U.S. had its second-warmest winter on record, NOAA says

The winter that included blizzards and subfreezing conditions in parts of the East and Midwest did not prevent the continental United States from setting another temperature milestone, according to federal meteorologists. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said the Lower 48 states averaged 37.13 degrees Fahrenheit (2.85 degrees Celsius) from December through February, a span NOAA treats as meteorological winter.

NOAA said the season ranked as the second-warmest winter on record for the continental United States. The agency said the average was just one-third of a degree below the warmest winter on record, a benchmark set two years earlier, and it noted that NOAA winter temperature records go back 131 years.

NOAA climate monitoring chief Russell Vose said the warmer national average was driven primarily by the area west of the Mississippi River, which he said largely missed out on winter this year. He described the West as seeing record or near-record warmth through the season, while the East experienced cold spells that were “not as extreme” as the warmth in the West.

Vose said, “The East, especially the Northeast, had winter,” and he added that “In the West, there were certainly places where you could say we missed the winter.” That contrast between regions contributed to the national ranking, even though parts of the country experienced harsh conditions.

NOAA said nine states broke or tied records for the warmest winter: Arizona, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Oregon, Texas, Utah and Wyoming. The agency also said Delaware ranked as the coldest state for the winter, with the state having only its 28th coldest winter on record.

Yale Climate Connections meteorologist Jeff Masters said the cold—though it “seemed harsh and long-lasting” in parts of the East—didn’t persist for the entire season. Masters said there was “a pretty impressive long stretch of unbroken cold that was very notable” but that “the total duration for the whole winter, not so much.”

NOAA said February was the fourth-warmest on record nationally, with Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Wyoming reporting their warmest February on record. It also said January ranked as the 24th-warmest month nationally and December as the fifth-warmest, as the season’s warmth showed up in multiple monthly slices of the winter.

NOAA further said that over the past 50 years, winter in the Lower 48 has warmed by 3.95 degrees Fahrenheit (2.19 degrees Celsius), a larger increase than in the other three seasons, according to the agency’s assessment.