Baby, it's cold outside



  • One of my recent interests has been cold places. I spent a rather dismal few summer upstate-new-york days in unacceptably cold (~60f) temperatures, and decided to make myself feel better by looking up places where it was REALLY cold. My first search for an incredibly cold place turned up Yakutsk, Russia. References to it kept turning up pictures of crystalized atmosphere, people in huge fur coats... so I looked it up on wunderground. It was 89 degrees.

    So, Yakutsk doesn't really suck that much unless it's between November and May. Screw that. On to the big guns - Antarctica. Paydirt! Vostok Station (manned by the Russians, naturally) is the coldest place on earth, both over the long haul and in absolute terms, with the weather hitting a somewhat chilly -128f, and depending on who you believe, -132f.

    Anyway, I checked wunderground.com, and they actually have Vostok Station listed. There are two semi-wtfs, and this is the first one:

     

     

    Meet locals, eh? I'm not thinking there are a lot of Vostok locals. And if that really is a Vostok local, she's a pretty hardy soul, considering the average high in summer is -28f...

     I'm guessing there isn't much of a hotel business, either. "Well, we're here, honey! What do you want to do today? It's -91, there's a constant 20mph wind, and the sun won't come up for four months!"

    Obviously the thing to do is to check tripadvisor for information about Vostok Station attractions! Hey - on Monday the windchill is going to be -157! In weather like this, Tripadvisor says that the number one attraction is "Go outside and freeze to death in 35 seconds"!

    So, there's that. The best bit was the wikipedia page, though. They have standard little graphs for the climate of places, and somehow this one speaks far more eloquently to the utter bone-chillingness of Vostok Station than any prose description could. Behold, the wonders of the fixed-scale graph!

     

     


    ...and that concludes my semi-wtfs about Vostok Station. Now, if you'll excuse me, I think I'm going to step outside for a moment. It's getting kind of warm in here.



  • It might help to attach the graph picture.



  •  Heh, that climate chart sure gets the message across.

    The sad part is that in the middle of summer with temperatures ranging around 34-40C Antarctica is starting to sound good.



  • @PeriSoft said:

    I'm guessing there isn't much of a hotel business, either. "Well, we're here, honey! What do you want to do today? It's -91, there's a constant 20mph wind, and the sun won't come up for four months!"

    One thing you could do with your MOTAS that quickly comes to mind in that situation is greatly enhanced by an hotel. A special kind of hotel, maybe, but still...



  • @PeriSoft said:

    unacceptably cold (~60f) temperatures

    What? 15C is in the high end of perfect outside temperatures (10-17C). I would much rather have temperatures below the perfect than temperatures above it (except in sauna) unitl certain point (like 20C is worse than 5C, but 22C is better than -35C).

    *eagerly waiting for global warming to take care of Gulf Stream*



  • @Buzer said:

    What? 15C is in the high end of perfect outside temperatures (10-17C). I would much rather have temperatures below the perfect than temperatures above it (except in sauna) unitl certain point (like 20C is worse than 5C, but 22C is better than -35C).
     

    Right here, right now, is the middle of winter and it is 20°C. Looking through the last few months and the coldest was around 6°C (lowest daily maximum still around 18°). You'd hate Queensland! I love the sun and surf; can't get enough. There are hotter places around; once I heard a weather report for Darwin that said "Cool and 27 [°C]".



  • @Zemm said:

    @Buzer said:

    What? 15C is in the high end of perfect outside temperatures (10-17C). I would much rather have temperatures below the perfect than temperatures above it (except in sauna) unitl certain point (like 20C is worse than 5C, but 22C is better than -35C).
     

    Right here, right now, is the middle of winter and it is 20°C. Looking through the last few months and the coldest was around 6°C (lowest daily maximum still around 18°). You'd hate Queensland! I love the sun and surf; can't get enough. There are hotter places around; once I heard a weather report for Darwin that said "Cool and 27 [°C]".

     

     Hmmm... Madang, PNG would be right out - latitude 5° S, it's minimum 25-26° C, maximum 31-32°C *all year round*.

    Perfect for some (I haven't had to wear a jumper for 10 years now).


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