold, but the record-breaking morning caught him by surprise.
“I knew today was special, but I didn’t know it was that special,” he said. “I have since stepped outside and confirmed it’s that special.”
It’s more special than that. According to Day, Sheridan hasn’t experienced a day with temperatures above freezing since Feb. 6, and that’s unlikely to change until the weekend.
Day referred to the last several days as “cold soaking.” It’s been persistently cold for several days, partially due to the heavy layer of snow covering most of the areas where it's been coldest.
“The Sheridan record of minus 27 is important for two reasons,” he said. “Sheridan’s records start in 1907, so it means something you break a record that’s been standing for 96 years. But the other interesting point is that minus 27 is the coldest it’s been this late in February for Sheridan.
Baggett’s defense against the record-breaking cold was multiple layers, his “Dell Griffith heavy winter coat,” and skipping the small talk.
“I usually chit-chat when doing my Meals on Wheels rounds,” he said. “Not today. I waved, said ‘God bless,’ and got back in my warm truck. I’m not very fleet of foot usually, but I was today.”
Mercer said Sheridan’s infrastructure is holding up under the intense winter conditions. In addition to the enduring well-below-zero temperatures, there’s also been plenty of snow, keeping the city’s snowplow trucks busy.
“They've been working around the clock, alternating shifts, trying to keep up with snow removal on priority routes, and dabbling in residential snow removal when they have time,” he said. “They’re also concentrating on drains in the low-lying areas because it’s hard to tell how fast the snow will start melting.”
Snowfall Windfall
Meanwhile, the last several days have been everything Wyoming’s ski resorts have been waiting for. Snowfall has been immense, particularly in the Snowy Range and Sierra Madres in southern Wyoming.
“Cheyenne set a snowfall record on Tuesday,” he said. “They got 7.1 inches of snow, breaking the old record of 2.7 inches on Feb 18 set in 1955.”
Snowpack sensors in the Snowy Range have reported between 70 and 80 inches of snowfall since Feb. 14. Jackson Hole Mountain Resort reported 11 inches of snow on Tuesday and two feet on Monday.
“They’ve had a total of between five and six feet of accumulation in the last few days,” Day said. “There’s been a significant increase in snowpack in the Tetons, Wind Rivers, and Sierra Madres, and the Green River and Upper Platte Basins are all above average now.”
Day said that many regions of Wyoming were wetter than average in January and February, but the average threshold for this time of year is pretty low. He constantly reminds Wyomingites that this is technically the driest time of year.
“The bulk of our snowpack accumulates between Christmas and early April,” he said. “You can’t look at the snowpack early in the season and start making assumptions about how the rest of the year will go, as this week has shown us.”
Warmer But Still Winter
This week could be as cold as it gets in Wyoming this winter, as the Sheridan, Gillette, and Newcastle records will attest to. However, we aren’t out of the winter woods yet.
The NWS is monitoring an incoming weather system that will significantly increase air temperatures. Day said that will be a slight reprieve, but not as much of one as many Wyomingites might want.
“Snow cover plays a big role in temperature, and there’s a lot of snow on the ground,” he said. “Some parts of Montana have had up to four feet of snow in the last four weeks, and it hasn’t melted. Snow cover will fight the warm-up because you lose a lot of heat when it melts snow.”
There could still be plenty of subzero days before spring begins and temperatures trend upward, but Day said those will be days rather than extended periods. That won’t signal the end of Wyoming’s winter weather.
“There’s still a lot of cold air up north, and we’re going to see a lot of storms forming in the Pacific Ocean that will move to the western U.S. as we get into the first half of March,” he said. “This week may have been the worst of the cold, but there’s still a lot of winter we have to get through.”
Andrew Rossi can be reached at arossi@cowboystatedaily.com.
