Talk about heat that isn’t horsing around! We’ve had more days in July with 100+ temperatures than not and we’re in for another week of them, not to mention that we’ve already had several hot months. In fact, since April 10th, at which time we were having a beautiful spring, we’ve averaged 88% ABOVE NORMAL high temperatures!
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That’s more than three months of hotter than normal days! In fact, April averaged 2.8 degrees above normal. Check out all the ‘red’ boxes showing 22 days above average for high temps:
Our May followed fast on the hot heels marking in as our second hottest May on record. Again plenty of red boxes...27 days above normal highs!
June showed up by the light of a very hot silvery moon as our HOTTEST June on record and, as you might guess, July is trending in the same direction. In fact, the May-July three months may come in on top for heat:
I’ve done a lot of comparisons to those very hot years of 1980, 1998 and 2011. Here’s how we stack up as far as 100-degree days against those years, keeping in mind that we’re only half done!
I’m not placing any track bets on whether we reach 46 days of century marks, but certainly 24 is likely and 32 is possible by a nose! And the graphic below shows our trend since 1970 of reaching 100 degree days:
Last year we officially didn’t even get to 100! We did hit 99 three times at Bush/IAH during the summer (once in each summer month!), and Hobby made it to 100 once, so not every year has this kind of horsepower. But this one does and all indications are that we better saddle up and grab a longneck! We’re not likely to buck this trend anytime soon. Big thanks to meteorologist Caroline Brown for today’s graphics!
Frank