As Super Bowl watchers around the US munch on chicken wings from the comfort of their couches today, the game’s attendees are gearing up for a cold one.
This year’s National Football League (NFL) championship game, the 52nd, will very likely be the coldest ever. The game will be played between the Philadelphia Eagles and the New England Patriots at 5:30pm local time in Minneapolis, Minnesota’s Bank Stadium. The stadium, of course, is climate-controlled, but fans and footballers on their way into the arena should don two pairs of warm socks.
Minneapolis is an unusually cold choice for the Super Bowl. More often than not, the game is played in a southern state like Louisiana or Florida, where temperatures tend to stay above 50 degrees Fahrenheit in January and February. As of 1pm local time, it’s -1°F in Minneapolis. At kickoff, it’s expected to be 3°F.
According to Farmers’ Almanac, which uses data from the national Climatic Data Center, only two other Super Bowl game days have had average temperatures below freezing: On January 26, 1992, at Minneapolis’s Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome, the average temperature was 16°F, and on January 24, 1982, Michigan’s Pontiac Silverdome had an average temperature of 12°F.