Dec 06 | Climate Review and Weather Forecast
The first week of climatological winter brought at long last a prolonged taste of winter to Illinois. Average temperatures this week ranged from the low 20s in northern Illinois to the low 30s in southern Illinois, between 8 and 14 degrees below normal. Nighttime low temperatures this week regularly dipped into the teens and single digits, including 8 degrees in Springfield and 9 degrees in Kankakee. Very strong winds added to the cold to push wind chills in the -5 to -10 degree range. The cold to start December was quite a shot to the system after a much milder November and overall fall season. Last season was the 3rd warmest fall on record in Chicago and the 5thwarmest on record in Champaign-Urbana.
Precipitation totals this week weren’t all that impressive, ranging from around half an inch in southern Illinois to less than a hundredth of an inch in northern Illinois. However, what was notable was the snow across southern and central Illinois in the days after Thanksgiving. 7-day snowfall totals were as high as 4 to 5 inches along the Interstate 64 corridor. Meanwhile, the northern half of the state has not seen much snow this season so far.
Looking ahead, mild weather will set in this weekend and early next week, with highs in the 40s and low 50s statewide. Colder air is expected to move in toward the end of next week, but it will be fleeting because the week 2 outlook is strongly leaning to above normal temperatures for the middle of December. Precipitation will be minimal this week, with totals less than three quarters of an inch forecasted for all but far southern Illinois. Most, if not all, of this precipitation will fall in rain form as temperatures will mostly stay well above freezing. The outlook for the middle of the month does lean toward wetter than normal weather, so we’ll see what form that takes as we get closer. We’re still much too far from the end of the month holidays to say anything about chances of snow, so we’ll see how forecasts evolve in the next couple of weeks.