Thunder Bay breaks cold weather record

It was a record-breaking day for weather in Thunder Bay on Tuesday, with the temperature dropping to -36.3 C.

And that’s not even counting the wind chill, which took the temperature down to -41 C.

Environment Canada reported this new low makes it the coldest Jan. 22 since it began recording temperatures. The previous record was set in 2011, when the mercury dipped to -35.7 C.

Meteorologist Geoff Coulson said recent winters have seen cold days, but not often back-to-back, as Thunder Bay is now experiencing.

"The last couple of winters, we've had some cold days here and there," he said.

"But in terms of actually locking in the cold weather for an extended period of time, we haven't really seen this in a while — especially not with the type of temperatures that we're dealing with in those areas."

Coulson said the Arctic air mass causing these low temperatures is slow to move and Thunder Bay can expect the cold to stick around until the weekend.

The normal high is about – 9 C for Thunder Bay at this time of year.  The forecast high for Tuesday was  -21 C. By Thursday night, the forecast low is -31 C.