According to the good folks at Weather Underground, it is currently 46.4 degrees Fahrenheit in Sochi, Russia. The consistently high temperatures have wreaked havoc on the various ski and snowboard courses, and prompted millions of people to wonder why, exactly, the Winter Olympics are being held in a place where it isn’t very wintry. If the International Olympic Committee wanted to ensure cold weather for the Olympics, they had plenty of other sites to choose from. Here are 10 places worldwide where, as of this writing, it is currently colder than Sochi. All temperatures are in Fahrenheit.
1. Washington, D.C. (37.6 degrees)
2. Pretty much everywhere else in Russia. (It is -18.3 degrees in Yakutsk at the moment.)
3. Pigeon Forge, Tenn., home of Dollywood. (44.1 degrees)
4. Beijing, China, site of the 2008 Summer Olympics. (32 degrees)
5. The Norwegian pavilion at Epcot Center in Orlando, probably. (They really crank the A/C in there.)
6. Dublin, Ireland. (45.5 degrees)
7. Lawrenceburg, Ind., the Indiana town where slopestyle skiing bronze medalist Nick Goepper grew up. (31.8 degrees)*
8. Pyongyang, North Korea. (31 degrees)
9. That indoor ski slope in a mall in Dubai. (It has an “amazing mountain-themed wintry setting”—just like Sochi!)
10. Chamonix, St. Moritz, Lake Placid, Garmish-Partenkirchen, Oslo, Cortina d’Ampezzo, Innsbruck, Grenoble, Sapporo, Calgary, Albertville, Lillehammer, Nagano, Torino, and Vancouver. Come on, IOC: Stick with what works.
*Correction, Feb. 16, 2014: This post originally stated that Nick Goepper won a bronze medal in snowboarding. His medal came in slopestyle skiing.
