Cities/Towns in the Southern Hemisphere that have recorded subfreezing highs

[Full Overcast]

Originally Posted by Mac15

I'd doubt they'd go there for cold.

A high of -2c is not impressive. It is not that rare here and let's be honest a proper ice day is below about -5c.

Ya except you forgot the small fact that Brazil lies almost entirely with 30° of the equator. So a high of -2C is infact impressive for them.

[Mac15]

No it's not.

[Troms]

With the same reasoning, if tomorrow it snows in Mumbai, we should dismiss it as "nothing special", because in Norway it snows every year.

However, a high of -2° in Sao Joaquim is impressive (better say "not normal", impressive can be a subjective concept) - it is about 16°C degrees lower than normal, which is definitely unusual for such a moderate climate at a low latitude.

Moreover, daily maximum temps lower than -5°C have been reported in Northern Ireland in very few occasions, most notably in December 2010. The definition of "ice day" is the same everywhere in the world.

[The East Frisian]

Just took a look on a site which has a fairly good summary of climate tables around the world.
It's mostly in French, but if you know some basic words of it- you can navigate very easily though this, plus the tables have also the lowest Maximums listed.

According to this list, there were some Argentine towns with quite remarkable subfreezing highs.

Rio Gallegos e.g. had a high of -12.0°C (10 F) in June 1964, this is pretty impressive (especially by european standards and furthermore if you consider that there is just a tiny strip of land on the southern end of South America
Mto climat stats | Station Rio Gallegos

Esquel had -10.0°C (14 F) in June 1984 and July 2001
Mto climat stats | Station Esquel

Ushuaia -5.9°C (21 F) in June 1992
Mto climat stats | Station Ushuaia

Comodoro Rivadavia -0.8°C (30 F) in July 2001
Mto climat stats | Station Comodoro Rivadavia

And also quite impressive, especially considering its latitude (39° southern paralell):
Neuquen -0.2°C (32 F) on 16/17 June 1984
Mto climat stats | Station Neuquen

This is the most that i found, though there might be many more like El Calafate, Perito Moreno or Bariloche for example.

[Mhc1985]

**New discovery**
After checking data from my workplace a couple of new towns with spectacular records of subfreezing highs have emerged... These are stations from a secondary network belonging to the National Water entity: Alto Río Senguer (900 metres, 1600 inhab.) and Río Mayo (430 metres, 3000 inhab.), both of them located well inland Patagonia.

Data look reliable; unfortunately part of Río Mayo's records, including the one I give most importance, lacks daily extremes -- it only contains records got at 9.00, 15.00 and 21.00 local time. However, it can be estimated that daily highs reached as low a temperature as -20ºC or maybe sligthly less due to thermal inversions on a deep U-shaped valley were the town is located and where frozen fog could not be 'broken' by the very weak winter sunshine.

Alto Río Senguer, on the other hand, does have daily extremes recorded, and whereas the lowest high isn't that extraordinary (-13.0ºC), it's recorded a low of -30.0ºC.

1) Comparative table including daily extremes of Alto Río Senguer and two official stations during the cold spell that I'm refering to:


2) Daily records for Alto Río Senguer and Río Mayo (whose daily extremes are not available; look at the consistency of the below-minus-twenty temperatures):


Link in Spanish about these records (with a map included): foro.gustfront.com.ar • Ver Tema - Temperaturas extremas de Argentina

So the ranking of the lowest highs in Argentina for inhabited places would look this way...
Río Mayo: -20ºC/-21ºC
Maquinchao (dubiuos): -17.0ºC
Maquinchao (reliable): -13.4ºC
Gobernador Gregores: -13.2ºC
Alto Río Senguer: -13.0ºC
Río Gallegos: -12.0ºC
Río Grande: -11.6ºC
Esquel: -10.0ºC
Perito Moreno: -9.8ºC

[kronan123]

nothing north of 38N?

[Ethereal]

In July, the average high for Perisher Blue, NSW is -0.1C.

[Mhc1985]

Originally Posted by Theropod

In July, the average high for Perisher Blue, NSW is -0.1C.

Looks like wrong data... according to the source, average high in July is 2.4ºC and in August it's 3.4ºC.
Anyway, for the purposes of this thread, the main record is that high of -6.0ºC recorded in June, 1983.

[ghost-likin]

southern south america can be colder than western europe.. but in patagonia dont have a lot of cities like europe to have a better climate data!