On the plus side, winter in Sullivan County brings with it ice fishing, skating, skiing, tobogganing and families gathering around the fireplace.

The flip side is that winter also gives us power outages, snow drifts that can cover a car and icy pavement that to successfully navigate requires the balance dexterity of the tightrope-walking Wallendas.

Watching the weather segments emanating on the major networks do not make you feel any better. Regardless of what the temperature is in our surrounding area, the weather report usually ends with something like, “So most of upstate will be in the low 20’s. But in Monticello and Liberty expect minus 5 degrees.”

Welcome to the mountains.

Speaking of cold temperatures, there is another component to factor in. During the early 1940s two scientists, Charles Passel and Paul Siple, were doing research in Antarctica. They lived in a small wooden hut that lacked indoor plumbing and Wi-Fi.

They were sent there to work on variables of temperature. Without Twitter, Facebook or TikTok, we can only imagine what they did to pass the time. Perhaps they wagered on which of the two icicles that hung from the door of the nearby outhouse would drip first. Maybe they played “guess how cold it is” on the outdoor thermometer.

It was the thermometer that led to the pair observing a weather measurement that is still used today.

As he wrote down the temperature in his notebook, Passel might have said “It says 8 degrees the same as yesterday.” Siple possibly replied, “but it seems so much chillier for some reason. I wonder why?”

As a gust of wind blew Passel’s notebook out of his hands, he exclaimed “that breaking wind sure is strong and cold.”

Immediately they realized they might have found the reason it felt colder than the thermometer reading. Back in their hut, Passel and Siple created what they called the “Breaking Wind Index.”

When they returned to civilization, the name was wisely changed to the “Wind Chill Index.” Passel and Siple expressed the calculations of how cold it felt in terms of kilocalories per hour per square meter. Unless you were a mathematician, the calculation was impossible to figure out.

In 1964 “cooler” heads prevailed. A researcher at the Alaska Air Laboratory was able to adjust what he renamed the Wind Chill Factor as a temperature reading. So, from that point, meteorologists could tell us that although the thermometer said 20 degrees, the Wind Chill Factor made it feel more like minus 5.

However, it is not an exact science.

It turns out that although it is now known that the winter wind makes it seem colder than the thermometer reading, it is impossible to accurately quantify the difference.

The problem is that humans have a wide variety of body types and reside in different environs. In addition, wind velocity is never constant in nature.

Experiments in Canada examined the extent of heat loss caused by wind on people of different body types. They had volunteers, a dozen at a time, exercise outdoors on treadmills as their loss of body heat was evaluated.

They discovered that people with a greater amount of body fat were more prone to develop frostbite because the fat layers kept their heat in, exposing the skin to the cold temperatures. Also, the Wind Chill Factor varies depending on whether the subject is standing still, walking or running.

Another variable is the surrounding environment. Out in an open field, with no blockages of wind, it will seem colder than if you were in a thick forest.

So, if you must go outside, I suggest you wear layers and bundle up. If the thermometer says 20 degrees and the weather forecast says it will feel like minus 5 with the wind chill, you would be better off chillin’ out by staying in.