Coldest December Ever In South Florida
MIAMI - (CBS4) - If you thought it was especially cold in December, it's not just your imagination. The facts prove it, according to the National Weather Service, which announced Saturday that December 2010 set a record as the coldest December ever in Ft. Lauderdale. Miami, and Key West.
Forecasters say December was also the second coldest month ever in Key West.
A series of arctic cold fronts put South Florida into the deep freeze, with frost on the ground, crops damaged, and people forced to bundle up to face wind chills in the 20's. While temperatures were unusually chilly as far south as Key West, where a one day overnight low record was set, Ft. Lauderdale, experienced the lowest low temperatures, giving them the nod for the record. However, even Miami and warmer Key West were still cold as records go.
Of course, a record low in Florida is not the same as a record low in the frozen Northeast. According to the weather service, the mean monthly average for Ft. Lauderdale in December was 60.4 degrees. That breaks the previous record of 62.2 degrees set in December 1935.
In Miami, the average mean temperature in December was 61.4 degrees, which also breaks the record for December 1935, which was 62.1 in Miami.
In Key West, the mean temperature for December was 63.1 degrees, a full 2 degrees under the previous record of 65.1 set more than a century ago in December, 1885. The coldest month in Key West history was January, 1981, and the December 2010 mean temperature matched that.
The mean temperature is an average of the high and low temperatures for the entire month.
