Mild December weather finds place in the record books

• Mild Weather

This December in Fargo had an average temperature of 25.3 which is just over 11 degrees above average.

Talk about it

Our warm winter weather continues to make entries in the record books. StormTRACKER Meteorologist Rob Kupec takes a look at where December and 2011 numbers ended up.

This December in Fargo had an average temperature of 25.3 which is just over 11 degrees above average. While this makes it the third warmest December on record, for all the talk of no one remembering a December like this, 2006 is still the 2nd warmest at 26.6

The warmest December, 1959 at 25.9 For the month Fargo had just over 3 inches of snow, compared to the average of just over 8.

Daryl Ritchison – StormTRACKER Meteorologist: “The December of 2011 broke the streak of 4 straight top 10 average snowfalls.”

Last month was about a half an inch below average melted precipitation at .36 inches, but we would have had to come in at half that to even make the top 10.

Our warm fall weather was able to propel 2011 to the 16th warmest on record, finishing just about 5 degrees above average. From July 1st to December 31st was the warmest end of the year ever in Fargo.

Daryl Ritchison: “To be the warmest, any 6 months period, with 130 years of records, is somewhat impressive. So just to be the warmest last half of a year, just shows you what a quick turnaround we can have in our climate.”

Our wet spring and summer had us running nearly 8 inches above average by August. But with our dry autumn we finished the year only 1.37 inches above the average of 22.58. This winter we've had nearly 4 inches of snow while average is around 20 up to this date.

Last year at this time using the extend-a-ruler we had nearly 4 feet of snow. Last winter in Fargo was the third snowiest on record with about 88 inches of snow.

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