Coldest start of year since 1040 in Alabama

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Year off to coldest start since 1940

Saturday, January 09, 2010 By Steve Doyle

Times Staff Writer steve.doyle@...

One fatality related to weather; temps to rise Monday

The coldest start to a new year since World War II is shivering into the record books.

Chelly Amin, a meteorologist at Huntsville's National Weather Service office, said the average temperature so far in January has been just 26.4 degrees.

That's the chilliest dawn of a new year in North Alabama since 1940, Amin said Friday, and the worst seven-day cold snap since February 1996.

The extreme weather has already claimed one life in the Rocket City. Authorities say Ronnie Warren, 52, died when the kitchen stove he was using to help heat his Hunters Ridge Drive apartment caught fire around 2:40 a.m. Friday.

Wilkerson, an investigator with the city fire marshal's office, said it appears Warren fell asleep in his bedroom with the stove turned on.

Eight of the 12 units in Warren's apartment building suffered smoke and water damage. Residents displaced by the blaze were being relocated to other nearby apartments, Wilkerson said.

He said this is the third time in the past week he has seen someone using their kitchen oven for heat.

"You should never leave a cooking appliance unattended," Wilkerson said. "Kitchen fires are the No. 1 cause of fires, and a lot of them result from unattended cooking."

With today's daytime highs well below freezing, icy patches left over from Thursday's snowfall aren't going anywhere. That means the slippery, elevated stretch of Interstate 565 near downtown will likely remain closed until at least Sunday afternoon.

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