Groundhog Day Report: Punxsutawney Phil Predicts 6 More Weeks of Winter, But He’s Usually Wrong

Is spring just around the corner?

Prodigious forecaster Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow early Friday, Groundhog Day 2018, despite a forecast that called for a cloudy, shadowless morning.

Phil, the world’s most famous groundhog, isn’t always right, however.

According to NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information, “there is no predictive skill for the groundhog during the most recent years of the analysis.” In the past 30 years, Phil has been right 14 times and wrong 16.

Groundhog Day evolved from a Pennsylvania Dutch tradition that transplanted a German holiday, Badger Day or Dachstag, to the United States. Dachstag was observed on Candlemas, February 2, and the tradition held that, if a badger emerged that day and found it to be sunny, thereby casting a shadow, it meant that winter would last for four more weeks.

(Photo: Accura Media Group)