Record #00286Nature archive
On 22 December 1991, the Klinck Automatic Weather Station in central Greenland measured -69.6°C, retrospectively recognized by WMO in 2020 as the Northern Hemisphere's lowest air temperature.
Current Record
-69.6°C
Current record value
The Klinck Automatic Weather Station operated high on the interior Greenland Ice Sheet, using automatic meteorological instruments. WMO verified its December 1991 observation as the Northern Hemisphere low-temperature record.
The previously accepted extreme was -67.8°C, recorded at Verkhoyansk in February 1892 and at Oymyakon in January 1933, with the two Russian sites sharing the former record.
Formal recognition in 2020 followed the observation by almost three decades, demonstrating how archival verification can revise the documented history of weather extremes.
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