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Lowest Temps
Posted: Mon Feb 19, 2018 3:45 pm
by ironmike
Wow we’ve gone far afield here talking about Wyoming, North Carolina and elsewhere. If that’s the case then I can cite the -50F (-70 with wind chill) that I encountered on the slopes of Vinson Massif. But I don’t think the OP was interested in our global histories. Like most folks here, I’ve dealt with 10’s and 20’s aplenty during various seasons in the Sierra, but I generally don’t take instrumentation to confirm. Luckily I never had to hunker down during any terrible winter storms. It would be interesting to know what are the coldest low temperatures that been “officially” measured in the High Sierra. Anyone got data on that?
Re: Lowest Temps
Posted: Mon Feb 19, 2018 5:18 pm
by longri
A quick internet search pulls up Boca, CA, right next to Truckee. In 1937 they measured -43°C / -45°F.
It could be some place higher in the mountains has been colder but often it's warmer up higher and the coldest spots are down in bowls where the cold air sinks.
Re: Lowest Temps
Posted: Mon Feb 19, 2018 5:53 pm
by Jimr
I don't bring a thermometer or a watch, so I wouldn't know. My guess is never in negative territory. Many mornings with frozen boots and frost all over gear and bag (when I used to cowboy camp all of the time)
Re: Lowest Temps
Posted: Mon Feb 19, 2018 7:56 pm
by maverick
Sierra only please, thanks.
Re: Lowest Temps
Posted: Tue Feb 20, 2018 11:40 am
by SSSdave
I'd bet few here actually have a thermometer in their backpacking gear and that inputs are likely mere guessing unless a person specifies how whatever was measured and where. I've always carried thermometers as well as a list of other small items that in sum hardly weigh anything but make my adventures more interesting and or capable of dealing with problems. In this digital era would recommend backpackers go on amazon and search with +small +digital +thermometer. Lots of cheap tiny products more accurate than any of the traditional chemical fluid products just a couple decades ago. A few years ago I bought one of these infrared types:
https://www.amazon.com/Non-Contact-Infr ... ef=sr_1_25?
So a worthwhile sub question to the thread if someone is going to post is whether or not they actually carry a thermometer. And no those digital wristwatches with thermometer features are lousy at cold temperatures except on a dead man. Especially on coldest air nights with calm air, temperatures vary enormously over short distances because cold air weighing more than warm air flows down water courses into depressions and then dam up behind features like narrow sections of canyons. This is also why deer never bed down on canyon bottoms but rather up on canyon walls above such cold night flows.
At these map crosshairs is where two of us might have experienced our coldest night:
http://mapper.acme.com/?ll=37.20026,-118.65792&z=15&t=T
Was August 2, 1989 and we had managed to reach 12160 feet by sunset. Me at about 135# was carrying over 70# so had climbed up 3400 feet. An effort where we had lunched then napped early afternoon at Upper Lamarck Lake. By time we reached our camp spot and made a tentless camp using bivy sacks, I recall reading 20F on a chemical fluid thermometer. Was using a heavy 0 degree F goose down bag at the time. Recall wearing all my clothes, getting really cold hands cooking a soup dinner, then spending an hour trying to warm my cold feet up inside the bag.
The reason we camped there was there is a small streamlet water source flowing down the Lamarck Col canyon and we were mighty thirsty. But that also meant we were dead center in a sumping cold air night flow at highest crest elevations on a night with dead still air and ultra clear air thus much radiation cooling. At sunrise when we rose it was no doubt colder but we were too cold to do much more than get our gear into our packs and start moving up the route in order to generate some heat. That second night we never got beyond the tarn of the col as my bro maybe got altitude sickness puking. The third morning he did not feel as bad but to be safe, I changed plans and we descended back down to Upper Lamarck Lake. That turned out to be fortunate because on our fourth morning an unseasonably cold weather storm for mid summer with amazingly black frontal clouds blasted in dropping a couple inches of snow as we moved over to the Wonder Lakes for a couple days. After the storm passed, the snow melted quickly as we enjoyed time exploring that infrequently visited zone.
Re: Lowest Temps
Posted: Tue Feb 20, 2018 2:11 pm
by longri
SSSdave wrote:I'd bet few here actually have a thermometer in their backpacking gear and that inputs are likely mere guessing unless a person specifies how whatever was measured and where.
Of course. Most people have no need for the information. Even if you have one, how do you know it's accurate? Who calibrates their thermometer?
I'm pretty sure my old zipper thermometer wasn't any better than about ±3°F, and possibly worse. But one time I did carry a thermometer that was spec'd to be within 1°F over its -30 to 120°F range. It was 30cm mercury filled glass thermometer. I can't remember why I cared about the temperature; I think it some sort of experiment I was doing.
Anyway, early morning at 9600 feet it looked like this:
Pretty typical winter morning in the Sierra.
Re: Lowest Temps
Posted: Thu Feb 22, 2018 9:58 am
by Shhsgirl
I was high in Gardiner Basin during the early winter storm of late last September. Someone told me that it got down to 10 degrees that night, and I believe it. I was okay because, reading the forecasts, I had taken my 10 degree bag with bivy sack, down pants, and a large down jacket. But the cuben fiber tarp wasn't the best. Wished I'd been in a big, fat Hilleberg.
IMG_2065.jpg
IMG_4145.jpg
Re: Lowest Temps
Posted: Thu Feb 22, 2018 1:33 pm
by limpingcrab
In 2014 I went splitboarding by myself in the the Tablelands in Sequoia and the forecast said a high of 15 with a wind chill of -28. When I took this picture it was still before noon so it had not reached the high. The thermometer INSIDE my backpack, close to my back, said 3 Fahrenheit. The camera inside my pocket, next to my chest, was frozen and didn't work so I took this with my phone. The wind made it super intense because 2 inch thick pieces of frozen surface snow started breaking off in sheets and flying through the air like danger-frisbees at knee height.
IMG_1304.JPG
When I worked at Heavenly I was on wind hold in the top lift shack on the Stagecoach lift. My thermometer on the leeward side said 13, but I was hanging out inside by a heater eating warm chili
Re: Lowest Temps
Posted: Thu Feb 22, 2018 2:31 pm
by jmherrell
The coldest I've measured was in the Hope/Faith/Charity Valleys area near Carson Pass in February, mid '80s: -6F the first night and -10F the second, no wind.
The coldest I've seen in the summer was during mid Sept in Dusy Basin: 15F. Also in mid Sept at Woods Lake it was 14F all day and night I think with 60+ mph winds - got stuck in the tent for about 40 hours. I was afraid to head out over Sawmill Pass for 2 days because I thought that the wind on the pass would be much worse. These temps are not that unusual but the reason I mention them is because I think there are quite a few inexperienced people with very light gear sets that are not up to these conditions.
BTW a simple/crude way to check your thermometer calibration (single data point) if its submersible is to place it in a glass filled with ice cubes and water. It should stabilize very close to 32F.
Jim
Re: Lowest Temps
Posted: Thu Feb 22, 2018 6:55 pm
by longri
jmherrell wrote:BTW a simple/crude way to check your thermometer calibration (single data point) if its submersible is to place it in a glass filled with ice cubes and water. It should stabilize very close to 32F.
This recipe results in an unpredictable temperature but typically a couple of degrees high. Crushed ice with minimal water is the usual recommendation.