December 2022 Summary

The first three weeks of the month were fairly uneventful with generally seasonable temperatures and little in the way of storminess. We did see an uptick in precipitation which significantly reduced drought levels in the region. The wettest system was a cold front that came through on the 14th that dropped one to two inches of rain across southern Indiana and north central Kentucky.

By far the most significant event was the amazing cold front that barged through the area during the evening of the 22nd. The front caused temperatures to crash 50 degrees in 12 hours, from the 40s on the afternoon of the 22nd to subzero readings the following morning. Light rain ahead of the front quickly changed to light snow behind it with 1 to 3 inches falling in many locations. A band of 4-5" developed from Salem, Indiana to Frankfort, Kentucky. The snow and plunging temperatures were accompanied by wind gusts to 40 mph and wind chills down to 30 degrees below zero...some of the coldest wind chills seen in 25 years. Daytime readings on the 23rd did not get out of the single digits.

The Arctic blast was followed by a quick warm-up, and by the 29th and 30th we were well back into the 60s.

	Average Temperature	Departure from Normal	Precipitation	Departure from Normal	Snow	Departure from Normal
Bowling Green	40.5°	0°	3.28"	-1.07"	2.5"	+1.7"
Frankfort	37.3°	-0.8°	3.18"	-0.59"
Lexington	38.7°	+0.9°	3.46"	-0.74"	1.9"	0"
Louisville Ali	39.4°	-0.2°	3.28"	-0.85"	3.2"	+1.0"
Louisville Bowman	37.4°	-1.4°	3.25"	-0.63"

14th: Rainfall of 1.45" at Frankfort
23rd: Cold max temperature of 6° at Bowling Green, cold max temperature of 7° at Louisville

White Christmas

We had a white, and cold, Christmas this year! Photo courtesy Ryan Sharp