# Cold Weather in the Philippines

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cold-weather-in-the-philippines/715434>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [March 19, 2015, 11:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cold-weather-in-the-philippines/715434 "2015-03-19T23:26:13Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Simple\_Mind](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/7cd45c/32.png) [@Simple\_Mind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Simple_Mind)\
**Post date:** [March 19, 2015, 11:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cold-weather-in-the-philippines/715434/1 "2015-03-19T23:26:13Z")

</div>

Hi all, I live since 1999 in the Central Visayas in the middle of the Philippines, I have a quality German made analog weather station that indicates, temperature, humidity and pressure, my lowest readings were always around January, February, the temperatures never went below 23°Celsius.  
This year is altogether much cooler than any other year and now we had last night only 22°Celsius.  
The forecast for this coming weekend are below 20°Celsius, does anybody have an explanation for this?  
Thanks

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\
**Post date:** [March 20, 2015, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cold-weather-in-the-philippines/715434/2 "2015-03-20T00:45:28Z")

</div>

Your sample time frame is simply too low. 15 years isn’t enough. Now, if you had data for 100 years and you reach a new low, you can make better conclusions about what’s happening.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Terminus\_Est](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terminus_est/32/3087_2.png) [@Terminus\_Est](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terminus_Est)\
**Post date:** [March 20, 2015, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cold-weather-in-the-philippines/715434/3 "2015-03-20T01:14:11Z")

</div>

You didn’t say where in Central Visayas you are, so I’ll take a guess and say you’re in Cebu. Average minimum temperature in Cebu for the month of March is 24°C. Record low for March is 19°C. Your temperature is right in the ballpark:

[http://www.myweather2.com/City-Town/Philippines/Cebu/climate-profile.aspx?month=3](http://www.myweather2.com/City-Town/Philippines/Cebu/climate-profile.aspx?month=3)

As to why it’s colder this time of year, the answer is the northeast monsoon bringing cold air down from Siberia.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![wevets](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e9a140/32.png) [@wevets](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wevets)\
**Post date:** [March 20, 2015, 1:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cold-weather-in-the-philippines/715434/4 "2015-03-20T01:23:25Z")

</div>

Part of that cold weather may be related to the mild El Niño conditions in the Pacific right now. If you look at [the Sea Surface Temperature](http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/enso_update/sstanim.shtml) (and temperature anomaly) animations in the link, you can see that warm water that typically surrounds the Philippines is moving east, and there’s a small amount of unusually cold water arriving at the northern Phillipines. Even though you’re in the central Philippines, the resolution of those animations is pretty low, so you may be getting some of that northern colder water, which would then lower your air temperatures.