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April 29, 2013 April 29, 2013 April 29, 2013 April 29, 2013
An April to remember...or forget!
It will come as no shock to anybody that has lived through Oklahoma's climate over
the last 3-4 years that April was an unusual month around these parts. It's been
fairly wet for most, which is odd enough these days. We've definitely had more
dry months that wet. But it's also been cool. Heck, from my perspective, it's been
downright cold! We have been rather cool around here since mid-February or so.
That is not what makes this April so unusual. It's how cold it has been that is
out of character for Oklahoma over the last 3 years.
The statewide average temperature through April 28 was 53.8 degrees, 5 degrees
below the normal mark of 58.8. The average high was 65.9 (-5.8 below normal) and
the average low 41.7 (-4.2 below normal). There are still two significantly warm
days left, but the damage has been done by the previous 28 days. April 2013 will
go down as one of the coldest Aprils on record, dating back to 1895.
Here's how the top-10 coolest Aprils would look if the month ended today, before
our warm April 29 and 30 coming up.
-***-
1983 53.2?F
2013 53.8?F
1926 54.0?F
1907 54.2?F
1997 54.4?F
1918 54.6?F
1916 54.7?F
1973 55.1?F
2007 55.2?F
1931 55.3?F
-****-
And of course this is preliminary data from the Oklahoma Mesonet. The "official"
tally for April will come out from NCDC after about a week into May. You can
see how our recent Aprils stack up from this time-series of statewide average
April temperatures, 1895-2012.
http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20130429/april-temps-1895-2012.png
April 2012 was the 8th warmest on record at 64.1 degrees, an incredible 10.3
degree difference between the two Aprils. And that followed two other very
warm Aprils, making the current version stick out even further. 1983's record
cool April is probably safe, barring any sort of statistical anomaly that
would appear in the NCDC data. It's not out of the question, but improbable.
So we are definitely going to end up with one of our top-10 coolest Aprils,
and possibly top-5 or lower.
This April will also become the most significantly cool month relative to normal
since February 2010 finished 6.4 degrees below normal. This will also become
the first time we've had three consecutive months finish below normal since
December-February 2010-11. Everybody remembers that January and February, I'm
sure, with the blizzards, the -31 degrees below zero at Nowata, and the onset
of drought. However, it was about mid-February - basically about a week after
the -31 degrees - that the weather broke to the warm side and STAYED warm
until mid-February of 2013.
Another oddity about April 2013, a month that saw quite a few sites
experience their latest freeze on record:
The statewide average temperature of 43.9 degrees (Mesonet) on April 24 is the
coldest day ever in the last week (24-30) of April for Oklahoma. The next closest
is 45.4 degrees from April 21, 1959 (although there was one day colder than that
in early May ... I'll show you later). . Nipping at it's heels was 45.4 degrees
from April 23 of this year as well. The warmest April day on record goes to
April 12, 1972, with a statewide average of 81.7 degrees. The warmest thus
far in April 2013 was 69.7 degrees from the eighth.
Still a couple of warm days to go, which could push our ranking higher. I'm all
for that.
http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20130429/monday-highs.png
http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20130429/tuesday-highs.png
As soon as we hit May, however, March starts to creep back in.
http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20130429/wednesday-highs.png
http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20130429/thursday-lows.png
The coldest day in May on record?
May 3, 1954 ... 44.9 degrees.
Stay tuned!
Gary McManus
Associate State Climatologist
Oklahoma Climatological Survey
(405) 325-2253
gmcmanus@mesonet.org
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