The Weather in Louisville? (Lexington, Fairfield: schools, tornado, living in)

[WanderingCajun]

First, sorry to hear that Louisville had terribly high winds yesterday. I read that roofs were flying off and quite a bit of other damage done as well. T.G. no tornados. Hope all Louisville and Ky forum members were not affected by the storm.

How is the weather in Louisville typically? I am asking because it is hard to form an opinion just by the data available and even by getting opinions of people who live NEAR Louisville but not IN it. I have friends in the Fairfield Ohio area and they assure me that L-ville is EXACTLY like their weather but a tiny bit warmer. Also some folks in Evansville claim L-ville is a cold snowy place worse than them for 6 mos a year!!! THAT would be bad news for a Cajun like me. Because they have called me and told me the snow is above their heads in the little tunnels they dig to and from their cars!!!

I recall that the winters in southern Ohio are awful, they never see the sun, the gray days go on and on...but then again, they have beautiful summers and gardens and autumns.

How is the weather there in L-ville really?
And are you all called LouisVILLIANS really??? YOu seem nice, not like villians at all.

Merci!

[censusdata]

Originally Posted by WanderingCajun

And are you all called LouisVILLIANS really??? YOu seem nice, not like villians at all.

Merci!

Well considering we live in Lou-evil...

Louisville is usually 5-10 degrees warmer than Southern Ohio and about the same as Evansville. Right in the city there is a significant heat island effect, which can make it 2-5 degrees warmer than surrounding areas on a sunny day w/o a lot of wind.

This is a current temp. map from the weather channel. It's 16 in Cinci, 19 in Lexington, and 22 here.

[Off Topic]

I really don't think our weather is that bad. We are most certainly not a cold, snowy place 6 months out of the year. Not even close. Most of our winters have been mild lately.

So far this winter I don't think we've even had more than 2 or 3 days of snow, and none of those days were more than an inch or so.

[WanderingCajun]

Thx for replies so far, it is good to know it is actually warmer than So. Ohio. 22 is much nicer than 19, but WOW those are some cold temps!!! Of course the nation is like a deep freeze today overall...

Do L-ville drivers know how to drive in snow or do they get kind of wild?

[WanderingCajun]

BTW censusdata, are you some sort of super-geek? You seem to post the best and coolest stuff, and you put up maps w/in minutes. I am noticing that you, O-T, and Stx are very knowledgeable indeed.

[Off Topic]

Originally Posted by WanderingCajun

Do L-ville drivers know how to drive in snow or do they get kind of wild?

You will fit right in - most people don't have a clue how to drive in bad weather!

[Off Topic]

Originally Posted by WanderingCajun

BTW censusdata, are you some sort of super-geek? You seem to post the best and coolest stuff, and you put up maps w/in minutes. I am noticing that you, O-T, and Stx are very knowledgeable indeed.

censusdata is a computer whiz, isn't he! He's very good and I enjoy his posts. I'd have to say that Stx is the gold standard on this forum. I have a tendency to throw out my opinions loosely on occasion, firing from the hip. I do make a real effort to make it my honest opinion, even if it hurts a little. Unless we're all painfully honest, I don't think this forum would as worthwhile as it should be.

[FutureMover08]

The weather can be kinda unpredictable sometimes which is really the case for most US cities so it's not really anything out of the ordinary. It can be a high of 20 degrees one day in the winter time and 50 the next.

I will take the time to give you (and anyone else who may be wondering about Louisville's weather) a little bit of an overview/my opinion on each season to give you a better idea of what the weather is like year-round.

Winter:
It typically does not warm up much over 50-55 during the main winter months (Dec-Feb). There are usually a couple weeks of really really cold temperatures in which the high doesn't climb out of the 20s on some days and the lows are in the low teens and sometimes even single digits. I'd say on average during the winter months it's usually around 35-45 for the high and 20s-30s for the low. It can vary but like I said it rarely warms up much over 55 and rarely drops below 10 or 15.

It does snow. I think the average snow per year is something like 12-15 inches which really isn't that bad compared to a lot of other places. Some years it will not snow much at all just sometimes here and there and it may not be more than an inch or two. It seems like about every 4 or 5 years there is a really bad blizzard that will dump 10+ inches of snow in 1 or 2 days and it will force schools to close and make driving conditions very dangerous. About 3 or 4 years ago we received a record snowfall of around 20 inches so it can be very bad but typically nothing more than just a little bit (1-3 inches) and even that doesn't happen often.

When March comes it typically starts to get a little warmer. There will still be cold days but there will also be more days mixed in where it will warm up into the 60s and sometimes 70s. March and the first week or two of April is basically the transition from winter into spring. As you go along the days start to get warmer. It can still get cold into early April though but for the most part it's usually pretty pleasant (a lot of days in the upper 60s and 70s.) By the 2nd or 3rd week of April it's usually warm for good until October.

Spring:
As I said April is usually pretty mild with the chance for some colder days early on in April. Spring is the rain and storm season. It can rain or storm at anytime throughout the year but it is most common during spring. As I said it's pretty much like a transition from cold temperatures to warm temperatures so sometimes it will warm up during the day and start to cool off in the evening and it is not uncommon to have thunderstorms fire-up. Severe thunderstorm watches/warnings are not uncommon. A few times a year there are lines of severe storms that come through the area producing tornado watches and tornado warnings. You would probably want to have a place planned out where you would go if you needed to take shelter during a tornado warning whether it be a basement, closet, bathtub, etc. This is not to try to scare you or anything but the Louisville area is actually considered by some to be a part of "tornado alley" so it's good to be informed. On the good side of things, in 20 years of living in the area I have luckily never been effected in any way (outside of being a little scared a few times) by a tornado. I have had to take shelter a few times but thankfully nothing has ever happened to me or anyone I know. I have seen 2 or 3 funnel clouds but never been in/seen an actual tornado on the ground. There are tornado sirens that go off and the local weather teams are always good with keeping everyone updated so in the case that a bad storm is coming through you will be informed and prepared.

May is usually pretty warm and towards the end of the month it starts to get pretty hot. May is probably my favorite month here becuase it's typically warm and sunny, my favorite kind of weather.

Summer:
Summers do get HOT here. Usually not as bad as places like Dallas, Houston, Phoenix, etc. but it does get hot. By the end of May and into June it starts to heat up. Highs are usually in the mid-upper 80s and low 90s. I personally don't think it's very humid most of the time. It's usually pretty dry all throughout the summer months. There are a few days where it will rain or storm but for the most part it's usually pretty dry and sunny alot . Someone from the deep South including Florida, Atlanta, Houston, New Orleans, etc. or other places that get very humid such as New York or Washington D.C. would probably think it's pretty dry here. Someone from a place like Phoenix or Denver would probably find it very humid. It's pretty much relative to what you are accustomed to. It's somewhere in the middle of all of those places. Not extremely humid, but not extremely dry. Again this is just my opinion. There are some days where it will feel humid and sticky but I'd say for the most part it's not bad. June, July, and August can be a blazer sometimes. It is usually in the 90s. This past summer we even had some days up into the 100s in August. September is usually still pretty hot the first week or two then it starts to cool down some and there will be some days in the 70s and 80s.

Fall:
By October it is usually starting to cool down and you will see a lot of pleasant days in the 60s and 70s. Around the 2nd week of October you will usually need to start breaking out the long pants and sweatshirts/jackets again. This past year it was unusually warm deep into October but it typically starts to get cooler around the 2nd week or so. November it starts to get cold. There aren't too many blistering cold days but you will definitly need pants and jackets. There are occasionally some pretty mild days in November but for the most part its pretty cold. As you start to get into December it starts getting colder. Snow can occur as early as late October and as late as early April but as I said before snow is really not that common here.



Another thing to consider, it is often cloudy and overcast in Louisville. It's not quite as bad as places in Ohio, Michigan, New York, etc. but it seems to be cloudy a lot, particularly in the winter months. On average, there are 93 clear days, 102 partly cloudy days, and 171 cloudy/overcast days per year in Louisville.

Overall, the climate here is not THAT bad. I personally don't like it too much from November to March (I would like a warmer climate and more sunny days) but I can deal with it for now. This is most definitly a 4 season climate so that is a plus for those who prefer that. It gets cold, it gets hot, and there are a lot of pleasant days. It rains, it snows, it storms, it floods, it sleets, it hails, the roads get icy... there is a little bit of everything here.

It's definitly not a perfect climate but it's not the worst either. There are a lot of cities that have it a lot worse than Louisville.

[missymomof3]

I don't understand the 12-15 inches snow average.
When was the last time we had anything more than an inch that lasted more than a day or two? The last one I remember was about fo9ur years ago. The one before that, in 1994. Why do they still use that average?

[missymomof3]

Oh and we have had several days of over 50 in the winter the last several years (call it global warming or whatever) but it seems to happen more and more. Heck, I remember an over 60 stretch in December back in 95.