The National Climatic Data Center released their official statistics for the winter of 2009-10 last week, and they verified what most people in the lower 48 states already knew: It was a cold winter.
All the states bordering the Gulf of Mexico, plus Oklahoma, Arkansas and South Carolina, had a top-10 coldest winter on record. South Central Texas, near Austin, and the extreme southern portion of Mississippi recorded their coldest winter since 1895. Miami, a hot spot for the winter snow birds, recorded their second-coldest winter on record, and most other cities in south Florida also recorded a top five coldest winter.
Locally, North Dakota recorded the 46th-coldest winter since 1895 and Minnesota the 57th. Only 10 states had the entire state finishing above average: Washington, Oregon, Wisconsin, Michigan and the six New England states.
The winter precipitation trends tended to follow closely to the temperature. Where it was colder, it tended to be wet (snowy), and the warmer areas were generally drier than average.
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