Residents of Fairbanks, Alaska, are enduring the harshest cold spell in more than a decade.

Temperatures early this morning at the Fairbanks International Airport plummeted to 51 below zero.

Fairbanks is known for its frigid winters, but temperatures typically only drop to 16 below zero this time of year. This morning’s low is actually not far from the day’s record low of 58 below zero from 1933.

That record would likely have been broken if dense ice fog was not present, according to AccuWeather.com Meteorologist Brian Edwards.

Today marked the second consecutive day of temperatures to or under 50 below zero, the first such occurrence since the last two days of December 1999.

Before Saturday, Jan. 27, 2006, was the last time temperatures dropped to 50 below zero in Fairbanks.

Saturday’s high in Fairbanks was held to 42 below zero, the coldest high temperature at the airport since Jan. 2, 2000.

A similar high is expected today before temperatures slightly recover Monday into Tuesday as a storm system delivers a bit of snow to eastern Alaska.

Temperatures in Fairbanks have been 40 below zero or colder 15 days so far this month. That ties the record from 1972 for the most 40 below zero January days in the last 40 years.

This month is on pace to be the coldest January since 1971 and one of the top ten coldest on record.

Furthermore, “there is a chance that this January will end just within the top ten coldest months ever on record at Fairbanks,” according to a statement from the National Weather Service in the city.