Saturday May 18th … Dear Diary. The main purpose of this ongoing blog will be to track United States extreme or record temperatures related to climate change. Any reports I see of ETs will be listed below the main topic of the day. I’ll refer to extreme or record temperatures as ETs (not extraterrestrials).😉
First Heat Wave For United States Of 2019
A few days ago models were hinting that a major heat dome would develop in the southern U.S. but were having a hard time pinpointing exactly where:
Now models have been very consistent since Wednesday that a heat dome maxing out around 594 decameters will get centered over my home state of Georgia by Thursday of this coming week:
What strikes me about the above image is A) how amplified the overall pattern is and B) how many closed lows there are surrounded by above average 500 millibar heights (in red). This is climate disruption at its worst, or about as bad as you will see it at 500 millibars as of 2019.
Through next week the primary threat for life and limb will be severe storms, but we will see some record May heat in association with the southeastern ridge. It will be interesting to see how hot it gets in my home city of Atlanta, which already came within two degrees Fahrenheit of the record high of 90 Friday when the thermometer hit 88.
I expect that this heat wave will last about a week then ebb as the heat dome diminishes according to most guidance after Thursday or Friday and will only be confined to about the southeastern quarter of the nation. Also, the heat wave will probably be on the lower end of severity for threatening life. For example, in Atlanta we would need to see many days above 95F before seeing fatalities because of air conditioning, unless careless people leave children and animals in cars with rolled up windows. Most folks have adapted to high heat and humidity across the South. This first time around I doubt that Atlanta will see 95F even for one day. Still, conditions will become quite uncomfortable for many who have to work outside or do sports. People should take precautions.
Beginning today and for the summer I will present this WSI chart depicting maxes for the following day to let my readers get an idea of how much heat will be affecting areas of the lower 48 states:
On Sunday we will see a band of 90s stretching from Florida northeast into the Middle Atlantic area, which will be near record values for mid May.
We will see how many records we get out of this heat event. Also, look for notes and articles on the associated severe weather outbreaks in the news section below each day that we continue to have this very amplified weather pattern.
Monday looks like a particularly bad day for severe weather in the Plains.
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Here is some more climate and weather news from Saturday:
(As usual, this will be a fluid post in which more information gets added during the day as it crosses my radar, crediting all who have put it on-line. Items will be archived on this site for posterity. In most instances click on the pictures of each tweet to see each article.)
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Guy Walton- “The Climate Guy”