Temperature | Label | Frequency |
30°F ... 10°F | seasonal | Every winter |
10°F ... 0°F | chilly | |
0°F ... -10°F | cold | |
-10°F ... -20°F | very cold | |
-20°F ... -30°F | bitterly cold | All winters but one |
-30°F ... -40°F | brutally cold | ~25% of winters |
-40°F ... -50°F | temperatures that must not be named | ~10% of winters |
< -50°F | never experienced | 0% of winters |
Notes:
Temperatures in Fahrenheit because it is a more human-centric scale
(i.e., below 0 feels cold, above 100 feels hot).
I've been out at -46°F. If you think you've been out where it's colder,
remember this doesn't indicate wind-chill, which is a bunch of hooey.
I've skied (at >30mph) at -44°F. According to NOAA, that's -90°F, but
that's not how cold works. Cold is tough because it changes the nature of
things in the environment—wind chill has no effect on these physical
properties.