Mainers can expect white Christmas
CARIBOU, Maine — When it began snowing last week, Christine Hannington of Presque Isle said that her three children “couldn’t have been happier.”
“After the warm weather we had last year when we barely had any snow on the ground last Christmas, my children kept praying that we would have a white Christmas this year,” she said. “Now, they have gotten their wish.”
This winter is indeed a departure from this time last year, Corey Bogel, meteorologist at the National Weather Service in Caribou said Monday. Last Christmas, there was no snow on the ground in Bangor and only three inches on the ground in Caribou.
But it’s looking like it will be a white Christmas around the state this year, with a foot of snow on the ground in Caribou, seven inches in Bangor and four in Portland.
The forecast over the next few days also calls for a storm moving in Thursday bringing a mix of rain and snow with maybe an inch of snow accumulation in the Portland area, 1-2 inches possible in the Bangor area and 2-4 inches further north.
Beyond that, there is a chance of snow showers on Saturday in the northern part of the state, but not in the Bangor area or further south, according to the NWS.
Bogel said that the Caribou office of the weather service considers it a white Christmas if the state has “at least 1 inch of snow on the ground” on the holiday morning.
“Over the years a white Christmas has been observed 75 percent of the time,” he said.
There have only been 6 years in Caribou —1957, 1973, 1998, 2001, 2006, and 2010 — with less than an inch of snow on the ground.
The snowiest Christmas was in 1938 when 9.2 inches of snow was observed in Bangor.
The snowiest Christmas was in 1997 when 8.7 inches of snow was observed in Caribou.
Also, Christmas so far is shaping up to be partly sunny across the state with normal seasonal temperatures.
Bogel said that since weather records began in Bangor in 1925 the weather conditions have varied widely on Christmas day at Bangor. The warmest Christmas was in 2015 with a high of 54 degrees Fahrenheit in Bangor, tying the previous record set in 2014. The lowest temperature ever observed on the holiday in the city was 17 below in 1980. The lowest high temperature ever observed for the day was 6 degrees above zero in 1975. The normal high and low temperatures for Bangor on Christmas Day are 31 and 11 respectively.
The forecast for the holiday in Bangor this year calls for a high near 33 degrees and a low of around 9.
At Caribou, where weather records began in 1939, the warmest temperature on Christmas was 48 degrees, which happened three times — in 1964, 2003, and 2014. Last Christmas, when warmer weather impacted the state, it was 44 degrees in Caribou. The lowest temperature of 26 below was observed in 1975. The only time that the high temperature for the day failed to reach zero was in 1983 when the mercury only hit 1 below. The normal high and low on Christmas Day in Caribou are 23 and 6.
The forecast for the holiday this year indicates a high near 24 degrees and a low around 0.
The warmest Christmas recorded in Portland was in 2015, when the temperature reached 62 degrees, according to Meteorologist Nikki Becker of the National Weather Service Office in Gray. The coolest Christmas was in 1980, when the temperature dropped to minus 16, she said Tuesday.
The normal high and low temperatures for Christmas Day in Portland are 34 and 17 degrees. The forecast for this holiday there is a high of near 37 degrees and a low of around 15.
