TheClimateChanger

Yes, looks like our spell of nearly ideal weather is coming to an end.

I don't think the Little Ice Age would be much of a factor. Perhaps @donsutherland1 could weigh in? But looking at proxy-based global temperature reconstructions, it would appear globally temperatures varied no more than about .5C over the preceding 2,000 years until the mid 19th century. And that temperatures by about the 1930s were decidedly warmer than at any time in the preceding 2,000 years. People often bandy around terms they don't understand. Even during the Holocene Thermal Optimum, mid-latitude winters were likely harsher than during the 19th century, as the earth would have been tilted at a greater angle away from the sun during wintertime. The summer warming is just a considerably larger impact, because that's when almost all of the solar radiation falls in the high latitude.

They are forecasting A LOT of drought though:

A little bit of D3 - Extreme Drought introduced to a small part of southwest Pennsylvania:

Bradford pear?

Here is the Iowa snowstorm. Must have been a wicked bomb cyclone. Look at the track of that low pressure center. Chicago --> La Crosse, Wisconsin, before drifting southwest into Iowa.

That must have been quite the bomb cyclone. Wicked loop there with the low pressure center passing from Chicago to La Crosse, Wisconsin, and then drifting southwest into Iowa.

It was a LOT colder back then though, so Africa was probably pretty temperate, especially at elevation. Well, for most of that time... per AI, it sounds like homo sapiens first evolved around 300,000 years ago, so they would have been around for a couple of glacial cycles and lived through the somewhat warmer Eemian interglacial. Of course, more importantly, the population was tiny compared to today.

Benign weather persists across the region. With another dry day in the offing, Akron will have seen just 0.29" of rain over the past 47 days (August 1 to September 16). August was the driest month on record at Akron with just 0.19" of rainfall. Note - not just the driest August, but driest of any month. Through today, only another 0.10" of rain has been measured in the month of September. This is the driest 47 day stretch on record. The prior record was 0.34" ending on November 17, 1924, but persisting for an additional 4 days [reaching a total of 51 days with just 0.34"]. In addition, a 47-day period ending on July 9, 1988, measured just 0.37" of rain. While a 47-day period ending on October 29, 1963, measured just 0.43" with that tally holding for an additional day. The next chance for rain occurs on Sunday, suggesting the current tally should hold through at least 51 days.

Wow, where are you heading? Iceland?

That information is available: Drought Classification | U.S. Drought Monitor D0 corresponds to indices in the 20th to 30th percentile, meaning any given week, on average, about 3 in 10 years should be at least "abnormally dry." Over the course of the year (52 weeks), the recurrence for at least some period of D0 or worse during the course of the year is probably like once every 2 years (given that the weekly percentile is nearly 1 in 3). It's not particularly rare.

Will be interesting to see whether the Youghiogheny River Lake approaches the lows of last autumn. Currently, around 1415.8' ASL. Looks like it fell to around 1,369' in early November 2024, although I'm not sure of the exact low. Further research suggests a low of about 1,362' in December 1998, and a value in 1991 of about 6' higher than that. The December 21, 1998 low was said to have been exceeded twice, in 1954 & 1957. Source: A bridge to the 19th century Not sure we reach as low as last fall unless October is dry, but decent odds of dropping below 1,400' again. Not sure when the "ghost bridge" becomes visible.

Those don't sound like representative readings. Likely in a sheltered valley or "frost hollow" that would violate WMO siting guidelines.

Officially came in as 3rd driest August on record for the Commonwealth. Ohio, Kentucky and Vermont all had their driest Augusts of record.

The State of New Hampshire had its driest summer on record, although precipitation for the CONUS as a whole came in a bit above normal.

Extremely dry conditions noted in many areas. Ohio obliterated the record for driest August. Kentucky & Vermont also had their driest Augusts on record.

Vermont and Kentucky also had their driest Augusts on record, with Missouri and Pennsylvania coming in 3rd place, and West Virginia in 2nd place.

Incredible. Easily the driest August on record for Ohio, with a statewide average of 1.01" of rainfall. The previous record was 1.31" in August 1951.

The gap between the pristine, gold standard US Climate Reference Network and nClimDiv continues to widen, with USCRN coming in a whopping 0.2F warmer for this summer. Contrary to the narrative widely spun on social media (and even among some in the traditional media), USCRN continues to warm at a faster rate than nClimDiv as more unadjusted/uncorrected biases are allowed to infiltrate nClimDiv. Recently, NOAA replaced temperature sensors, shields, and aspiration fans across its ASOS network, although it's unclear whether this is fully completed [last update was from July 1 and they were over halfway done at that time]. Probably no surprise that this summer saw the widest gap between the two, when ASOS sites make up a sizable portion of the nClimDiv dataset. The only difference in rankings is while nClimDiv has 2006 as 0.17F warmer than this summer, USCRN has this summer as 0.21F warmer. Also, USCRN has this summer MUCH closer to 2011, 2018, and 2016 - within a few hundredths of a degree. USCRN would also rank 2021 above 1936, subject, of course, to the qualification that this network didn't exist at that time (so it's comparing to the anomalies from nClimDiv dataset).

No statewide records, although a number of states finished in the top 10th percentile. No states were cooler than the full mean.

For summer as a whole, this will go down in the books as the 12th hottest on record, as I had predicted at the beginning of the month. Official number checks in at 73.33F, very near my ballpark estimate of 73.39F. Just 0.65F shy of the record summers of 2021 & 1936. I think it's only a matter of time before we eclipse that. The only summers hotter than this one from the 20th century were the drought-ridden Dust Bowl years of 1934 & 1936.

Big dropoff in August temperatures for the CONUS, although the persons characterizing this as a "normal" or "average" August were clearly full of you know what. Coldest since 2017, but still 28th warmest overall. One thing you can easily see in this graphic is before about the mid 1980s, Augusts this warm nationally were very rare (only a handful of occasions).