In New England, at least off the coast and west of the Appalachians, it tends to be cold in the winter. I vaguely remember a colleague who made a business trip to some state in New England in the winter telling us about the -50 C temperature there. Finland has a mixed maritime-continental climate with prevailing winds from the west. The Atlantic happens to be in the west from our perspective. Despite the northern location (60th latitude) about - 40 C is as cold has it has ever got in the south of the country in recorded history. In arctic north, however, -40 C is fairly common although not an yearly event. The coldest ever recorded temperature in the country is -51.5 C, measured in Lapland in 1999.
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Yes that sounds like fun NOT... The ocean and for us Great Lakes of Erie and Lake Ontario moderate most of that for us.... USA gets this polar trench when jet stream dips in from Canada in the center of the USA.
-50 is or has to be gruesome.
Right. North America has no mountain ranges blocking surface airflows from the north to the south or vice versa. Europe has the Alps and the Carpathians.
Yes. Only running/oriented north and south and out east and out west. All open in the middle. Yes. Plus when Lake Erie was slow to freeze over, cold air comes over it and makes TONS of snow.... Lake Effect. Ontario does same but at eastern tip of it. RT 81.
I've read about it. Under the right conditions, one storm can dump several meters of snow in some locations.
Blizzard of 77 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blizzard_of_%2777
Yes and we were trapped "At Home" during this event. I was a teenager and my father was trapped driving home from work early. He stayed at a farm house along the way.
My mother used to cut and wash and syle women's hair having a shop in our home. Her current and last customer of the day was done and leaving around the noon hour.
It was cold and overcast, little or no wind and in the low 30's F. She gets in her car which is parked up near the house, a sea foam green Ford Torino, and she drives the 400ft down our driveway to RT 18 to go home.
In those 30 seconds the wind came up and started to gust above 60mph and snow began to start drifting in the drive way. It was instant.
She stopped at the end of the drive and could not see to turn onto RT 18. A blizzard has formed. Her car began to shake as the wind gets under it and my mother asked me to see if I can help her. We now could barely see the car from our house.
I said yes as I got on boots and a coat and said I think she is staying here for a while and my mother agreed.
As I walked to her car a snow drift 3 feet deep had formed in the drive.
I said she should walk to the home and I will put her car back up by the house. She agreed.
I waited as she walked to see her enter the home and then had to back her car through a now 5 foot snow drift.
And this continued until snow covered the roof of our house.
I've never experienced anything like that in my life!
The Gulf of Finland to the south of the country can have a similar influence under the right conditions. It is about 50% larger than Lake Ontario. It takes some time to freeze over. A strong southeasterly wind in January may capture a considerable amount of water vapor from the Gulf, freeze it and cause heavy snowfall on the south coast of Finland.
What makes it rare is the fact that the Gulf of Finland is to the south of the country. Southwesterly and southerly winds carry warm air. Southeasterly winds may be cold if the pressure field is such that the origin of those air masses is actually in the north.
The blizzard was very bad yes. Many died in it. Found them frozen to death in cars. We had snow drifts 20 feet tall. They had to take a long time to clear roads using bucket lifts and plows. Walk along the roads on top of snow and use pipes to check for cars below them in the snow. A mess....
Sounds right yes. We call it "Lake Effect Snow" it generates it. Lake Ontario is too deep to freeze over and Erie being shallow most all winters does freeze over. They install an ice boom in fall in the upper Niagara River to catch pack ice from Erie. They take that out in the spring thaw once it is over.
This shows the depth readings of Great Lakes in this case Lake Ontario:
https://ngdc.noaa.gov/mgg/greatlakes/ontario.html