Central America Endures Record Cold; China Forecast First -50C Since 1969; At Least 100 Killed In Afghanistan’s Big Freeze; Major Winter Storm Clatters Plains, Midwest; + Antarctic Ice Sheet Posts Record SMB Gains

Cap Allon

Central America Endures Record Cold

Anomalous chills are being felt in Central America this week.

The region’s largest country, Nicaragua, has felled low temperature benchmarks: Polar air encased the town of Jinotega on Jan 17, dropping the mercury to 8.6C (47.5F) — the locale’s lowest temperature ever recorded.


China Forecast First -50C Since 1969

The severe freeze gripping Siberia, Central/Western Asia and the Middle East is extending eastward.

The likes of China, the Koreas and Japan are about to face another walloping of intense wintry cold starting this weekend.

Already the frigid temperatures are setting in across Northern China.

The northernmost city of Mohe, for example, saw its official thermometers sink below -45C (-49F) this morning (Jan 19), but looking ahead, temperature south of -50C (-58F) are in the forecast which would prove China’s first such reading since back in 1969.

Shifting attention a little south, to Myanmar (aka Burma), all-time records are already being felled there–or at least tied.

The western town of Hakha plunged to -6C (21.2F) on Wednesday, Jan 17, which matches Myanmar’s all-time national record low previously set in 1990, 2008 and 2021 — Myanmar appears to be cooling.


At Least 100 Killed In Afghanistan’s Big Freeze

Freezing, record-breaking temperatures of as low as -33C (-27.4F) continue to grip Afghanistan and neighboring nations.

This week, 100 Afghans –at the very least– as well as some 100,000 livestock are confirmed to have perished, according to officials on January 18, as the country’s humanitarian crisis is compounded by wave after wave of descending Arctic cold.

Kabul, as well as a host of other provinces, have suffered record-low temperatures since the New Year, with the central city of Ghor posting an all-time record low of -33C (-27.4F).

More than half of Afghanistan’s 38 million people are facing hunger, with nearly 4 million children suffering from malnutrition, according to aid agencies.

The nation is also short on energy, which is also the case across many Western Asian/Middle Eastern countries this winter:

Historic Cold In Cuba; Records Fall Across India, Pakistan And Iran, As Gas Shortages Hit; Heavy Snow Transforms European Landscapes; + 33 Feet And Counting: California Town Buried In Snow


“This winter is by far the coldest in recent years,” said Mohammad Nasim Muradi, the head of Afghanistan’s meteorology office. “We expect the cold wave to continue for another week or more,” he added.

Below, Afghan men warm themselves around a bonfire at a market in Mazar-i-Sharif:


Afghan girls collect firewood for their homes in the Kuz Kunar district of Nangarhar Province:


And lastly, men receive treatment for frostbite in Herat after being rescued from the cold:


Juxtaposing this real and genuine suffering we have a silly little Swedish girl, pawn of the anti-human elites, acting like the world is ending due, in no uncertain terms, to human prosperity (aka CO2 emissions).

This week we saw Greta posing for a photo op with German law enforcement after her “arrest” at a coal mine in Lützerath:


Major Winter Storm Clatters Plains, Midwest

A major winter storm that dropped feet of snow over the Rockies and Plains on Wednesday is trekking through the Upper Midwest, where a foot could still accumulate through Thursday.

Parts of Colorado and Nebraska picked up 2 feet of snow by late Wednesday evening. And, still, some 8 million Americans remain under winter weather alerts that stretch from Colorado through the plains and into the Great Lakes.

Taking Denver, the 9.1 inches that settled at the city’s International Airport (as of 5:45 PM Weds) ties the 1989 record for the Top 5 largest one-day January snowfalls on record. Furthermore, Denver’s snow has already comfortably exceeded its January average of 7 inches.

Many roads across the likes of Colorado and Nebraska have been impacted, with snow removal teams working through the night trying to clear major roadways such as Interstate 80 in Nebraska and Interstate 70 in Colorado.  

Troopers in eastern Colorado reported reduced visibilities and a major pile-up not far from Denver on Wednesday. According to reports, 9 semi-trucks and 12 passenger vehicles were involved.

Miraculously, there were no serious injuries, but the mess saw the 150 mile long interstate closed for hours:


The freeze is also continues to impact Colorado’s highest elevations.

The 6 additional inches that settled at Steamboat yesterday (Jan 18) has already brought this season’s snowpack above the past three years. The resort is not only on course to post its snowiest winter ever recorded, besting the 489 inches of 2007-08 (solar minimum of cycle 24), but is on pace to exceed 500 inches, and all.

Unusual cold is impacting Florida, too, where a record number of manatees have sought refuge at Blue Spring State Park. The 729 sea cows currently there breaks the previous record of 721.

Looking ahead, more heavy, disruptive snows and anomalous lows are on the cards, and across a wide area, too:

GFS 2m Temperature Anomalies (C) Jan 28 [tropicaltidbits.com].
GFS Total Snowfall (inches) Jan 19 – Feb 4 [tropicaltidbits.com].


And re. Asia’s historic Arctic Outbreak shifting east and into western North America –as has been mentioned in previous articles– latest GFS runs are picking up on the possibility of this playing out as the calendar flips to February.

Temperatures in Alaska and Western/Central Canada by early-Feb look truly fierce, and there are hints that this polar cold will descend south –and so into the CONUS– on the back of a weak and wavy ‘meridional’ jet stream flow:


Antarctic Ice Sheet Posts Record SMB Gains

Surface mass balance (SMB) is a good barometer for the ‘health’ of a glacier, but readings can vary wildly over Antarctica.

Still, this season’s gains are proving exceptional:

Left) Cumulated SMB (in mm) from the Mar 1, 2022 to today (Jan 19, 2023)--confusingly, reds/oranges represent snow/ice gains. Right) Same as Left) but in respect to the 1981-2010 average from Mar 1 to the today (Jan 19, 2023).


According to firn and ice-core records, current SMB has been comparable to that of the past 800 years, with Antarctica seemingly immune to the ‘ravages of global warming’.

This is a sore point for the AGW Party given that 90% of Earth’s surface fresh water is safely locked-up in the ice sheet, not going anywhere any-century soon.

In fact, a 10% increase in snow accumulation has occurred across coastal regions since 1850, with official data revealing that East Antarctica, which covers two thirds of the continent, has cooled 2.8C over the past 40-or-so years, with West Antarctica cooling 1.6C.

Also, while the past 800 year’s SMB has –overall– been comparable to todays, periods of very high accumulation are noted, in the 1370s and 1610s, which fits with past Grand Solar Minima: the end of the ‘Wolf’ and the onset of the ‘Maunder’, respectively.

Climate models claim that the Antarctic ice sheet will rapidly lose mass over the next century; however, these agenda-driving tools have been claiming such nonsense for decades, and yet this is the state of Antarctica’s SMB in 2023:

Time series of the anomaly of cumulated Antarctic ice sheet (AIS) Surface Mass Balance (SMB) in GT (Gigatons). The gray shading area represents the 1981-2010 standard deviation around the 1981-2010 average.