It was a cold week across much of the country as the largest blast yet of Arctic air poured in to the lower 48. For many locations it’s some of the coldest air in several years. For example, in the Twin Cities, they broke a four year stretch of not having a high temperature below 0 degrees. The streak was broken on January 21st. The Twin Cities airport only reached -2 degrees. The last time the Twin Cities had a below zero high was January 15th, 2009. If you’re wondering how many days that is…it’s only 1466 days.

There were several cold mornings in the Upper Midwest. The coldest low temperature was up in Embarrass, MN. It’s famous for being frigid. The low Thursday morning was -42 degrees. Yikes!

Below is a video from the National Weather Service of the cold air infiltrating and lingering of the United States from this past week. It’s a pretty cool video. Notice how we stay very cold all throughout.

The cold air and northwest flow also made for ideal lake effect snow conditions. Parts of upstate New York picked up upwards of 2 to 3 feet of snow.