Local
Sunday 17 February coldest day in 20 years
By MaltaMedia News
Feb 17, 2008 - 5:14:14 PM

Sunday 17^th February was the coldest day ever recorded in Malta since Malta Weather Services started keeping temperature records at Balzan in 1987. The maximum temperature on Sunday was only 7.9°C at Balzan. In fact, for most of the day, the temperature hovered at around 6°C or 7°C.

The previous coldest day ever was on 31^st January 1999 with a maximum temperature of 8.5°C. Also, of note was the previous coldest maximum temperature for February recorded on 7^th February 2006 with a maximum temperature of only 8.7°C. This means that Sunday’s maximum mean today was the coldest day ever for any month since temperature records began in 1987!

At night the minimum temperature is expected to be around 4°C under cloudy skies but if the clouds clear and the wind calms down then the minimum temperature at night could be even lower, especially in valleys and low-lying areas.

Monday is also expected to be cold with a maximum temperature of around 12°C but with the wind turning to southerly on Wednesday maximum temperatures are expected to be around 16°C or 17 °C later on in the week.

Sunday’s cold temperatures came about due to the contrast between a huge high pressure system of around 1050hPa over Europe bringing very cold polar air into the central Mediterranean and a low pressure system over Turkey. This caused this very cold and dry polar air to rush down the ravines and valleys of the mountains in southeastern Europe (known locally as the Bora wind) and to blow all the way to the central Medtiterranean, thus bringing us very cold weather indeed.

This cold weather has also affected other parts of the central and eastern Mediterranean, including Athens.

For detailed information and five day forecasts see Maltaweather.com