Events

Southwest Airlines, generally known for operational excellence, had a bad weekend from which they still have not recovered: Tens of thousands of flights have been canceled across the country due to the winter storm and other issues, spoiling holiday plans for many — and Midway has been hit particularly hard by the Christmas chaos. As of Tuesday morning, at least 245 flights there had been canceled in the past 24 hours, according to the Department of Aviation. Many cancellations are coming from budget...

The temperature here at Inner Drive Technology World Headquarters peaked at -5°C, the warmest we've had since 2:30pm on Thursday. Next Thursday it'll hit 10°C, which is 32°C (57°F) warmer than Saturday's overnight low. Welcome to Chicago in the era of rapid climate change. I hope we don't get any more really horrific cold snaps this winter, but I expect we will. For now, though, I'm going to take Cassie on the longest walk she's had in almost a week.

I forgot to do this in July, so the previous Chicago sunrise chart stayed up all year. As always, you can get sunrise times for your own location at https://www.wx-now.com/SunriseChart. Date Significance Sunrise Sunset Daylight 2023 3 Jan Latest sunrise until Oct 29th 07:19 16:32 9:13 27 Jan 5pm sunset 07:09 17:00 9:51 5 Feb 7am sunrise 07:00 17:11 10:11 20 Feb 5:30pm sunset 06:40 17:30 10:50 27 Feb 6:30am sunrise 06:30 17:39 11:09 11 Mar Earliest sunrise until Apr 16th Earliest sunset until Oct 27th...

Here's the (semi?-)annual Chicago sunrise chart. As always, you can get sunrise data for your own location at https://www.wx-now.com/SunriseChart. Date Significance Sunrise Sunset Daylight 2023 3 Jan Latest sunrise until Oct 29th 07:19 16:32 9:13 27 Jan 5pm sunset 07:09 17:00 9:51 5 Feb 7am sunrise 07:00 17:11 10:11 20 Feb 5:30pm sunset 06:40 17:30 10:50 27 Feb 6:30am sunrise 06:30 17:39 11:09 11 Mar Earliest sunrise until Apr 16th Earliest sunset until Oct 27th 06:10 17:53 11:43 12 Mar Daylight saving...

The Arctic air mass has arrived: We didn't actually get that much snow, though: On her evening walk last night, Cassie wanted to run around in the snow in circles for a bit, so I let her. But even with her double coat, after 4 minutes she was shivering, so we had to go in. She will not enjoy today at all. One other thing of note. I got myself one of the coolest and geekiest toys I could ever have imagined: That shows the location of every CTA train running right now. I might have to get one for London...

The world continues to turn outside the Chicago icebox: Julia Ioffe sees an interesting power play between the US and China taking shape in Africa. Ed Zitron experiences unbridled Schadenfreude as three billionaires experience the Dunning-Krueger effect up close and personal. David Frum says we should thank Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky for reminding us of our own history. 538 created an interactive map where you can see for yourself that moving time zone boundaries will probably make more...

It cooled off a bit this afternoon: We've hit -11°C, down from 1.1°C right before that sharp turn at 12:32, and it keeps dropping. Plus, we've got ourselves some snow. This is 1:40pm: And this is 3:40pm: Updates as conditions warrant.

In the last 24 hours, the temperature forecast hasn't changed but the snow forecast has: Right now it's a calm, overcast 0°C. But then we have this from the National Weather Service: Today Snow, mainly after 11am. The snow could be heavy at times. Areas of blowing snow after 3pm. Temperature falling to around -13°C by 5pm. Wind chill values as low as -25°C. Breezy, with a southwest wind 10 to 20 km/h becoming northwest 30 to 40 km/h. Winds could gust as high as 55 km/h. Chance of precipitation is 100%....

This looks fun: WGN fleshes out the forecast's bones: Snow develops Thursday – beginning in far western sections (west of Interstate-39) during the morning and spreading east with deteriorating conditions across the area by early-mid afternoon Blizzard conditions possible, particularly late Thursday night through Friday afternoon (heavy blinding blowing snow with visibility under a quarter mile or less for at least 3 consecutive hours). Very difficult and dangerous travel conditions. Wind gusts to 90...

We get one or two every year. The National Weather Service predicts that by Friday morning, Chicago will have heavy snowfall and gale-force winds, just what everyone wants two days before Christmas. By Saturday afternoon we'll have clear skies—and -15°C temperatures with 400 mm of snow on the ground. Whee! We get to share our misery with a sizeable portion of the country as the bomb cyclone develops over the next three days. At least, once its gone and we have a clear evening Saturday or Sunday, we can...