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San Antonio TX is listed as having low of 0f. Im sure there must be lesser known weather stations around there that have recorded a couple of degrees below that?
I would have thought one of the major factors would be the heat output by the exhaust from air conditioning units. How much AC was in use in the early 20th century? I imagine suburban NYC is still fairly densely populated.
Yeah it is quite dense in some places, though of course the heat effect is not nearly as strong once you get outside of the urban areas. I live way out in the fringe, so my area wouldn't be the best representation, but towns 20-30 miles outside of the city usually drop down to the single digits most winters. I imagine that the density and coastal influences make it difficult for it to get extremely cold in the jammed pack areas right outside of the city.
San Antonio TX is listed as having low of 0f. Im sure there must be lesser known weather stations around there that have recorded a couple of degrees below that?
Might not. I think it was colder across the US in the late 1800s and early 1900s than today. Looked like below 0°F were much more common in NYC years ago than now. It hasn't gone below -2°F since 1943 so perhaps extreme cold might be slightly less likely in NYC and probably across the east coast:
It also hasn't gone below 0 in NYC since 1994, the 2nd longest stretch in recorded history (if NYC goes 1 or 2 more winters without a 0 it will break the longest stretch, which is from 1943 to 1961). Only once in that stretch did it even come close, a 1 deg reading in January, 2004; I believe it's the only time in that period it was even below 5 deg F.
For some reason, a lot more of the warming in the last 100 years has been in nighttime lows than daytime highs. It could be "global warming", or an enhanced urban heat island effect as cities get bigger and bigger, or a little of both. My personal feeling is that it is mostly the latter, but a little bit the former too.
Chisos Basin hit -3 on 2/2/1951 during a cold snap that pretty much ruined Texas winter agriculture for years to follow. Chisos is the main camping area of Big Bend N.P. and is a good cold air sink. It is roughly 75 miles closer to the equator than Tallahassee. Not sure what it did in 1899 because weather records don't go back that far. A disclaimer; Chisos Basin is also nearly a mile up.
A better candidate is Tarpley. About 60 miles south of Tallahassee it is only about 1400 feet above MSL. On 2/2/51 (again) it dived to -5. What it may have reached in that awful cold blast of 1899 is unknown.
There are probably other stations further south and lower in elevation yet that do have figures for 1899 and if someone is enterprising enough can probably find one or two.
The Feb. 1899 extreme cold spell and blizzard missed most of Texas, tracking from Saskatechwan to the Gulf of Mexico, with the low entering the Gulf in far east Texas. I don't have any stats (with 2 exceptions) - I would guess that there was some serious cold and a substantial amount of snow in, at least, N. Texas. The 2 exceptions - 4 degrees in San Antonio and -1 in Austin.
But all of the stats and observations surrounding that storm focus on its' effects farther east:
The Mississippi River froze to the Gulf of Mexico.
Accumulating snow fell as far south as Tampa.
True blizzard conditions were seen as far south as Biloxi, Mobile and Pensacola.
Flurries fell as far south as Ft. Meyers, FL.
Below zero temperatures were recorded in at least one location in every state east of the Mississippi River. In all of those states except Florida, those temps were in the double digits below zero, and in 2/3 of those states it set an all-time record low that in most cases remains unbroken.
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