SLC on pace for warmest December since tracking began in late 1800s

Hoping for a white Christmas in Utah’s capital? Don’t count on it.

Instead of the crunch of snow under your boots and cozy holiday sweaters, you may be swapping scarves for shorts and T-shirts this week as unseasonably warm weather continues to roll in.

Temperatures hit the mid-60s Monday, with highs in the low 60s and upper 50s expected throughout the week, according to the National Weather Service’s seven-day forecast. Christmas Day is expected to reach 57 degrees.

Salt Lake City is on pace for its warmest December since at least the late 1800s, when tracking began, said Monica Traphagan, a meteorologist with the weather service’s Salt Lake City office.

“We’re on track to shatter the record,” Traphagan said, adding that average temperatures this December are about 2 degrees higher than the previous record, set in 1917 at an average of about 42 degrees.

Temperatures have been roughly 20 degrees above average for this time of year, she said.

This has caused some confusion for the area’s plants and trees, according to Rachel Broadbent, a plant, soil and climate instructor at Utah State University. The pear trees outside the Triad Center in downtown Salt Lake City, for example, have already starting to blossom.

“I have a little snowdrop — I have two of them in my garden that have bloomed because it has been so warm — but I have never seen trees bloom in the middle of winter, at solstice,“ Broadbent said. ”It’s like a miracle.”

Broadbent said early blooming poses little risk to the plants. The main concern is that if a tree blooms all its buds now, there won’t be any left for spring, which could affect orchards that rely on those blooms for fruit production.

“But they might not spend all of them,” she said. “Plants are smart and they want a return on investment, so I could see them being like, ‘OK, we’ll bloom some, but we’ll maybe hold back some just in case.’”

The unseasonably warm December is due to a high-pressure system that has been sitting across the southern United States for most of the month, Traphagan said. That pattern has kept Utah and much of the West warmer than usual while allowing occasional storms from the Pacific to reach the region, bringing rain to the valleys and snow to the mountains.

This pressure system has also caused the high winds the area experienced Sunday and Monday, Traphagan said. She expects the winds to pick up again Wednesday and continue into Christmas Day.

The city has also not seen measurable snowfall yet this season, Traphagan said.

There’s about a 20% to 30% chance of snow Friday at the end of the next storm system, she said, but if it doesn’t happen, the valley could end up setting a new record for its latest first snowfall, which is Jan. 2.

“I sure hope this is not a precursor,” Broadbent said. “I think it’s just going to be one of those weird years where we have a super warm winter, and hopefully our winter kicks in soon.”