I am not getting the significance of your use case. If you had know the temperature would that had changed anything? Even if it was not below freezing being caught out without shelter at 40F is not safe.

@paparazzo The kicker is that all night I was thinking about the 0 degree F sleeping bags that we brought on the trip but didn't have with us right then. They would have made the night a breeze and not even a concern. That was one of the mistakes.

CharlieBrumbaugh and paparazzo, though I only post on TGO seldom, I lurk here a lot and have seen much of what goes on. I love all of you guys, even the two of you. ;)

@paparazzo I see your answer is gone. That is too bad. If you care to bring it back and to add a little bit to it about the frequency of such situations, then it would nicely answer the generic (tl;dr) part of my question. That's what I'm trying to ask here, though it is difficult to make clear. If the weather inversion thing is the only situation which commonly causes this, I might be better asking at a meteorology site, but I'm not sure if that is the case. (ie: I don't know what I don't know)

I did add a situation other than inversion. I don't know how to be more clear than a weather report will tell you if an inversion is in place.

@paparazzo A weather forecast report is very clear for the future, yes. I suppose, if I want to just do the work to calculate how likely this is, I could scour forecasts for instances of this occurring. I think I see what you mean. I am looking at this from hindsight, trying to figure out what a situation was in the past, but I think you are suggesting that the future forecasts can still answer the question as I have asked it, which is likely true. I was more hoping that someone could answer from experience, but I can dig into the forecasts if necessary

@paparazzo ... in fact, I could even dig into the forecasts for the specific mountain in question to see how likely it happens there, which would probably be the best indicator. I had not thought of that. I would just need to keep coming back and checking it frequently. Although I did not see that mountain at the site you linked to (probably because it is so minor), I did find it elsewhere on another forecasting site which included forecasts both for the peak and halfway up that mountain.

I give up. Statistics of an inversion is not an outdoor question. I you want the temp at 2000 feet then look up the temp at 2000 feet.

@paparazzo It appears you keep ignoring what I say, or you are sorely misunderstanding, even though I'm trying to give you every benefit of the doubt and give you every credit I can. If it is as simple as "then just look up the temp at 2000 feet" then explain how/where I can do that. A weather forecasting site, even one that includes a weather forecast at 2000 feet at the exact location I desire, is not what this question is about. I don't understand why you keep making these odd proclamations like "just look it up" or "I see why you got stuck"; back it up with an explanation.

@paparazzo I did, however, see how I could use a forecasting site instead of an archive to partially answer my question, sort of, if I analyze it over time. I even tried to give you the credit for bringing that to my attention; but hey, if that's not what you meant and you don't want to take the credit for that advancement of this question, that's your call. Still, if there is a place where I can "just look up the information I want" as you suggest, please explain as much in an answer. I still think you're just misunderstanding and might know the answer; I'd be grateful if it was provided.

@Aaron Sorry I could not be of more help. If you are looking up a base temp you should be able to look up a temp at elevation. I don't know what your question is about. Moving on.

@paparazzo And lastly, if the way I have asked the question is confusing and we are looking at this from different angles, try to work with me to get us on the same page rather than just saying things like "I give up." I believe you have much good to contribute.

@paparazzo I do not mean to be patronizing; I'm just really trying to figure out what is going on here... do you understand what an "archive" is? Was the site you linked in your deleted answer an archive? I thought it was a forecast, though I cannot check again to be sure since the answer is gone. And again, if it is so easy, then please help us dummies; that is why we ask questions here, is because we don't know and couldn't figure it out ourselves.

@Aaron Good luck I have moved on. If you wanted to engage me you should have up voted my answer and not dismissed the example mountain weather for not having your mountain when the mountains was not the question.

I did not dismiss it. I was merely engaging you in comment to try and help me get at what I needed.

I did not down-vote it, and I was expecting to up-vote it once it helped me get closer to my goal. I assumed that I would be up-voting it at some point.

I understand that some people around here don't seem to be appreciating your contribution enough. Charlie's comment earlier hints at that, and I have seen some of what goes on elsewhere. I feel for you; I get that sometimes as well on other stack exchanges, and I'm sorry. That was not the nature of my comments on your answer though.

I thought your answer was decent and was on the crux of where I was trying to get this Q&A to go.

"crux"... I'm not sure I used that word correctly, but I hope you get what I mean. Your answer didn't immediately inform me in such a way that I felt the case was closed, but I did feel that you were close to that. That's what I'm trying to get at. And as I was getting at in the question-comments earlier, I was realizing that your answer might have been even closer to what I wanted than I had realized at first if I approach this from a different angle.

"from a different angle" being that I may have asked an "XY question" since I wasn't sure exactly what to ask for since I didn't know where to start.

I started by looking for archives, hoping to figure out what the actual temp was, which is exactly what my other Q is about. I did not find any good ones, only a little bit of data on a select very few mountains. So then I'm using the "rule of thumb" mentioned in this Q to try and estimate, but that seemed too low to me, hence this question.

@paparazzo Sorry I forgot to tag you in those previous comments. Anyway, am I making any sense here? I'm not wanting to offend you, and I would be more than happy if you work with me on this. I'm not even completely sure if what I'm asking for has a good answer; as an analogy maybe it's like asking "What's the probability that I'll get hit by a car today?" which depends on a million variables and all we can say is "higher if you're in a big city, or its rush hour".

Is what I'm saying helping? Should I keep going, or should I just stop here?

@paparazzo dude - just quit with the attitude!

you get the time outs when you are rude

@Aaron was trying to engage with you, very politely, and you decided to be personally confrontational with him

@RoryAlsop Cool moved on