January 1[edit]
1947: A severe hailstorm injured around 1000 people in Sydney, Australia.
January 2[edit]
2013: Mountaineer Ian McKeever was struck and killed by lightning while hiking on Mount Kilimanjaro.
January 3[edit]
1913: A severe nor'easter brought the lowest barometric pressure reading for a non-tropical system ever measured in the continental United States, with a pressure of 955.0 mb (28.20 inHg) recorded in Canton, New York.
January 4[edit]
2008: Cyclone Helen made landfall in the Northern Territory of Australia with 10-minute maximum sustained winds of 95 kilometres per hour (59 mph). One person was killed due to flooding.
January 5[edit]
1950: A Lisunov Li-2 carrying most of VVS Moscow (the ice hockey team of the Soviet Air Forces) crashed while attempting to land at Koltsovo Airport, Yekaterinburg, USSR (now Russia) during a major snowstorm, killing all on board.
January 6[edit]
2004: Cyclone Heta passed through the Samoan Islands, causing moderate damage and killing one person.
January 7[edit]
1839: Known as the Night of the Big Wind, a European windstorm swept across Ireland, killing between 250 and 300 people.
January 8[edit]
2005: European windstorm Gudrun struck Sweden and Denmark with wind gusts of up to 165 kilometers per hour (103 mph), killing 12 people.
January 9[edit]
1975: The Great Storm of 1975 began causing blizzard conditions in the Central Plains while spawning tornadoes in the Southern United States. Over the next 3 days, more than 2 feet (61 cm) of snow would fall on some locations, while 45 tornadoes touched down. Twelve people were killed by the storm.
January 10[edit]
1993: The Braer Storm of January 1993, the strongest extratropical cyclone on record in the northern Atlantic Ocean, reached peak intensity, with a minimum barometric pressure of 914 millibars (27.0 inHg).
January 11[edit]
2014: Cyclone Ian struck the Haʻapai islands of Tonga, destroying hundreds of homes and killing one person.
January 12[edit]
1988: Cyclone Anne made landfall on New Caledonia, killing two people. Anne was the strongest tropical cyclone to affect the French Overseas Territory on record.
January 13[edit]
1979: A major snowstorm affected the Chicago area, dropping record snowfall of more than 16 inches (410 mm) in one day.
January 14[edit]
2016: Hurricane Alex, an unusual January hurricane, reached peak intensity near the Azores.
January 15[edit]
1919: The Great Molasses Flood, a flood of molasses from a ruptured storage tank, caused in part by unusually warm temperatures, killed 21 people in Boston, Massachusetts.
January 16[edit]
1983: Turkish Airlines Flight 158 crashed short of the runway at Ankara Esenboğa Airport in Ankara, Turkey due to whiteout conditions in a severe snowstorm. Forty seven out of 67 on board were killed.
January 17[edit]
2008: Cyclone Funa passed near the island of Maewo, Vanuatu, causing significant damage across the island nation.
January 18[edit]
2016: An avalanche struck a group of French Foreign Legionnaires during a ski mountaineering exercise in the Massif des Cerces, France, killing 6 people.
January 19[edit]
1995: A helicopter crashed in the North Sea after being struck by lightning. Despite the high seas and stormy weather, all 18 passengers and crew were rescued.
January 20[edit]
2014: Tropical Storm Lingling dissipated east of the Philippines, but not before causing several days of heavy rain and landslides that killed 70 people.
January 21[edit]
2010: Cyclone Magda made landfall in the sparsely populated Kimberley Region of Western Australia, causing only minor damage and no injuries.
January 22[edit]
1999: One person was killed in Tennessee on the second day of a two-day tornado outbreak.
January 23[edit]
2011: Cyclone Wilma passed through the islands of American Samoa, killing 3 people.
January 24[edit]
2009: European windstorm Klaus made landfall near Bordeaux, France, with wind gusts of up to 200 kilometres per hour (120 mph).
January 25[edit]
1990: A European windstorm known as the Burns' Day Storm killed almost 100 people, mainly in the United Kingdom.
January 26[edit]
1978: The Great Blizzard of 1978 struck the Great Lakes and Ohio Valley with several feet of snow and winds gusting to 100 mph. Seventy people died in the storm.
January 27[edit]
2008: Cyclone Gene made landfall on Fiji, killing 8 people.
January 28[edit]
2013: The remnants of Cyclone Oswald, which had brought heavy rain to parts of northeastern Australia for several days, caused several rivers to reach their historical peak flood levels in Queensland and New South Wales.
January 29[edit]
1989: Cyclone Firinga dropped torrential rain on the French overseas department of Réunion, including 1,309 millimetres (51.5 in) at Pas de Bellecombe in just 24 hours.
January 30[edit]
1930: The first radiosonde was launched in Pavlovsk, USSR by Pavel Molchanov, sending weather data from high in the atmosphere to the Leningrad Weather Bureau and Moscow Central Forecast Institute.
January 31[edit]
1966: Oswego, New York received 50 inches (127 cm) of snow, which was the last of five consecutive days of heavy snow.