Normal Winter Weather in Moscow Moscow climate combines the features of European moderate and Asian strong continental climates. It is moderately chilly with occasional thaws that may last for half a winter season. Winter in Moscow starts in late October and continues till end March. Normally, a stable snow blanket covers the surface by December, however sometimes the snow cover settles only by January. Precipitation is mostly in form of a snow, but rain is also possible, which was a usual thing over the past few years. Thunderstorms are rare. Period with an average daily temperature below 0 °C lasts about 120 days, starting mid November and ending in the second half of March. Winter months temperatures (from December to February):
- day - 4°C
- average - 6°C
- night - 9°C At the same time the winter temperature is not monotonous: thawing periods with temperatures of +2°C interchange with moderately frosty of down to -5°C. Heavy frosts may happen on several occasions during the season with the night temperatures falling down below -20…25°C. Frost occurs mostly in the second half of the winter season, when the western-eastern warm air transport from the Atlantic grows weak and the Siberian and Arctic anticyclone moves to the European part of Russia. As a result the coldest month in a year is February (per 20 year-long monitoring). One of the warmest winters over the entire history of meteo observations was registered in early XXI century. Muscovites may recall an extremely warm winter of 2006-2007, when the weather temperature broke all absolute maximums in December, January and then in March and May. Abnormally warm was the beginning of December 2008 too, when several temperature records were set up, including the new absolute maximum of the month and season of +9.6°C (on December 6)! |
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