Monday, July 2, 2012

One Hot Week

A hazy, smoke-enhanced sunset heralded the end of a 99-degree day in St. Paul.
Whether it's labeled with "excessive heat warning," "heat advisory," or merely "stinking hot," it's hot, headline-stealing hot. The only suspense, it would appear, is whether the mercury will hit the century mark this week.
Posted by at

29 comments:

  1. big daddyJuly 3, 2012 at 1:56 AM

    we reached 99 Monday,if its going to be this stinkin hot it might as well hit 100,when are the 70's coming back....I hate this crap!

    ReplyDelete
  2. bemakiJuly 3, 2012 at 10:06 AM

    @Bill, carrying on previous discussion-
    Don't forget, that the official temperature reading must be taken over 100ft away from the nearest concreate structure or asphalt road. In addition, the reading MUST be taken in the shade of some object, wheather it be a wooden building or a tree. Thus, it does indeed make sense why they lowered the requirements for urban areas, because its hard to believe that you will be 100ft away from the road and in the shade of some wooden object in downtown Minneapolis or St. Paul.

    ReplyDelete
  3. AnonymousJuly 3, 2012 at 10:16 AM

    Quick question for you weather folks... why didn't we get thunderstorms earlier in the day on Monday? From my limited knowledge, it appears that we broke cap by the 00z sounding... http://www.spc.noaa.gov/exper/soundings/12070300_OBS/MPX.gif

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. randyinchamplinJuly 4, 2012 at 6:36 PM

      anonymous here is the link you posted again.

      http://www.spc.noaa.gov/exper/soundings/12070300_OBS/MPX.gif

      here is the same thing from a different sight.

      http://i960.photobucket.com/albums/ae84/arpetersonembaqcom/skew_KMPX-3.gif

      The skew T plot that you posted on the upper left shows the temp's on the red line and the Relative Humidity on the green line. The one I posted both are white. The closer those are the more saturated the column is. So that sounding while showing some saturation it really wasn't that high. Also notice the two dry punches at 650mb and 450mb.

      The real critical thing I want to point out is the Temp at 700mb. To find it follow the red line up to 700mb. Now look at the temperature lines, notice how the 10 and 20° degree line slant upward from the left to right on a diagonal from the bottom of graph. If you can follow that you will see that the 750mb to 700 mb temp was between roughly 15 and 12°C respectfully. Ideally you would want those temps to be under 12 to break the cap. On the Skew T that I posted look at the cap strength (you will find it on the left as CAP) it shows 2.4, anything around 2 is virtually unbreakable as a general rule (key term is general.)

      So why did the cap break later? First of all I was about to go to bed that night about 1230am as none of the short range models that update hourly were showing anything for the metro. But I decided to look one more time at the Meso Analysis page from the SPC, which updates about 25 min past the hour. I noticed a few things that caught my attention. #1.. there was a large moisture transport working it's way up from NE into SW MN up to the west of the metro. #2.. The precipitable water values had gone up to about 1.8" near the Metro which is very high. #3 I noticed that the temps between 700-500mb were cooling rapidly in SW MN and that the lower levels were ever so slightly cooling. #4 the 700mb temps were very close to 12°C. I decided to stay up longer to see if initiation would fire over SW MN, and low and behold it happened, as these storms moved to the NE they kind of merged with the storms coming down from the north. If this same scenario would have set up before sundown, things would have gotten interesting indeed.

      I hope that helps....since I am a amateur at this, If DDwx or NovakWeather see's this, please correct anything you see as being incorrect.

      Delete
    2. AnonymousJuly 6, 2012 at 4:32 PM

      Taking a quick look at the sounding provided, there appears to be a very weak cap in the environmental temperature trace starting at ~850. The environmental lapse rate (how much the air cools as one ascends through it) is roughly -10 *C per km up to ~850 mb. At 850, the environmental temperature starts cooling at slightly less than -10 *C. The lifted condensation level for a surface parcel was around 775 mb. This imparted a very small cap on a surface based parcel.

      Even with this small amount of convective inhibition (input energy required to realize the available energy), the lack of a boundary to force the parcels aloft through the negative area (cin, again) prevented the development of thunderstorms.

      It's likely that later in the evening one or a combination of factors acted on the environment to neutralize the inhibition experienced earlier.

      -- Kevin.

      Delete
  4. CWY2190July 4, 2012 at 12:07 AM

    Nothing to set them off like a front or dryline.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Disco80July 5, 2012 at 8:55 AM

    48 hours at 80F+ as of 10am today. We'll easily get to 60 hours.

    Also, it looks like the daily minimum today will be 80, so we had consecutive days with an 80+ daily minimum, which has not happened since 6/30 + 7/1/2002. And the 81 minimum yesterday (a record) was the warmest since the heatwave of 1936. 7/13/1936 had an overnight low of 86!

    ReplyDelete
  6. AnonymousJuly 5, 2012 at 9:00 AM

    According to this: http://w1.weather.gov/data/obhistory/KMSP.html, it seems that we dipped to 79 at some point.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Disco80July 5, 2012 at 9:13 AM

    I don't see it. it was 80 at 3:53 and 4:53.

    ReplyDelete
  8. BillJuly 5, 2012 at 11:52 AM

    If you look at the 6-hour Max/Min column in http://w1.weather.gov/data/obhistory/KMSP.html, it shows that the temp reached 79 at some point in the six hours ending at 7 a.m. (or 6:53 a.m.).

    ReplyDelete
  9. My BlogJuly 5, 2012 at 2:34 PM

    Looks like we won't hit forecasted highs again today. I'll take every little bit of good news where I can get. Counting down the days of summer!

    ReplyDelete
  10. Disco80July 5, 2012 at 6:42 PM

    Well, it looks like the "official" high was 79 according also to Wunderground. So, boo-hoo. :)

    ReplyDelete
  11. Disco80July 6, 2012 at 7:43 AM

    79 was the official low, which is still a record, beating the old record of 78 in 1982.

    At any rate, the first five days of July are running about 14 degrees above normal.

    ReplyDelete
  12. AnonymousJuly 6, 2012 at 3:01 PM

    Global warming. Its real. Not made up.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. bemakiJuly 6, 2012 at 9:51 PM

      It is not global warming. It is global Climate Change. The entire world is not heating up. The whole of Europe grows colder. Pockets at sea grow colder. Sure, most of world is heating up, but not all of it. Therefore warming trends cannot be considerd global.

      Delete
  13. bemakiJuly 6, 2012 at 9:54 PM

    Interesting... the NWS terminated the watch before the storms began. It seems that same error that occured with the nowcasting a year ago. The cool, dry air came in below, but it is still elevated warmth to touch off elevated thunderstorms.

    ReplyDelete
  14. BillJuly 6, 2012 at 11:37 PM

    Yea, it did seem weird that the storms got started after the watch was dropped. However, these storms aren't severe so they're still OK.

    Speaking of the NWS, I think they really nailed the timing of the end of the excessive heat warning. The temperature became more comfortable almost exactly around 7 p.m. I'll give them credit for that.

    ReplyDelete
  15. BIG DADDYJuly 13, 2012 at 5:41 AM

    More 90's and possible 100 degree coming again,next 5 days! Here's one for all you research folks,we are in a 16 day strecth with above 85 degree temps,is the current streak the longest,if not what is the record for above 85 degree weather. This has been one hot start to summer that I can remember(living here or NY)

    ReplyDelete
  16. My BlogJuly 14, 2012 at 3:30 PM

    Pretty much knew when we lost our winter that this summer would bake. I think someone even laughed at me when I suggested it.

    Seems like there are more extremes but patterns seem to last forever. I'm not calling it just yet, but at this rate this winter may have more moisture than last, but will be warmer than usual.. again. Look for lots of freezing rain and thunderstorms in Dec.

    ReplyDelete
  17. My BlogJuly 14, 2012 at 3:32 PM

    I have been outspoken against "global warming" for a long time. Call it US warming, but I'm now convinced our climate is seeing some very very long term warming trends that seem like they will continue. Dance around the wording, but something is happening here... whatever it is, I wish it were the reverse. This heat sucks!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. big daddyJuly 14, 2012 at 6:59 PM

      Amen brother......this heat does suck.......up to 18 days now over 85,anyone know the record or where I could get that info?

      Delete
    2. randyinchamplinJuly 15, 2012 at 2:31 PM

      big daddy:

      I don't know where to find days above 85, but with today we are now 20 days above 90 and with Mon and Tuesday we are looking at two more. Next weekend looks very warm as well.

      The record for days above 90 was set in the drought year of 1988, that year 44 days or 90 or warmer.

      Delete
    3. randyinchamplinJuly 15, 2012 at 10:10 PM

      big daddy:

      I don't know how many days we have been above 85 this year, but the NWS has put this out. As you can see we are at 19 days straight of 85 or higher for high temps. The record is 23 days, that is about to go down. Just scroll down to see it.

      http://www.crh.noaa.gov/news/display_cmsstory.php?wfo=mpx&storyid=85155&source=0

      The question is will we approach our record of 44 days above 90 for the year? I don't think so but it could be close. I calling for 35-40 days total of above 90.

      Hope I'm wrong

      Delete
  18. AnonymousJuly 14, 2012 at 7:44 PM

    Another 100 degree day looking likely again on Monday.

    ReplyDelete
  19. big daddyJuly 16, 2012 at 9:51 AM

    @Randyinchamplain....thanks for the link,that's exactly what I was looking for,I knew we had to be close,its been pretty warm for awhile now(85+),I'm focused around the 85 threshold because that's the highest average temp MSP gets,so when everyone is focused at 90 or above,I believe the true above average number we should be looking at is 85,today will be Day 20,Wednesday and Thursday of this week might be close to NOT reaching 85,will be close,I could see a high of 85 both days,if we don't stumble midweek then the beat goes on,cuz I see 90+ from Fri to early next week.I hate the heat,but like anything else if were going to be this close we might as well set a record,kinda like the snow record we came so close to 2 seasons ago.Bill I think a new post might be in order,as we inch closer to this record.

    ReplyDelete
  20. AnonymousJuly 17, 2012 at 5:24 AM

    @big daddy,day 21 will easily be reached today,and if you follow the weather.com forecast then the record of 85+ days in a row should have no problem getting to 30 days.See what happens.

    ReplyDelete
  21. Disco80July 17, 2012 at 9:40 AM

    A couple tidbits:

    - the 1891-2012 high/low average for 1st-16th July is 83/63. This year our average is 93/71. Every single day this month has been above average high AND low.

    - the 1891-2012 high/low average for all days thru July is 54/35. 2012 so far is 59/41.

    - the last day that didn't reach 80 was 25th June (77). Last sub-85 was 26th June (82). We've been at or above 60 since 8:00am on 13th June. I would like to see the record for that stat.

    ReplyDelete
  22. Disco80July 17, 2012 at 9:47 AM

    I should add this interesting factoid: if we hit the highs forecast thru Friday, our average high temp this year will reach 60 (right now it's 59.45). Keep in mind that the the two coldest months (Jan/Feb) are behind us.

    ReplyDelete
  23. free checkersJuly 23, 2012 at 4:26 AM

    I love warm weather but 96 degrees is way too much for me. My poor dog lies in the shade with a hanging tongue all day long.

    ReplyDelete

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)