Heat Recap and A Look Ahead

The last 2 days were quite hot, with many records being broken on Sunday. Let’s take a look at the high temperatures.

Sunday: 

Wow!!! Widespread highs of 95-102 degrees! It sure felt hot if you stepped outside. The hot weather and a nearby weather disturbance contributed to scattered thunderstorms and very muggy weather. Here’s some cool clouds I saw last night that show instability in the atmosphere.

Today (Monday) was another hot day. Highs of 85-95 around the area today. Still hot, but not as hot as yesterday.

Western Washington wasn’t the only place setting records this weekend. Death Valley in California recorded a high temperature of 130 DEGREES on Sunday, one of the highest temperatures ever recorded on Earth. This could also be the hottest reliably recorded temperature ever, as the other two 130+ highs were in the early 1900s (134F and 131F, both near Death Valley), when weather instruments were much less accurate than now.

This graphic is from weather.com, and it shows that if this is verified by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), it will be the world’s highest temperature since 131F in 1913 (also at Death Valley). That’s crazy!

Let’s take a look ahead...as we cool down from the heat of the past few days, temperatures will become more seasonable for Western Washington. Tuesday and Wednesday will be mostly sunny and 75-85 degrees. Expect early morning clouds clearing out for sunshine. 

Clouds and rain chances return Wednesday night and remain through Friday night. The GFS model suggests 0.4-0.6 inches of rain between Thursday and Saturday, a decent amount for August. As rain moves in, temperatures will cool to the low-mid 70s before rebounding to the mid-upper 70s by next weekend.

This will help keep fires contained, as this August has been quite dry, with our area only totaling under 0.05 inches of rain so far. Stay tuned for more rain updates. 

However, don’t forget that as we are cooling down, one thing is heating up...