Buckle up: We’ve got quite a temperature rollercoaster (and an unsettled pattern in general) headed our way over the next couple weeks.

The latter half of January looks to usher in a more unsettled pattern that seems reminiscent of December, at least in its timing: Unsettled weekends followed by mostly dry (and occasionally chilly) work weeks. Indeed, that’s how this week looks to go down.

We’ve been fortunate to catch a bit of a break from the wet weather over the last few days. Unfortunately, this respite looks to come to an end this weekend as a storm system approaches from the west.

I hope everybody enjoyed this absolutely fantastic weekend of weather. Our stretch of dry weather should continue through the rest of the work week before unsettled conditions return to the forecast for the weekend.

Despite January’s frigid start, 2018 landed within the top-five warmest years on record at the airport, tying 1998 with an average temperature of 67.9°. This is the fourth consecutive year that average temperatures have landed within the top five warmest on record. 1990 still reigns supreme, though, as the warmest recorded year with an average temperature of 69.3°.

Data for this post is sourced from a compilation of records by the Southeast Regional Climate Center as well as the National Weather Service forecast office in Charleston, SC. Records at the North Charleston climate site begin in 1938.

2018 was highly irregular in one fairly beneficial way: There was an overall lack of severe weather (at least as far as tornadoes, straight-line damaging winds, and hail go) during the year.

To say 2018 was an interesting (and at times baffling) year in weather in Charleston is really selling it short. It just about had it all: Snow, tropical threats, frigid cold, sweltering heat, rainfall, and (of course!) flooding.

Over the next few days, I’ll be looking back at 2018’s key weather events and trends. Today, we start with the most epic weather event of 2018: The January 3rd winter storm.

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