Report: Mount Washington Hits 89-Year Low of -47 Degrees; Windchill Breaks U.S. Record

Temperatures at Mount Washington Observatory in New Hampshire approached an all-time low Friday into Saturday morning and reportedly set a new windchill record for the United States, hitting levels feeling as low as -109 degrees.

As of 9:58 p.m. Friday, windchills were -108 degrees Fahrenheit, and gusts were howling at 110 miles per hour, according to a National Weather Service Eastern Region (NWS) screenshot of the Mount Washington Observatory real-time summit conditions. The temperature at this time was -45.8 degrees:

Windchills set a new national record low and reached -109 degrees Fahrenheit at one point Saturday, NBC Connecticut reported. 

The NWS Eastern Region noted in a tweet that the “coldest temperature ever recorded” at the observatory had been -47 degrees in 1934; it began tracking meteorological conditions in 1933. It also reported that the lowest ever recorded temperature at Mount Washington, as well as in the state of New Hampshire, was -50 degrees in 1885 prior to the observatory’s establishment:

Preliminary data from the NWS indicated that at some point, Saturday morning’s low temperature at Mount Washington had reached the observatory’s all-time recorded low of -47 degrees

Mount Washington Observer Francis Tarasiewicz told WGME that the 127 miles per hour wind gusts at one point Friday caused a damaged door at the observatory to swing open and that “it took about three people to prop themselves up against [the door]” to keep it closed until it could be repaired.

“There is half of me that loves what is going on right now, and the other half of me is pretty terrified, especially when the door fails,” Tarasiewcz told NECN. 

The coldest temperature ever recorded in the United States, -80 degrees, was documented in Alaska in 1971, as the Weather Channel reported. For the mainland U.S., the all-time low was -70 degrees in 1954 at Rogers Pass, Montana. 

Throughout the United States, Americans are experiencing frigid conditions. Single-digit temperatures have been documented in much of the Rust Belt on Saturday morning, and temperatures in parts of the Northeast have fallen below zero, the Weather Channel reported.