Last week was one of the coldest we’ve seen in years. High temperatures only managed to make it into the teens from Wednesday through Saturday.

Readings fell below zero early Saturday morning in Coeur d’Alene for the first time since Feb. 6, 2014 when the mercury plunged to minus 8 degrees. At the Coeur d’Alene Airport, it was minus 12 degrees. At Cliff’s station, it was minus 5 degrees. Athol went down to minus 14 degrees while several stations around Rathdrum ranged from a low of minus 12 degrees to minus 19 degrees.

Early this week, temperatures are forecast to warm up into the 30s to near 40 degrees with snow expected to change to rain in some areas by Tuesday. Even if we get rain, we’ll still get a White Christmas as another round of snow is expected toward the end of this week. There’s even a chance we could see some snow fall on Christmas Day as the storm door from the Pacific stays wide open.

The normally wet new moon lunar phase, which begins on Dec. 29 and continues into early January, looks snowy across the Inland Empire. Cliff and I believe that January will see snowfall totals above normal along with temperatures below average as well.

After the early January storms, we could see a brief period of dry weather. Toward the middle of next month, there is also the possibility of another round of very cold temperatures with more snow. Our snowfall pattern is forecast to continue into February, but totals should be closer to “normal” during the second month of 2017.

By the way, on Wednesday, Dec. 21, winter officially begins at 2:44 a.m. Pacific Time. This is also the occasion when we experience the shortest day of the year, and as we head toward 2017, number of daylight minutes begin to climb. Of course, we really won’t notice the longer days for at least a month or so.

At this time of year, we are closer to the sun than during the summer. The Northern Hemisphere is much colder due to the tilt of our planet of 23.5 degrees away from the sun, while the Southern Hemisphere is tilted toward the sun. In the Southern Hemisphere, their summer, the sun is directly overhead at the Tropic of Capricorn, which is 23.5 degrees South Latitude. On the first day of summer, the sun will be overhead at 23.5 degrees in the Northern Hemisphere, at the Tropic of Cancer. By the way, the approximate date when the Earth is closest to the sun is Jan. 3.

Forecasting the weather has come a long way in recent years. It’s not an exact science, but with continuous upgrades in equipment and computer models, short and long-term predictions have improved tremendously.

Satellite technology is one of the big reasons why weather forecasting has seen big strides and it looks like this science will be taking another big leap forward. On Nov. 19, NASA launched the nation’s most advanced weather satellite, the GOES-R. Once in its permanent orbit of 22,300 miles above the Earth, the $1 billion instrument is expected to send the sharpest and fastest pictures of hurricanes, tornados and other U.S. weather events in super high-definition. We should start seeing the implementation of the new satellite sometime next year.

This is the first of a fleet of weather-tracking satellites to help scientists and forecasters predict the weather further in advance and help saves lives when severe weather strikes. The GOES-R will be capable of scanning the Earth five times faster than the older systems that were developed in the 1990s.

Much of this data will also be streamed to Earth in real time, compared to delays with the current system. This will be incredible as lightning strikes will be seen almost instantly, mainly the common cloud-to-cloud variety, using a new instrument called the Geostationary Lightning Mapper (GLM). This system will be excellent for better tracking of severe thunderstorms and tornadoes.

In addition to providing faster and more detailed weather information, the GOES-R satellite will also be able to detect solar flares and the solar wind from the sun. This system will also have the capability to participate in the Search and Rescue Satellite Aided Tracking and help those with emergency transponders.

Late last week, NASA also launched its Global Navigation Satellite System of eight small satellites to better study hurricanes and predict their intensity. These series of satellites will use GPS satellites to measure wind speed in the tropics where these hurricanes form. They can also measure the surface roughness of oceans to help calculate wind speed and storm intensity.

A FACEBOOK LIVE SHOW ON THURSDAY

For the first time, I will be doing a Facebook “Live” at 3 p.m. this Thursday, Dec. 22. Log into Facebook at the Coeur d’Alene Press site (www.facebook.com/cdapress). I will talk about our current weather patterns and what’s to come in 2017. You can interact and submit your questions during this live event.

Contact Randy Mann at randy@longrangeweather.com