Punxsutawney Phil predicts an early spring at Groundhog Day festivities

Punxsutawney Phil has predicted an early spring in Gobbler’s Knob, Pennsylvania, the scene of the largest and best known Groundhog Day celebration in the United States.

The annual event is a tongue-in-cheek ritual in which Phil’s handlers, members of a club with roots in the late 19th century, reveal whether the groundhog has seen his shadow.

Just after sunrise on Friday, the Punxsutawney Groundhog Club announced that Phil had not seen his shadow, which would usher in early spring-like weather. The groundhog seeing his shadow presaged six more weeks of winter, according to the group.

About 10,000 people have made their way in recent years to Punxsutawney, where festivities begin in the dead of night and culminate in the midwinter forecast.

A bundled-up crowd, some wearing groundhog-themed hats, watched musical performances and fireworks as they waited for sunrise and the appearance of Punxsutawney Phil.

Pennsylvania governor Josh Shapiro took to the stage before Phil to urge people around the world watching the festivities to come to Punxsutawney next year.

Mr Shapiro also announced that the famed groundhog was the new official meteorologist for Pennsylvania.

“Punxsutawney is the centre of the universe right now and I love that you’re all here,” Mr Shapiro said.

Phil predicts more winter more often than he sees an early spring, not a bad bet for February and March in western Pennsylvania. A federal agency reviewed his record last year and put his accuracy rate at about 40%.

The tradition of celebrating the midpoint between the shortest day of the year on the winter solstice and the spring equinox dates back several centuries in European farm life.

There are more than a dozen active groundhog clubs in Pennsylvania, some dating back to the 1930s, and weather-predicting groundhogs have appeared in at least 28 US states and Canadian provinces.

The 1993 blockbuster film Groundhog Day, starring Bill Murray, fuelled interest in Punxsutawney Phil and inspired informal observations far and wide.

When he is not making his annual prognostication, Phil lives in a customised space beside the Punxsutawney Memorial Library, with a window where library patrons can look at his burrow.

Back in 2009, library workers said Phil had managed to escape three times, climbing into the library ceiling and dropping into offices about 50 feet away. He was not injured.