Meteorological Summer Has Arrived
Way Over Our Heads 6-2-2021
Wed, 6/2 8:42PM • 26:52
SPEAKERS
Jim du Bois, Kenny Blumenfeld
Jim du Bois 00:00
The calendar and the weather agree: summer has begun. This is Way Over Our Heads. It's a weather and climate podcast. I'm Jim du Bois. Kenny Blumenfeld's a climatologist. Kenny, how was your Memorial Day weekend?
Kenny Blumenfeld 00:14
So we had a nice extra day off and went out to western Minnesota and saw some pretty stuff. You know, outside of the Twin Cities, I think that the Memorial Days, rightfully, are a much more solemn day and you'll find a lot more things shut down as people either take the day off or observe the holiday or both. Just good to remember. You know, we get that extra weekend day because of folks who sacrificed their lives in service of our country. So it was a good weekend. Western Minnesota, the sunshined almost all weekend long, and we only had very brief showers on Saturday. I understand it wasn't quite that way in the Twin Cities. But yeah, how was your Memorial Day weekend, Jim?
Jim du Bois 01:02
Well, Kenny, it was excellent. A lot of great yard work done, put in a raised flower bed, planted the flowers. hauled 44 cubic feet of soil to fill up the garden bed, did a lot of work. Just done some landscaping. So it was it was nice, but I'm glad you brought up the true meaning of Memorial Day weekend, and I think sometimes, to your point, a lot of people lose track of what that is. And while it's traditionally the kickoff for summer, it's also a solemn reminder of the price that so many Americans paid that we can enjoy the freedoms that we have.
Kenny Blumenfeld 01:04
Yeah, indeed. Yeah, we didn't. I mean, we didn't get here easy. It was not an easy road here. So, and you know, the fact that we have something to go and enjoy on these days off is kind of a testament to, you know, all the work that was done getting us here, so...
Jim du Bois 01:58
Absolutely. Well, kickoff to summer, Kenny. Today, of course, we're recording this on June 1, it is the kickoff of meteorological summer; astronomical summer is still a couple of weeks or so away. But let's, Kenny, recap, meteorological spring, we said goodbye to that yesterday.
Kenny Blumenfeld 02:18
You know, Memorial Day was as late as it could possibly be. It's, you know, that that final Monday in May. You can't get any later than May 31. So, you know, we always say that Memorial Day weekend is kind of, you know, the inaugural for summer. And it's especially true when it basically aligns with the end of meteorological spring. So, you know, March, April and May were generally warmer than normal across Minnesota. You know, April was a little bit more of a push across the state, there were some areas that were a little bit warmer, some that were cooler. March was quite a warm month. And May, you know, you might recall May started out pretty cool. And we spent many days wondering are we going to see some more snow, but then we kind of turned on the heat and the humidity around the middle and late middle part of the month. And I wouldn't say we never really looked back. But it was enough to to flip us. It was not a massive, warm anomaly. It was just that the warm period was slightly stronger and/or longer than the cool period, so may ends up being a little bit warmer than normal. But I think if there's anything that people would talk about from meteorological spring, it would have to be the just sort of dogged determination of this, you know, these drought conditions or at least the drought-like weather pattern. We have been able to get bailed out with enough precipitation that we don't have any really major impacts anywhere in Minnesota that are being reported yet. We've gotten kind of saved by the bell with some precipitation and sometimes kind of widespread heavy precipitation, often timed with relatively cool conditions that kind of team up to keep the evaporation of that precipitation down. But we've been building these precipitation deficits and that continued through the spring. On average around the state during spring, meteorological spring, we lost about an inch and a half of precipitation compared to what you would normally receive. Now some areas lost more than others, but around the state it kind of averages out to about an inch and a half deficit over those three months. And that depending on where you are also, that's an average deficit of 20, 25%. Those sorts of deficits start to mean more as you get into summer when, you know, you expect more precipitation. And so we'll have to see. But I would say that's kind of how we would summarize spring. It was warm. It was dry. It was not disastrously dry. And it was not disastrously warm. But you know, we're starting to see some precipitation deficits, for sure.
Jim du Bois 05:19
Well, last week on Thursday, May 27, we got some much needed rain in a good portion of Minnesota. I know, in our backyard, we had over an inch of rain on that day. And then the following day, that was Friday, May 28, some record-setting low temperatures. So let's talk about both events. I would imagine, Kenny, that rain was extremely welcome. And did it do some good in terms of alleviating some of the dry conditions in parts of the state?
Kenny Blumenfeld 05:51
Yeah, I mean, it bought us a little bit of time. You know, drought or...and even the sort of pervasive dry pattern. Drought is a kind of a, it's a long game. It's not something that you can generally fix with one event. And but what it does is, you know, if you have dry conditions, and then you get a widespread inch, or in some cases, two inches of rain, in fact, in my rain gauge over a, I think an eight day period, I got a little over three inches, I believe. So we've done all right in the last couple of weeks in parts of Minnesota, although west central parts of the state were almost completely left out of this. So I would say, you know that when the climatologists and the folks at the Weather Service work together to figure out what's going to happen with the status of the drought monitor for Minnesota, you know, there's a lot you have to consider. You have to consider where have we been for the past several months, kind of what's the big picture story? Where do our statistics in terms of precipitation versus where we're supposed to be, where do those statistics place us? And then you look at well, what's happened recently, that at least changes the short term story. And when you get that kind of precipitation, like we had last week, and also the week before, it helps, it doesn't get us out. But it prevents the drought from escalating in the areas that got the rain, both from a statistical standpoint and also from a real standpoint. I mean, statistically, it decreases or temporarily decreases the deficit that you have. But then realistically too that is water going into the soil, that is water going into the streams. And although it might not get you out of drought, it, you know, having one week that's pretty well behaved, it certainly prevents the drought from sliding deeper into kind of concerning territory. So, I would say it had, you know, it had a slightly better than band aid effect on the areas that got the precipitation. We need more of these, though, and we need them regularly. And yeah, you're right. I mean, then we got really cold on the heels of that weather system, didn't we?
Jim du Bois 08:17
Yeah, some record-setting low temperatures, correct?
Kenny Blumenfeld 08:20
Yeah, I mean, we did have some, we had some, you know, in the kind of frosty areas. We weren't so close in the Twin Cities. The urban heat island really kind of bailed us out. But where you look in parts of central and northern Minnesota, and the temperature easily fell below freezing, you had temperatures in the in the 20s and 30s in some areas, and you had frost, and it was a, you know, troubling frost that got the attention of some of the horticulturalists and agriculturalists. Who, I don't know if there was any significant damage, but it is, you know, poorly timed frost, you know, right after things had really started growing in a lot of areas. So yeah, we had, we had some cold conditions. We didn't break any records in the Twin Cities, but there were some there were some areas around Minnesota that did.
Jim du Bois 09:15
Well, the other big thing of course, Kenny, you mentioned we had a dry spring and we had a little bit of a respite last week with some good rains. And I looked at the drought monitor for the Midwest that was issued last week, and it looks like a good portion of Minnesota is either abnormally dry or in moderate drought. Do you see any relief in sight Kenny for this or can we expect at least over the next seven days or so to see more hot and dry conditions? The current week doesn't look great for those conditions. Again, because drought is a long game, you're not going to have one hot week and really accelerate all of the drought categories across the state. It generally doesn't work that way, just like how one precipitation event won't bail us out, but between now in the weekend, in any case, I don't think we see any real chance for any part of the state to see significant improvement in those drought conditions. And then when you overlay the fact that much of the state is going to sail into the 90s by Friday, and certainly over the weekend, that not just our precipitation deficits, but now our our actual water demand is going to start creeping up there to because those really high temperatures, they start exerting stress on soils and on plants and on standing water or, or surface waters because they removed so much water from those systems. So, you start to increase the water stress and the water demand. So, I don't think again, we're not at a point where the drought is about to become dire everywhere. But we are in a kind of critical situation where if over the next month, we continue to see heat and also continue to see not much precipitation, then we're going to be dealing with a much more significant drought situation. So, you know, we can kind of do a status check when we get to the end of June or early July. And wherever we are with the drought, it's going to have been determined by how much precipitation we had, and then secondarily what happened with temperatures. We definitely need more precipitation than we've been getting. I think I've mentioned this in recent episodes, but at this point in the summer to keep pace just to stop from losing ground, most of Minnesota needs about an inch of precipitation per week. And that would be, on average, right through August. So an inch of precipitation a week, or you lose ground. It's even a little more than that in parts of southern Minnesota, and maybe a little less than that in parts of far northwestern Minnesota. But that's kind of the basics. And so, I don't know what our prospects are for having that kind of a steady diet. It doesn't look great if we just extrapolate from what's happened because we have not been getting very regular precipitation. So having a steady diet of, you know, an inch of precipitation or so every week, it's not something we've been getting recently, so it's hard to kind of bank on it. Meanwhile, have you've seen the forecast for the weekend, Jim?
Jim du Bois 12:38
Yes, I see 90s in the forecast.
Kenny Blumenfeld 12:41
Oh, you must be you must be joy. How does Jim du Bois feel about this?
Jim du Bois 12:48
I'm feeling good about that. You know, me, I like hot weather. And although as a gardener, I have concerns. And as a farmer, too, I have concerns about lack of moisture. So, I'll celebrate the high temperatures but will be very concerned about the fact we're not going to see a lot of precipitation over the next seven to 10 days.
Kenny Blumenfeld 13:09
Yeah, I mean that, you know, this is the part that I think that the real professional forecasters maybe have a slightly better handle on than me. But the thing that I find most disturbing about this system that's coming in, it's just a heat pump, it's gonna just jack all kinds of heat right up into this region. And what I don't like about it is that it's hard to see any really meaningful precipitation for Minnesota until we get past the weekend. And so they're you know, I think there could be some, you know, scattered thunderstorms, because the heat is going to get up into and maybe slightly through Minnesota, but it's not going to be off in...off into central Canada necessarily. And if the boundary between the heat and just kind of regular warmth is close enough, then you're going to see some thunderstorms forming. Fortunately, that zone looks to be, you know, for the weekend anyway, in parts of central North Dakota and far northwestern Minnesota, where they really, really need precipitation much more than other areas. So that could be good. But I think one of the...one of the things that I don't like about this is the weather models have kept advertising precipitation, but it's always stuck 6,7,8,9 days out. It's not, you know, showing up three days from now, and the problem I have with is in the meantime, we are going to get very, very toasty. I would say you know, for most of Minnesota, you know Tuesday's kind of your main transition day, by Wednesday...Tuesday and Wednesday. So Wednesday, you see temperatures in the 70s, maybe the 80s. In western Minnesota. On Thursday, though, the heat really drives... starts driving up everywhere except northeast Minnesota on Thursday should see temperatures in the 80s, maybe even some 90s along the Red River Valley, and down into the Buffalo Ridge of southwestern Minnesota. And then from there, we just keep going by Friday, the 90s spread across most of Minnesota, except maybe again, far northeastern parts of the state. But even International Falls should have no problem hitting 90-plus on Friday, and the only saving grace from that point through the weekend will be if any thunderstorms can develop. And we just don't have a real strong signal for those because through the weekend, the temperatures will remain high temperatures will get up into the you know, 90s again on Saturday, and probably on Sunday, and the dew points will be high with dew point conditions probably in the 60s, maybe even getting into the 70. So starting to get real muggy and summer like and so it's gonna...you're gonna feel it. We need precipitation. I can't really promise anything meaningful or widespread until we get at least halfway through the weekend for northern Minnesota, and for the rest of the state, we're probably looking into next week before we see precipitation. So there's a lot of heat between us and the next kind of slam dunk for precipitation that we see.
Jim du Bois 16:33
Well, Kenny, I know you are not a fan of long-range forecasting, but there...but
Kenny Blumenfeld 16:39
Correct.
Jim du Bois 16:39
Yes.
Kenny Blumenfeld 16:41
Desperate, it's desperate.
Jim du Bois 16:44
But you did make a comment in a conversation we had a few weeks ago that you were seeing some patterns that were emerging that you thought were similar to those in the year 1988, the summer of 88, when we saw a pretty significant drought situation and a very, very hot summer. Are you still seeing this pattern?
Kenny Blumenfeld 17:10
Unfortunately, I am. And hopefully I have bad vision. And, you know, it's good to remind listeners that I'm not a professional forecaster. You know, I know a decent amount about the weather and I understand what's going on. And I do in one professional capacity, provide some limited forecasting, guidance. But as a climatologist, and as someone who, you know, has just been fascinated by this stuff for a long time, really my whole life. You know, I was a kid, I was going into high school in the drought of 1988. But I was watching weather patterns through various resources, you know, the Weather Channel being one of them, but also, through our local public television station would show weather radars and radar maps and play aviation weather broadcasts all day long. And so I get a really good chance to kind of see what was happening. And obviously one similarity between any drought situation and 1988 was just that the days without precipitation vastly, vastly outnumbered the days with precipitation. So that one's kind of a given. Anytime it's really dry, that's usually why. But the thing that is starting to look familiar is the early June heat. The dry conditions in 1988 were really exacerbated by scorching heat. It would have been a bad drought without the heat, but the heat made it incredible. And we don't have the same levels of drying at this point here in Minnesota that we did going into that 88 drought. But we're starting to see, you know, early heat waves don't necessarily bode well for the rest of summer. You don't see a lot of 90 plus days in southeast Minnesota in southern Minnesota, in early June. Typically, I mean, it's not it's not unheard of. The record books are certainly dotted with days with temperatures in the 90s and even higher in early June. But getting a run like we're gonna have where, you know, a lot of stations hit 90 or better four or five days in a row, and you're not even a full week into June, I wouldn't call it rare, but it's not that common either. And then when you look closely at the summers that had heat waves in late May or early June, those same summers tend to produce a lot of other hot days. And so that's the part that has me concerned where we're dry. And now we're starting to see some early heat waves emerging. And hey, maybe next week's conversation will be totally different because, you know, the front running right through the region will have just dumped massive thunderstorms on Minnesota. And we'll have, you know, a bunch of areas will have gotten two to four inches. And we'll kind of be having a different conversation. But since we don't know if that's really going to happen, and there's certainly not a strong forecasting signal suggesting that it will, my concern is that we've got an early heatwave. Early heat waves tend to foretell with like, 60 to 70% frequency, they tend to foretell the rest of the summer having a lot of hot days too. And then we're, you know, we're dry. It would be dangerous and irresponsible for me to say, oh, this is just like 1988. But on the other hand, it would be maybe equally irresponsible not to mention the at least subtle similarities that we're starting to see. One of which is that, you know, it looks like we're gonna have a heatwave of at least a few days, probably four or five days at least, in early June, and that was something that we had in 1988 also.
Jim du Bois 21:08
Well, as we enter June, we are also entering the peak month for severe weather in Minnesota.
Kenny Blumenfeld 21:14
There we go. Yes.
Kenny Blumenfeld 21:16
How has the severe weather season been shaping up so far, Kenny? Are we about normal? Are we lacking severe weather compared to a typical year? Where do we stand right now?
Kenny Blumenfeld 21:28
I mean, I would say we're at this point a little bit behind in Minnesota, and the US tornado numbers are well behind the average also. You may have seen on, you know, your favorite channel, or social media, you may have seen some amazing pictures, there have been some very chaseable storms, and some very photogenic and photographable tornadoes in Texas and in Colorado and in parts of the Southern Plains and the High Plains. But it has not been a very busy spring from a severe weather standpoint. And Minnesota is now at the point where, you know, in a typical year, by this point, we've had one kind of widespread statewide event with lots and lots of warnings and multiple tornado or severe thunderstorm watches. We really haven't had that event yet. So I would say we're a little bit behind. We don't really reach our peak in terms of severe weather frequency until the last week or so in June. And then also early July. It kind of depends on what you're looking at. For tornadoes, it's late June. For severe weather in general, though, it's really the first week in July. And if we continue to be in this pattern where the weather systems of consequence spend a lot of time not here--they're going elsewhere and they're not in our region--then that would definitely extrapolate to a low frequency severe weather season in which the events themselves aren't particularly common. Now that doesn't say anything about their intensity, when they do occur, or their impact when they do occur. But we're not off to the kind of start that we were in, you know, 1984, where, you know, we had severe weather beginning early like we did this year where it began in March and April, especially April, or other years where it began early, and then just kind of continued at a pretty good pace through April and May. We didn't have that. So we're a little bit behind. Things can always change quickly. You never count out severe weather season before it happens. That would be foolish. But right now, you know, if we were to extrapolate where we've been, we'd have a less busy than normal season, even though we might have some real doozy events.
Jim du Bois 23:57
So Kenny, over the next several days, can we safely say, way above normal temperatures and drier than normal conditions?
Kenny Blumenfeld 24:06
I think the majority of the state will be drier than normal. There again, I think our glimmer of hope, and it might be even more than a glimmer, is that this very warm and increasingly moist air mass, once the boundary that kind of cuts it off moves into the region, that could ignite some pretty nasty thunderstorms and maybe those areas will start to see some meaningful precipitation. But for most of Minnesota, I think dry for the next several days is likely. And you're right, yeah. Much above normal temperatures, hot days, warm nights, increasingly uncomfortable as the humidity gets up there and again, as I look at this, you know, to me it looks like hot through the weekend. So Friday, Saturday, Sunday are very, very warm to hot depending on time of day and exactly where you are. And then, even Monday, at least in the southern part of the state looks quite hot. And there are signs that it just kind of doesn't really leave us, that maybe we have more activity kind of keeping temperatures low for parts of next week, but we could be in this warm air mass with predominantly southerly flow through much of next week, too. So, yeah, I would say several days of very warm conditions at least, and we might be looking at 10 days where the kind of predominant condition is warmer than normal.
Jim du Bois 25:40
Well, Kenny, enjoy the hot weather. Fingers crossed on much needed precipitation. And boy, what a joyous kick off to meteorological summer.
Kenny Blumenfeld 25:51
Yeah, enjoy the heat. Try and stay cool, beat the heat, drink fluids, stay in the shade, stay out of the direct sunlight. And of course Minnesota has numerous aquatic resources that will be almost perfect by this...by the time that he really sets in, water temperatures will be good, you'll be good to go, most of Minnesota. So, you can use those aquatic resources to keep things in check.
Jim du Bois 26:19
Well, good, good advice. Yes. Stay hydrated if you're working outside and engaging in any kind of physical activity over the next...looks like seven to 10 days at least. This is way over our heads. Kenny Blumenfeld's a climatologist. Kenny, great chatting with you, as always, and we'll look forward to chatting with you next week.
Kenny Blumenfeld 26:40
Always nice talking to you. And there will be a next time, so I look forward to whatever our conversation needs to be at that time.
Jim du Bois 26:48
I'm Jim du Bois. Thanks for listening. We'll catch you next time.