Coldest Thanksgiving in 10 years for Minnesota?

The good news? Your favorite beverages will keep nicely chilled on the porch on Thanksgiving Day. A persistent northwest flow will keep Minnesota in the freezer through Thanksgiving weekend.

On the map, below, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Global Forecast System model shows the frigid upper-air pattern holding into at least early next week.

Earlier Tuesday I wrote about our chances for light snow Wednesday. As we move deeper into this holiday week even colder air will spill south courtesy of our friends in Canada.

Highs Thanksgiving Day will be in the 20s east with teens west.

Throw in the wind chill on gusty northwest winds and it will feel much colder.

Right now, I’m forecasting a high of 25 degrees in the Twin Cities on Thanksgiving Day. We hit 26 degrees on Thanksgiving Day just three years ago in 2021. But if we stay below 26 degrees, it will be the coldest Thanksgiving Day in 10 years since the frigid high of 10 degrees in 2014.

Highs on Black Friday through the weekend will hover in the teens across most of Minnesota.

Bundle up this holiday weekend, Minnesota.

Here’s more on Thanksgiving climatology from the Minnesota State Climatology Office:

Thanksgiving Day occurs during the transition between autumn and winter, so its weather can be anything from balmy to brutal. So what's the weather usually like?

The "normal" high temperature on Thanksgiving Day, based on 1991-2020 averages, is 32 F in Duluth, 29 F in International Falls, 38 F in Rochester, 34 F at St. Cloud, and 38 F in the Twin Cities. Normal low temperatures are in the teens F across most of Minnesota. Temperatures have been as high as the 60s F in southern Minnesota (and the upper 40s F in northern and northeastern Minnesota), and have been deeply subzero in some years. In 1985, the temperature fell to -34 F at Argyle and -32 F at International Falls, ahead of a huge winter storm taking aim at the region.

Although the Thanksgiving holiday travel period (often considered Wednesday through Sunday) has boasted some legendary winter storms, the snowfall statistics for Thanksgiving itself are not outstanding. The highest Thanksgiving snow on record in Duluth is 8.1 inches, with five inches in the Twin Cities, and 3.7 inches at Rochester.

In the Twin Cities, mild Thanksgiving conditions, with temperatures in the 50s F, have only occurred eleven times in 150 years, or about once every 13 years or so. The most recent very warm Thanksgiving was November 22, 2012, when the temperature hit 60 F, two degrees short of the record high of 62 F observed in 1914 and 1922. Very cold conditions struck most recently in 2014, when the low temperature was -4 F in the Twin Cities, with -20s F in northern Minnesota. Below-zero lows have occurred ten times in the past 148 years.

Historically, about one in three Thanksgivings have at least one inch of snow on the ground in the Twin Cities, and the deepest snow cover measured was 10 inches in both 1921 and 1983. By contrast, International Falls has at least an inch of snow cover on Thanksgiving in about seven out of 10 years, with a high of 17 inches in 1955, and 15 inches measured on Thanksgiving as recently as 2010.

On average, Thanksgiving Day has warmed more than 4 degrees since 1970.