Just this morning the wall calendar rolled over to the 2nd month of 2000. Regardless of weather February will be a rare 29 day month.

The 31 days of January brought a wide variety of weather to Muskegon. We saw temperatures as high as 53° and as low as -7°. By months end the average reading was 25.3° which is 1.5° above norm. The first 12 days of January were above normal in temperature. It was during these 12 days that the months high temperature occurred 53° on Sunday the 2nd, a nice bonus for a holiday weekend. Monday the 10th saw the warmest low of the month, 39°.

Once again the average wind speed reading rose. January's average was 10.4 knots up. 1 from December.

The most common wind directions were from the westerly quadrant (10 days) and from the south (9 days). Below is a table of wind directions and temperature differences.

The prevailing south and west winds were warm as the temperature was above norm more days than not when they blew. It was the abnormal east and north winds that blew on the cold days.

Precipitation wise January was a below normal month. 1.07" of precip fell well below the January norm of 2.3".

Snowfall was also well off in January. 16.7" fell with 38" being the norm. Muskegon received only 44% of the normal snowfall.

January was another warm and dry month. This lends further credence to the idea that 2000 will be a low water year for Great Lakes Sailors.