Recently, people are constantly talking about climate change, global warming and other phenomena, complaining that every year the harsh Russian winter is getting closer to European, and the moderate summer is more and more like a tropical one. Let's try to figure out if everything is so bad with our climate. And as a material for analysis, we will use the temperature in Moscow in January.
General information
According to its geographical location, the capital belongs to the temperate continental climate zone, so according to all the laws of meteorology, the air temperature in Moscow in January should be no more than twenty degrees with a minus sign. The absolute maximum, by the way, recorded by scientists, is minus nineteen, while the average minimum is minus seventeen Celsius.
Besides, the temperature in Moscow in January after the winter solstice does not drop below fifteen degrees. The historical maximum, by the way, was plus four - not at all what you expect from the harsh Russian winter. So inIn principle, it cannot be said that the first month of the year is as cold as is commonly believed. Still, it's stupid to argue with dry statistics.
Cases of bygone days
But back to the specifics. Analyzing the period from 2002 to 2012 (a decade is quite a long time), we can say that the average air temperature in Moscow in January was minus five degrees. The coldest year for the study period was 2010, when the average monthly temperature dropped to the canonical minus fifteen. In 2006, the second coldest year, the thermometer dropped to minus ten.
The warmest years were 2007 and 2005 with minus one and minus two degrees respectively. So what is it - global warming or just a banal coincidence? Let's try to go to the latest information.
What about today?
In the period from 2012 to 2016, the situation did not change significantly. The temperature in Moscow in January averaged minus seven degrees. At the same time, 2015 was the warmest year with a record minus three. Of course, many will now notice that this year there was no winter at all, but at the same time, January 2016 was distinguished by rare instability: at the beginning of the year, the weather pleased us with frosts down to minus twenty, in some places even minus twenty-six was recorded, but by the end month, the temperature rose to those very record plus four, thereby exceeding the norm of recent years by thirteen degrees.
Conclusions
So what is the temperature in Moscow in January? One thing is documented information, some meteorological canons and other scientific data, and another thing is the reality that we face every day. It is safe to say that in recent years the temperature has definitely been much higher than the norm. And how this can be explained is very, very difficult to say. The only thing left for us is to wait for the next winter to either make sure that there is a trend towards an increase in the average monthly January temperature, or to refute its existence, attributing everything not to global processes, but to the influence of various factors, such as cyclones and sea currents.
