ChescoWx

Couple snow flurries and squalls during the day - our high made it up to 46.5 here in East Nantmeal Township...this is the 6th lowest maximum daily May reading in Chester County history....freeze warning up again for tonight but suspect the higher spots like here may stay just above freezing as the Wxsim indicates.

New Western Chester County PA elevation record (1983 to Present) low 31.3 at 6:15am breaking the old mark of 34 set in 1985. Well off the all-time Chesco record of 25.0 set in 1947. Also storm total of 0.68" of rain and indeed some overnight snow showers and flurries on May 9th - amazing!! A chance of more flurries and snow showers later as we make a run at the coldest May high temp in Chester County history today! Some other chilly Chesco factoids to munch on. Today's freezing temperature marks the 15th latest freeze in 127 years of records back to 1894. The average final freeze in Chester County is April 18th. The latest freeze in County history was the 32 degree reading on May 28, 1927. This is also the latest freeze in the last 24 years with 1996 seeing it's final freeze on May 14th at 30 degrees....of interest just 5 days later Chesco began a 3 day heat wave from May 19 (91)- 20 (94) and 91 on the 21st of 1996

It was 51 on that date in Chester County that was also the coldest max temp ever recorded in Chesco in June

So again how incredibly rare are the cold temperatures tomorrow across Chester County PA? Tomorrow will be only the 14th May day since record keeping began way back in 1894 with a high temperature only in the 40's. It will be our 1st May day with a high in the 40's since May 12, 2008. If my WXSIM forecast high of 43 degrees were to verify that would tie for the coldest May max temperature EVER on record which was set on May 1, 1963! My NWS point and click is 44 degrees....that would tie for the 2nd coldest May day ever set back on May 5, 1917

So how unusual is this cold May in Western Chester County PA? very! On top of the potential of snow in the air on Friday and Saturday in May - an extremely rare event in the climate change era....or heck any era climate change or not! We are well on the way to the latest 80+ degree reading in at least the last 38 years here in Chester County. Already through today this is the 5th latest 80+ degree reading so late into May. In looking at the longer range models it looks increasingly possible that we will set a record for the latest 80+ day in County history. Below are the latest such readings #1 - 5/22/1988 / #2 - 5/20/1984 / #3 - 5/19/1997 - 5/19/1992 - 5/19/2019 / #4 - 5/10/1987 - #5 - TBD here in 2020

In NW Chester County PA at East Nantmeal Township we made it up to 77.9 degrees our warmest high temperature since the 87.6 back on October 2nd....of course this was nowhere close to any records as as recently as 2 years ago we made it to 90.3 degrees here in East Nantmeal and you know how rare that ever happens even in the soaring hills of NW Chesco even in the middle of summer....with the all-time record high for Chester County being the 91.0 degree reading on the 3rd of May back in 1913.

Our warmest April Temperature so far this month is only 72 degrees....this is the lowest max reading in the month of April in the last 37 years. To put that in context in those 37 years we have see a max temp over 90 degrees 2 times....over 80 degrees 20 times and in the 70's 14 times. Here in Chester County while a below normal month and our 1st such month since November 2019... it was however only 0.4 degrees below normal

With today's 53.0/39.5 split this marks our 14th straight day with below normal temperatures here in NW Chester County PA....to put this in perspective the last time this happened was the 14 below normal days recorded between March 5th-18th in 2018. Couple of great shots attached of the sunset on the SJ Beaches of Sea Isle City and here across the soaring peaks along the Welsh Mountain Anticline in NW Chester County PA

Sleet coming down here in NW Chesco with the temp at 39.4 - (WXSIM had in in the forecast last night) can't remember sleet this late in the season....might be harder to get sleet in late April than Snow....

Low this AM was 33.1 (WXSIM had 33.9) NWS had 29 For the month we are still 0.7 degrees above normal - looking ahead a pretty good shot at finishing the month below normal temp wise....this would be the 1st below normal month since November 2019 and only our 8th below normal month in the last 30 months!!

Thanks Greenskeeper! The heat island certainly skews the data warmer in data from the major city airport sites

Hey guys, So I thought I would analyze the last 13 decades back to the 1890's to see if the first quarter winter months (January-March) outside of the Philadelphia heat island in the more rural areas of the Philadelphia suburbs during the peak winter months of January through March have shown any signs of warming or cooling or more or less snowfall. Keep in mind snowfall amounts are not seasonal totals only January through March totals. Below is a chart with the analysis of the data. Of interest our most recent complete decade from 2010-2019 was the coldest first quarter since the 1980's! I did not expect to see that!! The warmest Q1 decade was the 1930's with the coldest being the 1970's. The snowiest was the 1890's followed closely by our most recent complete decade of the 2010's. Overall not surprisingly there appears to be no significant Q1 warming evident outside of the urban heat island impact in SE PA...just typical variability and expected cyclical trends. Snowfall appears to have a stronger cyclical signal with a general fall in snowfall totals from the turn of the 20th century...reaching a low point in the 1930-1950 period with a gradual increase in snowfall through our most recent decade of the 2010's. If I am reading the tea leaves correctly based on cyclical weather I suspect we could be entering a period of declining snowfall over the next 5 decades through the 2060's....with snowfall amounts beginning to climb again starting in the 2070's. Our most recent winter season of 2019/20 may be a sign of the seasons to come as our 5.8" of snow in Chester County PA this season was our 3rd lowest total in history. If these historical trends are indeed cyclical....for many on this forum over 30 years old who love snow - you may be in for some tough sledding (meaning relative to our most recent decade little snow) for the rest of your lives....for the younger folks born since the turn of the century you might at least begin to see snowfall increases as you reach your social security (if it still exists) age in the 2070's.

We are now 0.8" below normal for April Snow and only 30.7" below our seasonal total - at least rainfall wise with our 0.18" today we are not 0.95" above normal for April to date and up to 15.41" of w.e. this year which is 1.97" above normal.

Hey guys - a non-weather topic as we all miss live sports during these crazy days I saw an article by David Murphy (Inquirer) where he was trying to find ways to "make baseball more watchable with a potential shortened season being discussed" as he opined that most people find baseball boring to watch on TV and are not interested in watching. Now, I know a lot of folks may indeed find it boring....but his statement made me go back and look at the facts regarding Philadelphia's viewing habits when it comes to live sports on TV available multiple times a week during the season. I am not including the Eagles as with it only on TV once a week it is not comparable. I found the attached year end review of 2019 viewership on NBC Sports Philadelphia (the #1 cable network in Philadelphia). The facts say the Philadelphia area indeed finds baseball to be their favorite sport to watch on TV by a large margin over the other 2 major sports. Phillies games average well above both the Sixers in basketball and the Flyers in hockey for average live game viewership. This baseball ratings despite baseball being having twice as many games available to watch during the season. In 2019 the Phillies averaged over 30% more viewers per game than the Sixers and a whopping 2x as many viewers as Flyers game viewership. In fact the Top 5 live games on the network were all Phillies games and for those that stream games the top 4 in the top 5 were Phillies games with only the Sixers cracking the top 5.https://www.nbcsports.com/philadelphia/nbc-sports-philadelphia/nbc-sports-philadelphia-most-watched-cable-network-2019

Up to 2.39" storm total and 2.36" today so far with more rain incoming. When the WXSIM had 3+ inches of rain forecast here 4 days ago I kind of doubted it....high wind gust here has been 23mph while down the shore in Sea Isle City top wind gust so far has been 53mph

1.95" of rain so far in NW Chester County PA here in East Nantmeal Twp. this sets a new rainfall record for today (1894-Present) of 1.92" so far today breaking the old record of 1.30" set in 1994. High wind gust so far 23mph

Big temperature inversion across the area this AM with low spots like Marsh Creek a couple miles south but at 350ft reporting an AM low of 28.7 - while here at 685ft was 11.1 degrees warmer at 39.8 for our low temp

Hey guys, Thought I would upload a video of a forecast I made with the WXSIM weather simulator program. Hope you like it. Questions and comments are welcome! Thanks! Paul https://youtu.be/PRfENtnFjI8

Do you think the sea breeze front passed through Sea Isle City in the last 27 min? 1st column is wind direction - 4th column humidity (going up quick as temp falls) and last column Temp

Some vivid lightning and rolling thunder during the 230am hour overnight with 0.47" of rain MTD now at 0.49" (0.45") below normal with YTD rainfall now at 12.59" or 0.57" above normal. More rain on the way with our active pattern over the next week or so - Good news for our Township farmers who are busy in the fields!

Sea breeze front showing up nicely on radar - temp has been falling steadily at the beach in Sea Isle City - while here in the soaring peaks of the Welsh Mountain anticline we are 13 degrees warmer....beauty of a day!

A beautiful couple of days on tap today and tomorrow get out and enjoy it! Looking forward to getting the kids out of the house! Today is the 1st day this month that has a high temp above the normal for the day. Record high for today is 77.7 back in 2010 with the record low at 21.0 from 1995. Also 3" of snow fell on this date in 1898 here in Chester County PA

yes!!! better than mine even now!!

After today's dreary day Chester County PA we will finish with our 10th warmest (46.2) average monthly temperature for March since records began in 1894. Of note 4 of the 5 warmest March's on record happened before 1950 back - back when we had a warmer March climo....the top 5 are below: 1921 - 51.5 1945 - 51.3 2012 - 49.5 1903 - 48.4 1946 - 48.0

Your lawn looked mighty green even then....what a non-winter this was!!