There continues to be a number of reports of colder than normal weather and seasons from around the globe. Here are a few.
Loveland Pass Colorado, today
Australia:
http://www.weatherzone.com.au/news/cold-weather-here-to-stay/9718
Cold weather here to stay
Tom Saunders, Saturday August 16, 2008 – 20:23 EST
August 2008 continues to be one of the coldest on record for most of Australia with temperatures averaging as much as six degrees below normal.
The cold weather has even spread to northern Queensland with Burketown dropping to five degrees on Saturday morning for the first time in 24 years. On the Queensland coast Coolangatta has now dropped to five or less on 10 consecutive mornings, easily beating the old record of six.
Daytime has brought little relief with Orange shivering through 10 consecutive days below eight degrees for the first time in 17 years.
The prolonged cold spell is due to a strong high pressure system anchored south of WA. The high is directing southerly winds over the country, carrying cold air from the Southern Ocean well north into the tropics.
The high will finally move east early next week but a second high will maintain chilly weather until at least Sunday.
– Weatherzone
Canada endures ‘briefest summer’ in decades
A bummer summer
Our sunny hopes for a long, hot season have been dampened by too many wet weekendsAugust 16, 2008(Aug 16, 2008)
Summer, we hardly knew ye. Even the sunniest optimist can’t deny the signs. It’s all but over. Area fall fairs start today. The CNE is under way. (Both, no doubt, doomed to storms that are both unforecast and torrentialWhat, you say summer doesn’t officially end until 11:44 a.m. on Sept. 22? Only if you’re an astronomer.
Back-to-school ads are out, retailers licking their chops in anticipation that Christmas is virtually around the corner. Soon sweaty Olympians will be replaced on TV by sweatier Jerry Lewis, the Ticats thump the Argos on Labour Day weekend, and the wet, brief, Summer of Woe-Eight is history. Has any summer felt shorter? And why does it matter? What is it about summer that so often breaks our hearts?
If you measure the season by blue sky and sunshine, this has been the briefest summer since perhaps the oppressive gloom and cold of the summer of 1992.
It’s not so much the total rainfall this season — although Hamilton has indeed had at least 10 centimetres more rain than average, and three times more than last summer. No, it’s more about timing. Summer is about the weekend. Last year, to this point in the summer, Hamilton had measurable rainfall on a total of four Saturdays or Sundays.
This summer? Sixteen — rain on 16 Saturdays or Sundays. Put another way, last summer there were seven totally dry weekends, this summer, just one (July 4-5).
Worst of all, the weather has been maddeningly schizophrenic, storm clouds on the periphery seemingly every day, and forecasts as scientific as a Ouija board.
“If it’s bright all day, or rains all day, it’s easy to plan, but we’ve seen the weather changing on a dime, by the hour,” said Dave Phillips, senior climatologist with Environment Canada, who is quick to assert that forecasters “never promise anything.”
As if to compound frustration over the summer that wasn’t, there is nothing convenient on which to blame the weather, not global warming, El Nino or El Nina. The cave-like summer of 1992 — perhaps the worst ever for cloud and cold — was attributed to atmospheric fallout of dust from the eruption of Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines the year prior.
And this summer? There’s no identifiable cause for our season of discontent, other than we have for some reason been trapped beneath what is called an “upper low,” an oxymoronic disturbance parked over the James Bay-Central Quebec area that moves around a bit but never really exits, refusing to spin north or east, which would allow for the arrival of dry warm air from the southern United States.
Complete article here
In Colorado, an early mountain snow, the forecast…http://www.9news.com/news/article.aspx?storyid=97578&catid=339
In addition to the fall-like temperatures, the storm will bring a very good chance for rain to the metro area and snow to the high country.
Scattered showers and a few isolated thunderstorms will first develop along the urban corridor starting late Thursday afternoon. The rain will become more widespread as the main storm system moves into the state Thursday night.
And the results…
DENVER (Map, News) – Heavy rains prompted flood watches and warnings in Colorado‘s foothills, along the Front Range and on the eastern plains Saturday, while snow temporarily closed Loveland Pass in the mountains west of Denver.
http://www.examiner.com/a-1540471~Colorado_sees_flood_warnings__snow.html
We had a cold front reach Florida in mid-August. I cannot recall the last time this has occured. Perhaps I am more aware now that I have taken an active interest in the AGW debate (thanks in great part to this excellent web site!)
Funny, Metcheck shows that the CET for England is +0.5Deg C above the average for August and I am just going to put the central heating on.
http://www.metcheck.com/V40/UK/FREE/month.asp
R Sach
DaveK,
Good question. At bottom of the Accuweather story in your link:
“By the way, the University of Alabama at Huntsville (UAH) lower tropospheric temperature anomaly for the globe was +0.06 C/ +0.11 F, making this past July the 15th warmest over the past 30 years based on this particular satellite measurement.”
So, you ask a good question. Is it the 5th warmest in 128 years? Or the 15th warmest in the last 30? It can’t be both, somebody’s got it wrong. Those of us who keep an eye on this blog and surfacestations and CA will have our own opinions about who to trust. Which will differ from someone at Accuweather who sees two temperature reports, and picks one to lead the story, and the other for the token “yeah but” at the bottom from us grumbling flat-earthers.
Steven Talbot,
I live in North Wales and whilst we haven’t yet resorted to the central heating we have occasionally used the gas fire and frequently donned more clothing. So I had to laugh when, shivering in the bathroom this morning atfer my shower, the BBC weatherman said on the radio that temperatures were normal for this time of year!
The clincher though is when your teenagers, who are normally impervious to this sort of thing, start telling you it is COLD.
An inconvenient truth, or a denialist talking point?: http://www.crh.noaa.gov/news/display_cmsstory.php?wfo=lot&storyid=17450&source=0
On Saturday I read the weather forecast and saw that I had a window of opportunity – two fine days in a row. My friend the meteorologist has assured me that modern weather forecasts can be very accurate, so I spent some quality masculine time in my garden pruning trees.
Unfortunately, the saw was quite blunt so I quickly worked up a sweat, despite the cool 12 deg C temperature. I decided to visit the local hardware store to buy a saw file, and as luck would have it, found one that was just the right size, and for a very reasonable price in these days of high oil prices.
The work went much more quickly after some judicious work with the file, and I finished the job just as the sun was setting, at which time I noticed a distinct drop in temperature.
Next day also dawned fine, so I mowed the lawn and generally cleaned up after my previous day’s efforts. After lunch I dozed off in the sunroom, where the temperatures are often higher, although sometimes lower, than in other parts of the house.
Tonight the rain is falling intermittently, as it tends to do at this time of year. So all in all, nothing much out of the ordinary, but still, makes you think.
R Sach (12:14:37) :
Like so many on this blog try to remember what an average temperature is (i.e. day AND night)!!
Dave Andrews (12:56:28) :
“……the BBC weatherman said on the radio that temperatures were normal for this time of year!”
err, temperatures are normal, and using hormone crazy teenagers as proof the weatherman are wrong..frankly bizarre!
I would think some would be inclined to ferret out an explanation for the difference between the perceptions of a significant, disbursed, population vs the official history.
Mass hysteria, perhaps.
We should build our own weather monitoring network.
garron writes,
We should build our own weather monitoring network.
What a wonderful suggestion. Seems we have posters from all over the globe ( I’m in central Connecticut). Would love to see a suggestion by the boss, Mr. Watts, for such an undertaking.
WRT to the Corn crop – the Corn crop in N Texas was 70-80 bu/ac average vs 100-110 that we would have expected. March and April were cold and cloudy and the corn got too slow of a start. We did not get our first cutting of hay until the end of june vs the end of may. The Sudan crop did not emerge until the middle of june vs april 15th most years.
This may end up being our wettest august on record AND one of the coolest depsite the 100+ degree days at the beginning of the month. Its been very cool the last few days.
Today in Seattle it is raining and will reach only the mid-60s. That is fine after the past few days of 90s and not particularly special, but, on tuesday night what is described by NOAA as an “unusual” cold front will roll over us, bringing snow levels in the Cascade Mountains down to 7,000 feet or lower. That system may roll down to Colorado on Thursday or Friday. So, watch out down there.
Twenty hundred and froze to death. Not quite as extreme as the impacts of Tamobora, but definitely a pretty lame summer in many parts of the NH.
We should build our own weather monitoring network.
sign me up, I can give you a choice of some actual rural locations.
As to own weather networks – what are the rural stations on the wunderground?
Does this theory hold water?
Not if you cut down all the trees . . .
Mary H,
The reference to my teenagers was meant to be humorous.
With regard to temperature, whilst anecdotal, I suspect most posts are not reliant on individual points of view and they are largely consistent from several continents.
Does this prove anything, maybe not, except that the UK Met Office constantly talking up the warming and getting their longer term forecasts spectacularly wrong, in the face of individual peoples actual experience, is going to result in tears for the Met Office.
It has been colder than usual this winter in eastern Australia. Here in Sydney the winter has been more extended and we’ve had more days of frost than usual. Snow has fallen to about 1200Ft (350m) in the south of the state and down to sea level in Tasmania. This would not be unusual in 1970 but we haven’t had many cool winters like this for 30 years. This morning it’s 2.5 degrees again amd we had a sleety shower last evening with the thermometer reading about 4C.
Although this is warm compared with northern Hemisphere climates we are all looking forward to spring here. While it’s still cold though I’m off to the ski fields this weekend to make use of the 2m base of dry powder.
Well second line of thunderstorms ripping though Hamilton today. We did have a rain free weekend for a change. Supposed to be sunny all this week we will see.
A record snow base now exists at Turoa Skifield in New Zealand. Snow graphs are available at
http://www.mtruapehu.com/winter/latest-news/
Unfortunately there was so much snow we couldn’t get to the skifield last weekend, and it is still snowing … 🙂
The weather service in New Zealand and the news media have been strangely silent on any possible connection between the recent cold spell, record snow levels and “climate change” – formerly known as “global warming”. Notwithstanding this, the old media (ie everything excepting the internet) continues to be littered with the usual doom and gloom stories about the feared consequences of carbon dioxide global warming. When will they wake up? They are losing their audience to the internet, because the truth is more accessible here.
i hate windows vista …too!!
all versions!!
in england da weathers terrible too its lyk thunder lighting in summmer weird init
It’s been cooler this Summer in Beaufort, South Carolina except for three days in the second week of August when it reached over 100 degrees F. It’s cooled back down to the low to mid 80’s since then. Trees have started to change color here early. The first trees to change color here for fall is the sycamore they always change in late August but this year they have started to change in late July I have never seen them change this early since I have lived here 37 years. some other trees that have started to change are the red oaks, sweet gum, maples and some dogwoods. There has also been a coolness to the air even on the hotter days this year. It’s usually very hot and humid down here in the summer. Maybe we’ll get some snow down here for winter that has not happened since 1989.
[…] today Australia: http://www.weatherzone.com.au/news/cold-weather-here-to-stay/9718 Cold weather herehttp://wattsupwiththat.wordpress.com/2008/08/16/anecdotal-cold-weather-news-from-around-the-world/Wet, wild weather The Peterborough ExaminerA severe thunderstorm hit the area with torrential […]
Hi all, in Europe it has been a generally cool summer in western side (Uk, Portugal) but warm in the eastern part. In Austria, where I am living, after a very mild winter it was quite a long warm season and we had record thunderstorms. But the warm was average and not the extreme like 2003 and 2007. In September the weather is now much colder than average with already some snowfall in mountains (and its still official summer!).
In Portugal, my home country, it was a warm winter (with really unusual warm in February), then the cold and wet weather follow all spring and summer.
But I guess this is still not extraordinary weather. We forgot quickly how cool was the weather before the rapid warming of the decade of 90. It used to be like this before! The lack of sunspots, la nina, and recent volcanic eruptions help bring this cold weather for 2008 and perhaps still in 2009. But it is still far from being a little ice age climate!