JANUARY 2007

                                                         A Tale of Two Seasons                            Feb. 1, 2007

     The first half of December was a continuation of the warmth we were experiencing through much of December 2006. In fact, January 17th ended a 38 day stretch of above normal temperatures that had begun December 10, 2006. While we were getting use to the above freezing temperatures the first half of the month had for us, twenties, teens,and even a few single digit readings is the latest reality.

     Despite the turn around in temperatures January, the month still came about between 4.5 and 6.0 degrees above normal area wide.

     Precipitation was abundant last month. In general, the region was about 2 inches above normal. Rain characterized the first half and snow the second. Cleveland ended up at 3.36 inches above normal this month which places it as the 4th wettest January on record. Twenty-four days out of the 31 in the month recorded at least 0.01 inches of precipitation. If you include the days were only a trace of precipitation was recorded, only Jan 3rd had absolutely no precipitation.

     Snowfall totaled up to be 21.1 inches last month. No big one-time snow occurred in January, but instead we "inched" our way to nearly two feet. January 25th had the most snow in one day with 4.9 inches at Cleveland Hopkins Airport. We had measurable snow each day since the 19th of the month. Of course the lake effect counties really made out with Lake Erie ice free up until the last few days of the month. One of our faithful snowfall observers in Pierpont in Ashtabula county had 54.1 inches of snow in January! Our snowfall observer in Hambden Township in Geauga county had 58.6 inches for the month!