Chester County Summer Wx Summary for local paper

[ChescoWx]

Below is my September weather recap for the local newsletter...some very interesting stats on the unprecedented wet summer and it's impact on our equine friends in our Township.

Hello again from Paul at the East Nantmeal PA Weather Station (www.chescowx.com). Be sure to follow me on twitter at Twitter as I am tweeting multiple daily climate reports, forecast updates and weather photos for our fair Township.

When I wrote my last article, we were in the early days of June coming out of a warmer and wetter than normal May. This trend would continue with 2 of the 3 summer months of June, July and August averaging above normal in temps. Before we get to the big weather story of the summer the incredible wetness let’s cover the temperatures.

June finished up with an average temperature of 69.0 degrees which is +1.7 degrees above normal. We did not experience any 90-degree days here in East Nantmeal in June, with our highest temperature being the 88.7 on June 30^th. We also experience our last low below 50 degrees on June 12^th when we bottomed out at 48.4 degrees. That was our last dip into the 40’s we will experience until toward the end of this month (September) or early October. July ended up just a bit below normal with an average temperature of 73.7 which is 0.2 degrees below normal. That said we did experience our 1^st heat wave (3 or more days in a row at 90+) in 6 years the last being July 5-7. 2012. Our heat wave this year started on July 1^st with the hottest day we experienced all summer at 92.6 degrees. Highs of 90.9 and 92.3 followed on the 2^nd and the 3^rd. This however would be our last 90-degree day of the year. We finished the year with only 4 days above 90. As I mentioned in my last article keep an eye on the heat island that is the Philadelphia airport to contrast the summer we experienced here in the relative high elevations of East Nantmeal compared to the near sea-level readings recording at PHL airport. Philadelphia ended up with a whopping 30 days that exceeded the 90-degree mark while we ended at just 4 such days. That said a lot of upper 80’s with humidity did not mean we had a cool summer!

What really made this summer notable and for many of you with horses in the Township quite stressful was the incredibly wet summer. Alison Mallamo from our Township educated me on a condition called “laminitis” which results from horses love of tall lush grass, however just like human diabetics, horses can develop insulin resistance, and lush grass is high in sugar. What happens is their feet fall apart. Structures called "laminae" that support the "coffin" bone within the hoof begin to break down, and the sole can also thin out, causing this very painful condition. I hope those of you with horses in the Township made it through this very wet summer.

So how wet was this summer? In a word it was unprecedented. I went back and looked at every summer in Chester County over the last 125 years of weather records. During the summer months of June, July and August we recorded an incredible 28.71” of rain including 13.00” in August -  this crushed the old record for wettest summer previously held by the wet summer way back in 1928 when 26.40” of rain fell. What made this even worse was how many of our summer days ended up with recorded rainfall. In fact, from June 1^st through September 15^th over 45% of the days featured some rain with 45 of those 107 days experiencing rainfall.

To add more perspective that 28.71” that fell in just 3 summer months represents 58% of our normal annual rainfall! The 1^st 15 days of September have actually increased the rainy trend with 11 of the days so far this month with rain.

The good news is our driest season (fall) is almost here. With fall we will see normal high temperatures falling from the mid-70’s today to the upper 50’s by the end of October. We should also experience our 1^st frost and then freeze during the month of October. By the next time we chat in December it is probable that we would have already experienced our 1^st snowfall or at least flurries of the season. Our average snowfall here in East Nantmeal is a little over 36” in a typical winter season. As I mentioned in a prior article this is actually the same average snowfall that is expected in Chicago IL. Philadelphia at the airport by contrast should only expect around 22” in a normal winter.

I hope all of you have a great fall!  If you have any questions, please visit my website, follow me on twitter and send me an email. Until next time –All the best!  Paul

“Some are weather-wise, some are otherwise” Ben Franklin