Coldest day of season has state shivering

Some parts of Maine haven’t even had snow yet. But there’s no doubt that winter is here.

The entire state saw its coldest weather of the season Friday, with a low for the state of 21 below at Clayton Lake, according to Butch Reynolds of the National Weather Service in Gray.

In Caribou, the low was minus 7, but that told only part of the story: The wind chill was minus 55.

Nonetheless, residents of the northern Maine community are used to January temperatures that never get up to zero for a week at a time, so they took it all in stride Friday.

“It’s cold with the wind chill, but we’re used to it. We are, believe it or not,” insisted Val Helstrom, who works in the Caribou tax assessor’s office. She proclaimed it “chilly.”

Kathy Mazzuchelli, Caribou’s recreation director, said it was the wind chill that made it cold. After all, the temperature fell far short of Caribou’s record for the date: 32 below.

“We’ve traded in our lightweights for our expeditionweight longjohns. We’re putting on the Polartec socks and the Neoprene masks,” she said. “The mercury isn’t that bad but the wind is cutting.”

Caribou wasn’t the only cold spot. In Bangor, the mercury dropped to minus 1. In Portland, it was 4.

The American Automobile Association reported that by midafternoon Friday, it had received more than double the normal number of calls from drivers seeking help to start their cars.

In all, 2,500 calls were received in New Hampshire, Vermont and Maine; that compares to 1,000 on a typical day.

The cold snap kept plumbers busy responding to emergency calls to repair broken water pipes.

Roto-Rooter Plumbers responded to about a dozen calls first thing in the morning in the Greater Portland area, said Chris Wardell, a dispatcher for the plumbing service.

The cold weather was expected to stay early into next week, and places in southern Maine that have not received snow, like Portland, may see some of the white stuff on Sunday.

Portland has not seen snow in more than 300 days, although other parts of the state have recorded snow.

“The next storm system for Sunday looks favorable for a little snow. We’ll see how it develops,” said Butch Roberts, meteorologist from the National Weather Service office in Gray.