Environmental Science Blog

The DFW area just experienced its first couple hours with temperatures below freezing. Up to this point, the weather showed no signs of being winter with temperatures around 50-80 degrees Fahrenheit.

I want to take this opportunity to analyze the longest consecutive hours below freezing in the past in DFW. As seen from the graph, last year (2021) had one of the longest stretches of below freezing temperatures with 139 consecutive hours. The longest time below freezing in DFW was 295 consecutive hours, which occurred in 1983. This winter has not yielded any long stretches of freezing temperatures, but this winter is not over yet.  Although I do not know the causes of the data, no noticeable pattern is evident either. The data shows the randomness of the Texas weather.

All data from the National Weather Service

Surprisingly enough, after many days of freezing temperatures that reached into the single digit territory, the weather has warmed up again. Today, the temperature is a comfortable 61 degrees. Who knows whether the warm weather will stay for the rest of the winter, or if the temperature will drop again.