roardog

August started cool and obviously ended very cool with just “heat” in the middle of the month which was more like very warm with obnoxious dewpoints. July was certainly hot overall but June was fairly cool until the last week to 10 days of the month. For all the talk of record setting ridges and all that stuff, it wasn’t even anything special for heat.

I gotta say. This cool airmass is impressive not only in strength but in duration. I mean, the sun has been set for about an hour and a half here and the temperature is already down into the 40s. That’s impressive for August even if it is at the end of the month.

Yeah. I’m seeing that too. I remember a lot of early color in 2017 after that cool August and early September. Then it of course turned hot in late September as you know. lol.

Through yesterday, we are now at .4 above average for the month around here. Tomorrow will be well below average and the lows around here for sure will be below average the rest of the month. The highs might be too but Sunday might be close. I think we’re going to end the month slightly below average with the low temperatures leading the way which has become quite unusual in recent times.

I still think that all of the extra water vapor/moisture around the globe(compared to a few decades ago)helps keep the summers cloudier and cooler there while keeping the other seasons warmer. Every year when October rolls around these days, the temp anomaly maps go from light blue to dark red. It just can’t cool down as fast as it used to with so much more moisture in the air. Having more open water than decades ago probably just adds to the moisture.

We have some of the bluest sky I’ve seen in a long time here. A nice Canadian airmass with no smoke. It was down into the low 50s last night and should get to the mid 70s today with dewpoints in the 50s. It’s in the low 60s now with a breeze. It has a September feel to the air.

This weekend/early next week might actually bring you some organized widespread convection for a change.

We had 2.2 inches yesterday and 1.25 inches last week so all grass is green and happy again.

We got a good region wide soaker over here this evening after some downpours late this morning/early afternoon too.

Yeah. It’s getting crispy around here now too. We’ve definitely had more rain than you’ve had this summer but with these slow/nearly stationary storms, it almost has to develop over top of you or it rains itself out before it moves 5 miles. lol

People forget that 2012 fell off a cliff in August. Prior to that it wasn’t that low relatively speaking. Also when a graph only has this year and 2012 on it, it’s hard to get a visual on how it compares to other years since then.

I was hoping the SW flow later this week would push the smoke out. Maybe not if it’s way down there. lol

Then on top of that, if the ONI ends up cold neutral but RONI is into Nina, does the ACE rule apply then? Neutral and weak are tough because there’s just so many competing influences on the pattern.

It’s even raining here. I don’t think any of the models had the rain even close to getting this far north. The forecast still only has a 40 percent chance here. lol

Sunny with highs in the low 70s and dewpoints in the 40s. Boring as ever but you can’t really beat it comfortable wise in late July. Already down to the low 60s and most likely headed to the 40s tonight. Who says we can’t get low dewpoints in the summer anymore? lol

Yeah. I said that last winter. Some of the air masses last winter were very cold. We had a couple of mornings here that were below zero with strong winds. It takes a very cold airmass to achieve that around here with the warming influence of the Great Lakes. Below zero temps are much more common here in clear, calm nights. If we would have had any clear and calm nights when those air masses were overhead, there would have easily been some -20s in some spots. The center of those Arctic highs were generally south of here so the atmosphere always stayed well mixed

Mid 40s here this morning. Feels refreshing.

Nice cool day today. Only in the mid 60s with lots of clouds. Feels nice.

They are but what I'm saying is we often see H5 forecasts that don't make sense with 2m temp forecasts. You'll see a forecast in the medium range for a massive ridge over Alaska in January with a flow directly from the north pole into the northern plains and the 2m temp anomalies will show normal or barely below normal. This is where you look at that map and realize it would be frigid in that location if that actual H5 forecast verified.

Quite Frankly, models suck with 2m temp anomalies in the medium range, never mind a seasonal forecast. It's pretty much useless to look at IMO. They are a little better with 850 temp anomalies but not much. It's best to just look at their 500mb anomaly forecasts and that will give you an idea on what temp anomalies would be if that particular map was to come to fruition.

We really need an almost perfect setup to beat that 2012 record. The cool June and continued strong +AO and cool isn't going to cut it regardless of the May melt pond data IMO.

It looks like GAWX posted that it peaked at +1.95. I thought it peaked at +2.0. Maybe what I saw was rounded up? I guess 1.95 isn’t technically super.

This is off topic but I have memories of a hot June in the mid 1990s and I always feel like I’m remembering 1995 because it was a hot summer. However, I don’t think June of 1995 was actually warm. I wonder if I’m remembering 1994.

Two of those years on that composite are super Nino(23-24 and 82-83) so that probably skews it some.

I think the overall point of posting that map was to show that despite being hot in the Midwest and northeast, the country had a lot of well below normal temperatures in the western half on Sunday. There was some impressive chill out there even if the daily departures weren’t -30.