I know nearly everyone loves this weather. Bright blue skies, warm temperatures and pleasant levels of humidity are tough for anyone to complain about. For those of you working outside or having to be outside for extended periods, it’s easy to take this kind of weather pattern. I imagine teachers having a tough time getting the kids back inside from recess on these flawless days.

Still Drought-like
The long stretch of dry and warm weather continues today and will actually continue basically unabated for at least another week. While this is certainly beautiful weather to look at, I wouldn’t be me without mentioning I’d love to see a day or two of widespread rain. It’s just not good for trees, shrubs and lawns to go into winter too dry and at some point in a few weeks; it will be too late for any rain we do eventually see to help most plants for this year. Once everything goes dormant for the season, the water doesn’t really do too much. If you are overseeing lawns, moving shrubs or buying new plants, be sure you are watering thoroughly.

Big High, Blue Sky
High pressure is responsible for the dry weather and September and October often bring some of the longer periods of dry weather for the year. The atmosphere is no longer as humid so the risk of afternoon thunderstorms has decreased and the lack of big contrasts between deep cold and Gulf Coast or Atlantic warmth prevents major storms from forming. Although the northern hemisphere is sliding towards winter, it’s a slow slide in September and much of October.

Temperatures this month are running an incredible 5.8 degrees above average and if we continued this pace through the second half of the month it would easily become one of the warmest September on record. With two weeks left in the month and the current pattern, it’s likely this is going to end up in the top 5 warmest Septembers and could eclipse the number one spot.

No Records
While it is warm, it’s not record warm. Today’s record at the Jetport is the highest for this late in September at a whopping 96 degrees, the records over the next several days are also too high to catch. Humidity will also stay under record territory.

Typically, the second half of September doesn’t yield oppressive levels of moisture and we won’t see extreme humidity this week.

Pattern Continues
The weather map for the rest of the week shows high pressure parked to our south. These big highs keep any wet weather at bay. On Sunday a front will push that high out to see and then a new one will come in right behind it. The air is so dry with the front, I don’t expect any showers. The second high brings somewhat cooler air into the area so I don’t expect widespread 80s next week, but temperatures will still be pleasantly warm and humidity levels low enough you won’t notice it.

The final map this morning is the expected rainfall over the next 5 days. As you can see, we continue very dry with any rainfall in the area quite light.

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