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Late 1998 Warmth
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| Late 1998 was exceptionally warm in the Eastern US, with hundreds
of record highs broken each day, some of which broke all-time
December high temperature records during the first week of that
month.
The warmth, accompanied by the Drought of late 1998, made the news. I have included some of the articles below, along with statistics and numbers. Record data is hard to obtain on the web, especially after the fact, so I took the liberty of providing some video captures from the Weather Channel detailing the specifics. CASI Member Reports | News Articles | NWS Reports | Stats/Numbers CASI Member Reports 1. Jesse Ferrell (State College, PA) Pretty amazing. That's the only way I could describe the feeling when I awoke in Central PA on the morning of December 7, 1998 to a temperature of 67°F. The normal low for the date, which should have been occurring about 7am when that temperature was observed, was 27°F for a grand total current temperature departure of 40 degrees above normal!. Much of the fall had been above normal. Take a look at the graph below, click on it for a larger image. The green lines represent normal, and the bold red line represents the actual temperature minimum and maximum. Some of the minimum readings in late Oct. and early Nov. are too low, by as much as 20 degrees, due to a malfunction with the CASI1 Weather Station, from which these readings were taken. So it's even warmer than it looks in some cases. Notice that, speaking of high temperatures, that the period of November 10 - December 7 had only 2 days that were not above normal high temperatures! Add to that the fact that from Nov. 29 to Dec. 6 the low temperature exceeded the normal high temperature and you get the picture. Note: although the CASI1 station is an automated station, it has been my observation that the temperatures are +/- 2 degrees F with the exception of the malfunction I described above. Temperatures at CASI
HQ for period of record. State College PA. Dec. 7 Not Complete.
2. Michael Pitt (Macclenny, FL) Sept: Norm High: 88.5F days over 90F: 9/1 (101.1) 9/4 (100.0) 9/5 (95.5) 9/13 (91.4) 9/14 (92.1) 9/15 (94.5) 9/17 (90.0) 9/23 & 9/24 (94.3) 9/26 (92.1) 9/27 (91.0) 9/28 9/29 (90.9) Highest Temp:101.1(9/1) Cooling Degree Days:473.8 Oct: Norm High: 81.7 days over 85F Everyday except: 10/1 (83.8) 10/22 (78.8) 10/23 (79.2) Highest Temp: 95.0 (10/20) Cooling Degree Days:380.7 Nov: Norm High: 74.7 days over 75F: Everyday except: 11/4 & 11/5 (72.1) 11/6 (71.8) 11/12 (73.9) 11/22 (72.3) 11/23 (73.9) Highest Temp: 90.1(11/1) Cooling Degree Days: 183.0 Dec: Norm High: 67.6 Days over 70F: Everyday so far 12/1 (86.5) 12/2 (78.8) 12/3 (82.8) 12/4 (81.0) 12/5 (86.4) 12/6 (85.1) 12/7 (84.9) Over all in the past 4 months of Sept-Early Dec. It has been usually hot here in Macclenny FL which is located in Northeast FL approx 25 miles West of Jacksonville FL. *note temp. sensor has an accuracy of -+4º (plus/minus 4 degrees)* 3. Barry Hile (Chambersburg, PA) Nov 28, High 74, past record 69, 1990 Nov 29, High 73, past record 69, 1991 Nov 30, High 75, past record 64, 1991 Dec 3, High 73, past record 61 in 1955 Dec 4, High 73, past record 65 in 1956 Dec 5, High 75, past record 75 in 1982 Dec 6, High 75, past record 70 in 1982 Dec 7, High 70, past record 69 in 1951 4. Mid-Atlantic Weather Station (Baltimore, MD) Mid-Atlantic records began falling on December 3,1998. Dulles International Airport (IAD) set a record high temperature of 74 degrees and BWI set a record of 72 degrees. Things really began to heat up on the 4th with the all-time December record falling at Ronald Reagan National Airport (DCA). The old record of 75 was replaced with a new record of 76. The new December record did not last long with new high temperature records of 78 degrees at DCA and 79 degrees at IAD being posted on the 6th. For the third time in four days the record high for December was broken when the temperature reached 79 degrees on the 7th at DCA. The period of high temperature records ended with a cold front passing through the area late on December 7th. Milestones -- DCA all-time record for any December with 79 degrees. With 12/6/98 also setting an all-time December record at DCA with 77, this was the first time where all-time monthly highs were set on consecutive days since 1991 at DCA (5/29/91=97, 5/30/91=98, 5/31/91=99 -- all 3 were all-time record monthly highs). BWI hit 77 and Richmond hit 81, both of which were all-time December records. 4. Dan Salkovitz(Richmond, VA) Richmond, VA broke its all-time high temperature for December on Sunday and then tied Sunday's record on Monday. The high temperature on Sunday and Monday was 81 degrees. 5. Francis Duval(Darlington, SC) Date | Old Record | New Record 12/5 78 in 1982 81 in 1998 12/6 75 in 1956 80 in 1998 12/7 79 in 1980 79 in 1998 12/8 overnight lo aas of 6:30 am is 66.2, another warm one. 6. Michael Girone(West Orange, NJ) Newark (EWR) tied a record high for 12/2 with 66F. A new record was set on 12/3 with 70F, and an all-time December high was set on 12/4 with 75F! Early this afternoon (12/7), EWR set another record high of 76F, which would make this the new all-time December high temp. (for some reason, I haven't heard of that being "officially" recorded). News Articles
NWS/Govmt. Statements There were so many record reports issued as hundreds of stations broke their daily and some their monthly records, that it was impossible to keep up with. See also the maps below. To illustrate the scope of the heat wave, here are some of the public information statements (those available at 8pm) from December 6 alone:
Statistics/Numbers Selected Days Record Highs Via The Weather Channel Since I couldn't get ahold of a list of records on the web, I captured these images from the Weather Channel On-Air, it is my hope that these images might help people researching this heat wave.
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© 1998 Central Atlantic Storm Investigators |
