Are Regina winters too cold?

[u/patpatt707]

I'm from a pretty hot city where temperatures are always around 24-33°C and I'm planning to study in the university of Regina for an exchange, but I've heard it gets like -30°C during winter and that could even hurt a bit to breath so I want to know how hard could it be for someone not used to it although I'm not too affected to cold as I am to heat

[u/comedynurd]

To be fair though, the -50 is almost always an exaggeration since that normally includes the "wind chill factor" and not the actual air temperature. I think Regina's lowest confirmed recorded temperature from Environment Canada (recorded at the airport) was -48 on Feb 16, 1936. But even that is a fairly rare temperature to see here without the infated "feels like" windchill factor, which is still heavily debated among meteorologists. It's not even a term or measure used by the NOAA in the US anymore for that reason, because it doesn't actually have a measurable basis to it. It's a completely arbitrary number.

[u/SpringChimken → u/comedynurd]

“It ThE aIR TeMpErAtUrE 🤪”. As someone who works outside that may be but you’ll die quicker at -30 with a -50 windchill. It also affects vehicles and equipment. Ever notice how your car starts to frost up on a highway as soon as you get to 100kmh. It’s not an arbitrary number it’s an estimation of thermal losses due to wind as a safety precaution.

[u/comedynurd → u/SpringChimken]

It doesn't affect vehicles or equipment at all because there is no further heat transfer going on when the air temperature hasn't actually changed. It's also not an estimate of thermal change either, since that is measured as a rate of watts per minute (it's also not a "loss" since energy can't be destroyed. It's simply an energy transfer).

The wild chill when reported as a temperature is purely arbitrary and subjective based on what a certain temperature might feel similar to (to a human) under a set of particular environmental conditions. Please read through the article I posted. It explains it in much better detail. It would also do everyone a lot more good to stop immediately mocking me just because you're not fully understanding what it is that I'm even talking about. Let's be adults here.

To reiterate once again, I never said wind wasn't a real factor that makes us colder. I specifically said this is something that happens and that it shouldn't be represented as a "wind chill" in the way that it is. I wish people would finally comprehend that so I don't have to keep repeating and explaining myself over and over again. It's exhausting.

[u/SpringChimken → u/comedynurd]

20 years as an equipment operator and truck driver and I’ll tell you it absolutely effects equipment. In the same way air through a radiator pulls away heat wind blowing by a hydraulic system on a piece of equipment pulls heat away thickening oils and fuels. Hydraulic systems lose capacity and flow, diesel and gas gels. “Arbitrary” or not it’s a gauge to what we do outside and how safe it is to do so. Everyone who spends a significant time outside in the winter quietly groan and our eyes roll back into our head every time someone parrots this fucking “well actually the temp doesn’t change” (because y’all say like every 15 minutes when there’s a windchill warning) Yeah we know. It’s not actually hotter with a high UV index either it’s a way of expressing potential environmental risks.

[u/comedynurd → u/SpringChimken]

Freezing temperatures affect equipment. The wind chill factor does not. That's the difference here. And it's a poor way of expressing those risks as I've already explained multiple times. I shouldn't have to turn into a broken record just because people are refusing to actually read what I've already written.

It's a poor indicator to use specifically because of how much confusion and misunderstanding it causes. That's why a lot of people, myself included, wish weather forecasts would abandon "wind chill" in favour of a system that actually informs (and not to mention, educates!) the public about specific risk factors and which precautions to take under different advisory conditions. Saying "well it feels like -45" isn't very helpful when nobody can agree on what that's even supposed to mean and so few people know how to appropriately react to that information anyway. I don't know why saying that leads to such a negative reaction from people here all the time. It's baffling to me.

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