![\"Greg](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2015\/01\/postel_resized.jpg\")
<\/a>Greg Postel ’90 is a hurricane and severe weather specialist with the Weather Channel.<\/p><\/div>\n
Bates came in second at 11.4 degrees below, just nipping Williams\u2019 10.8 degrees below zero.<\/p>\n
\u201cBeing in the top three is always good!\u201d says Greg Postel \u201990, an on-camera meteorologist with the Weather Channel.<\/p>\n
Postel, who earned a doctorate in atmospheric sciences from the University of Wisconsin\u2013Madison, is a hurricane and severe weather specialist with the Weather Channel. But he knows his way around cold weather too.<\/p>\n
There were few surprises in the overnight low temps on Jan. 8. Inland and northern NESCAC campuses, away from the ocean’s moderating effects, saw the lowest readings.<\/p>\n
But while most of the NESCAC low temps were achieved right around sunrise, as is typical, Hamilton bottomed out a few hours earlier, at 3 a.m.<\/p>\n
Cirrus clouds, even some lower clouds, moved into western New York state by then,\u201d Postel explains.<\/p>\n
<\/a>With the cold comes moments of great beauty, too. (Phyllis Graber Jensen\/Bates College)<\/p><\/div>\n
When clouds roll in at night, heat that would otherwise be radiated into space gets bounced back toward the earth, keeping temperatures from falling much or, in some cases, keeping them steady.<\/p>\n
Ironically, the windy night of Jan. 7-8 may have kept some NESCAC readings from going lower. \u201cWinds can mix up the air,\u201d Postel explains, preventing the heaviest and coldest air from sinking into valley locations.<\/p>\n
Postel\u2019s weather memories of Bates, where he was a mathematics major, include the very snowy winter of 1986-87.<\/p>\n
\u201cI remember walking by the old tennis courts next to Alumni Gym, and stepping off the path and sinking into a waist-high snow drift. I didn\u2019t think I was going to get out. And we didn\u2019t think that winter would ever end.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n
The rankings: Coldest temps in the ‘Cac, Jan. 7-8, 2015<\/h3>\n
All temperatures taken from Weather Underground reporting stations either at or closest to each campus. On-campus stations are noted.<\/em><\/p>\n1. Hamilton: minus 13 degrees<\/a><\/h3>\n
<\/a><\/h3>\n
\n2. Bates: minus 11.4 degrees<\/a><\/h3>\n
<\/a><\/h3>\n
\n3. Williams: minus 10.8 degrees<\/a><\/h3>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n
\n4. Colby: minus 10 degrees (recorded at the college)<\/a><\/h3>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n
\n5. Middlebury: minus 9.3 degrees (at the college)<\/a><\/h3>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n
\n6. Bowdoin: minus 7.8 degrees<\/a><\/h3>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n
\n7. Amherst: minus 3.7 degrees (at the college)<\/a><\/h3>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n
\n8. Tufts: minus 0.8 degrees (at the university)<\/a><\/h3>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n
\n9. Trinity: 0 degrees<\/a><\/h3>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n
\n10. Connecticut College: 1 degree<\/a><\/h3>\n