MAIN WEATHER AND CLIMATE TRAITS IN THE NORTHEN HEMISPHERE AS OF JANUARY 2023
Air temperature
The New Year in the ETR commenced with very warm weather: since the first day, new daily temperature maxima started to arise in the Moscow, Tula, Orel, Smolensk, Kaliningrad and other Regions. But later, the Arctic air rushed in these areas as well as in the northern regions of Russia, and frosts at the end of the first decade and at the beginning of the second one brought new temperature minima reaching -40° or below in the Volga region and Bashkiria as well as in the Ivanovo, Vladimir and Orenburg Regions. At the same time, the temperatures were down to -50° in the north of the Krasnoyarsk Territory, and -60° or lower in Yakutia. In the second and third decades, abnormally cold weather survived in the east of the country only, and gave way to the warmth in the ETR where new daily temperature maxima were recorded in the Crimea and on the coast of the Krasnodar Territory. No such warm weather had been seen at this time of year for more than sixty years before. Right amid the winter, the thermometer readings rose above +20° sometimes. The unprecedented warm weather was also observed in Central Russia (Smolensk, Bryansk, Orel and other Regions) as well as beyond the Arctic Circle. But the weather in the east of the country was very cold still: the thermometers in Trans-Baikal, in the Amur Region, in the Khabarovsk and Primorye Territories and on Sakhalin indicated record-breaking low values. On Sakhalin, a new absolute minimum temperature for January was set to -44.9°.
As a result, the monthly-averaged temperatures turned out to be noticeably higher than usual in the north of the ETR, in some parts of Central Russia and in the south of Western Siberia (with +1…4° and higher anomalies). In contrast, these monthly averages in the north of Siberia, in Yakutia and in the Far East were 2-8° below normal. January in the 21st century was never so cold in the south of the Far East, and was the third coldest in its north after January 2021 and January 2001 which were even colder there.
MAIN WEATHER AND CLIMATE TRAITS IN THE NORTHEN HEMISPHERE AS OF DECEMBER 2022
Air Temperature
At the beginning of the first month of winter, abnormal colds spread over the entire ETR territory, as well as the Urals, the south of Siberia and the Far East. Record-breaking frosts were reported in the south of West Siberia, in Altai, along the coast of the Sea of Okhotsk and in Kolyma where the thermometer readings dropped to -53° sometimes. In the first decade of December, only Eastern Siberia, Yakutia and Chukotka were in the zone of excess heat, and the events of record-breaking warmth were even recorded in the north of the Krasnoyarsk Territory. Although the weather in most of Russia remained abnormally cold in the second decade, relatively warm air already reached the ETR, and the decade-averaged temperatures exceeded the normal values in this territory. But in Yakutia, the weather became so cold that the air temperature as low as -61° was measured there on the night of December 12. Recall that the absolute minima of air temperature are -62.8° for December at the cold pole and -67.8° for winter in the Northern Hemisphere. In the last decade of the year, warmth occupied almost all Russia, with the temperature maxima recorded both in its west (in the Kaliningrad and Black Earth regions) and in the east (in Yakutia and Kolyma). Cold air still prevailed in Trans-Baikal only.
In overall, this December turned out to be abnormally warm in Russia due to very warm third decade. The monthly-averaged air temperatures exceeded their normal values in the north of the ETR, in the Urals, in Siberia and in the Far East. The south-east of the Volga region as well as the south of the Urals and of Western Siberia were the only areas were this month was colder than usual.