It was colder in South Florida than it was in Maine this morning. But was it a record?
First thing you did this Saturday morning — even before making the coffee?
Bet it was to check your phones to see what the temperature reading was if you live in South Florida.
You saw the mid-40s in Miami-Dade and Broward, like 46 degrees in Kendall around 7 a.m., with wind chills as low as 39 degrees in Pompano Beach and 41 in Opa-locka, reported CBS4 meteorologist Jennifer Correa.
If Sylvester Stallone woke early to unpack around his new house in Palm Beach County where it was about 43 degrees he might have thought he bought a lakefront property in Caribou, Maine where it was actually warmer than South Florida: 47 degrees there, the National Weather Service in Miami said.
Even the Florida Keys felt the chill from the Christmas cold front that made Boxing Day morning even colder than South Florida’s coldest Christmas since the mid-1980s.
Temperatures along the Keys island chain ran from 58 degrees in Key West at the southernmost point to 55 degrees in North Key Largo, reported WSVN meteorologist Jessica Fernandez.
Was this record cold for Miami?
No, South Florida did not see any cold records broken said meteorologist Paxton Fell at the National Weather Service in Miami. The record low for South Florida was a freezing 32 degrees way back in 1906, she said. Theodore Roosevelt was the U.S. president and John Sewell was the third mayor of a young Miami back then.
Saturday’s chill wasn’t the coldest day of 2020 in South Florida either, Fell said, noting that Miami woke up to temperatures in the lower 40s in January.
John Morales, NBC6 Miami’s meteorologist, noted that December in Miami was running just above one degree colder than normal and is the city’s first below-average temperature month since May.
But overall for 2020, Miami still had its hottest run in a calendar year, Morales observed. “Coming into this month we were obliterating the previous hot-year (2019) record by 1.1°,” he tweeted. “Some months were insane like April at +6.1° above normal.”
What about New Year’s Eve in South Florida?
A gradual warming trend will begin later Saturday, though Fell said some parts of South Florida could still see lows in the upper 40s Sunday morning.
Highs will reach 63 degrees Saturday, with lows in the upper 50s at night and after a cool start Sunday morning, temperatures will aim for a high of about 71 degrees in the afternoon and lows of 65 degrees Sunday night, according to the weather service.
Otherwise, expect mostly sunny skies through the holiday week. Your next best chance of rain is New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day — Thursday and Friday — when rain chances are currently 40%.
The end of 2020 and beginning of 2021 in South Florida will happen with temperatures between 67 degrees and 73, according to the weather service.
This story was originally published December 26, 2020 at 9:34 AM.
